Mercedes Birth by Rachel

Another 'guest' post, by my friend Rachel, on her second baby's birth.



With my second baby, I woke up at 12:15am on Monday with a crampy feeling and a desperate need to pee. A trip to the bathroom ended both, so I went back to sleep. Woke up at 12:45 with another cramp and suspected it might be a contraction, but waited for a third and fourth one to come within the next 20 minutes before waking my husband. We both got up, and I called the midwives to let them know I might be coming in. They were about 5-10 min apart, only 30-40 seconds long, from then until about 3am. We finished packing our bags, packed food to take to the birth center, and I painted the Big Brother t-shirt for our son. At 3, my husband gave me a backrub and the contractions eased off, so we went back to bed. I woke up with a contraction every half hour or so for the rest of the night.

At 7am the contractions were back to what they'd been earlier, so we went to the midwives' at 11 to get checked out. They did a non-stress test on the baby and checked my cervix -- at first she said I was still at 2, then she paused and said, "No, I can stretch you -- your cervix is so stretchy and pliable!" Turned out I was at 5, but the head was only at -1. Since I wasn't having strong or long contractions yet, we went home and had lunch while they got a birthing room ready for me.

Things picked up after that, and at 1 we called a friend from church who was standing by and told her it looked like the day had arrived. We went to the birth center at 3, where I walked around out by my husband, our son, and our friend for about 45 minutes, having increasing contractions. Got in the birthing tub for half an hour, where my husband helped get rid of charley horses in my feet. But the tub started to feel too soothing and counter-productive, so I got out. I was between 6 and 7 then, and having some pretty intense back pressure, so my husband gave me counter pressure on my hips with each contraction. I stood up leaning on the bed for a few, then got on a birthing ball where I did my transition.

They got me up on the bed on my back to check me again, and I was at 9+. I had 4 or 5 contractions there before I could manage to turn over and get on my hands & knees -- I hated being on my back and was kinda mad at the time that I had to do it that way. Once I was on all fours on the bed, I got the urge to push, and they said it was okay. The baby crowned soon after. They made me stop pushing for a bit so I could stretch. I had to do some half-pushing, and my water broke. Then with a couple long pushes, she was out -- pushing this time took 11 minutes instead of the hour I did with my first baby.

They passed her between my legs so I could turn over and lie down with her while my husband cut the cord and they cleaned us up -- she pooped all over me while she was lying on my tummy, such a polite girl ;-) I only needed one stitch for a superficial tear -- they said if I didn't have our son to run around after at home they wouldn't have given me even that one, but they wanted to be safe.

We went home at 11 that same night. I don't know her APGARs, just that they were "good," but she was 8 lb 10 oz and 20" -- the same length as her big brother, but 13 oz heavier!