A Time to be Born

June 12, 2011

A Time to be Born

Still, after almost a week, I can not sincerely say, "Thank you Jesus." without crying. (I also cry these days when the floor needs to be swept, but that is another matter). I am so thankful, so incredibly thankful, for our beautiful son and his healthy delivery.

What a gift. What a precious gift.

I love it all. The little feet, the way the skin slips around on his squishy head when I kiss it, the way his still malleable ear molds together on itself when he is nursing.

As births go, I think Asher's was pretty darn great. I was only really in active labor for 4 hours and he came out in 2 pushes. I was amazed. Titus was an amazing coach, even though I almost bit him at one point. It was shortly after that that I decided on an epidural. Looking back, decided that I could have made it without one. I only had it for an hour and half, so that was nice because I didn't get as totally numb and it wore off sooner.

The main reason I decided on the epidural, well because I was in pain, duh No, what I meant to say was that the hour or so of hard contractions I had was miserable. In my experience the "Pit Contractions" (caused by the Pitocin) are much different and more horrible than normal labor. The reason in this case was that they were not only very intense, but irregular and long. I had one that was five minutes long. For that hour there it seemed that there was no time in between contractions to rest. They just came one after another. That is why I didn't want to have to use Pitocin, but overall it all worked out.

I should have been emotionally prepared to use Pit (because I was being induced, after all) but I wasn't. The Dr was going to break my water first, but then when he went to do it the baby floated up and away. : ) Dr said we needed to use Pit to stimulate contractions to engage baby again before we could break the water. So we did. I cried. (but what's new) I was hoping not to have to use Pit.

It worked. We "ruptured the membranes" as they say. Dr said we could stop Pit and see if my body would kick in on it's own. The contractions became harder, but less frequent. After sitting around most of the day it became evident my body was not going to kick in on it's own.

So more Pit. More crying. It did work as it is supposed to, the contractions came faster and harder. By 8 in the evening we were finally in active labor. The difficulty came because it was one constant hour of pain, instead of waves with breaks in between. The nurse asked if I wanted to be checked. I agreed. Titus said he knew that if I was checked and didn't like the result I would want an epidural. He knows me well.

The nurse said I was at 6. (later she said 6-7, if I heard 7 I might have not been so disheartened). I had been at 4 that afternoon after they broke my water. If that hellish hour of nonstop pain (that felt like an eternity) only got me two centimeters, I didn't think I could make it to 10. That and I almost bit my husband. I wanted an epidural. I got it at 9:30 pm, the baby was born at 11:10 and that was after we waited 15 minutes for the Dr before we started pushing.

Dr. Fine arrived in his sweatpants and donned his blue plastic gloves. People grabbed my legs and hoisted them into the air and then on the next contraction I pushed. I couldn't remember the proper position, breathing, ect, so everyone reminded me and then the contraction was gone. I thought of it as a "practice push".

There we were, gathered around my crotch, waiting for the next contraction. I was ready now, I had my breathing figured out and my position right, back curled, arms up, chin down. And then: Nothing. As much fun as it sounds having a bunch of people gathered around your exposed self, holding your limbs for you, I felt a little awkward. It was probably less than 5 minutes but it felt like a very long time. Finally another contraction came along. I started pushing, turned purple, and kept pushing. That is what everyone was yelling at me to do. Image my surprise when out popped the baby's head! On the second push! (With Joe I pushed for 3 hours, so I didn't know what to expect, but I was delighted with only 2 pushes.)

Asher cried even before his body was fully out. I guess that is unusual. He was perfect, slippery, long legged, covered in lots of white vernix. Amazing.

We don't have many early pictures because we were just all so concerned about getting him born, and then so excited, we forgot to take pictures :)

Here he is meeting the fam.

Joe was a little timid at first but he has now warmed up to his new little bro. Judah was thrilled from the get go. Yesterday he came up to me and declared, "Mom, I sure do love that baby!"