Matthew J - A Birth Story

Matthew, a Birth Story
Pregnancy stinks. Seriously. I am the worst pregnant person ever. For some reason at the end of my pregnancy I am in SOOO much pain. I think it has to do with the fact that I carry my babies extremely low. They usually can’t even see the face on the ultrasound because my babies are so down low in my pelvis and hips. It hurts. It hurts bad. Let’s just say my bladder and lower stomach muscles will never ever be the same. Haha. For weeks up to the birth they were predicting that he would be a big baby, but I had two 9 lb babies before with no problem and so I didn’t think much of it, but I did agree to be induced a week early. I was hesitant to be induced that early and felt guilty like I was robbing the baby of his growing time if he wasn’t ready to be born yet. Every night I would spend several hours having hard contractions, but they would always die off after a little while. I literally prayed to go into labor. I was in so much pain all of the time. But every morning I would wake up and no baby.

The day of the induction arrived and I felt weird. I felt nervous. Probably the most nervous I have been for a birth since Williams. My mom helped me get everything ready and I ate some pancakes around 2 pm. At 7 pm, Mike and my Dad gave me a wonderful blessing. Mike blessed me that my body would know what to do, that my recovery would go well, and that although the Postpartum Anxiety would come back, that it wouldn’t be as bad as before and that I could handle it. It was a wonderful blessing that I will always remember. We said goodbye to the boys and jumped in the car. We got to the hospital at about 7:50 pm for our 8:00 pm induction (I was SOOO nervous to be induced that late at night, I felt like it wouldn’t help me with my PPA and sleeping issues, but I was in so much pain I was willing to do anything to get the baby out!). They put us in a room and told us that they had been super busy and so it might be a while until they were ready to get us started. I was really nervous I would have a bad nurse and really nervous that a certain epidural doctor that I don’t like would be the one on call. Luckily, it was a different doctor on call (who was fabulous) and I got an amazing nurse. We sat in the room for a good hour before they came in and the whole time I was contracting on my own. They finally came in and got me hooked up to the monitors and yep, sure enough I was having contractions every 4 minutes on my own, but that had been happening for weeks at night. Finally they got the Pitocin started and with the lowest dose I immediately started having hard HARD contractions every 2 minutes. After contracting for a little while, I called mercy and asked for the epidural. It was THE best epidural! I literally wanted to cry for joy after they gave it to me because that was the first time in 2 months I had not been in serious pain. I laid down and relaxed and felt amazing being in zero pain. It was one of the best moments in my entire life (dramatic…I know, but that is how much pain I had been in for the last 2 months and the relief of pain was miraculous!)

 Mike slept and I dosed in and out, but the pressure on my pubic bone started to get pretty painful. They came in and broke my water and then let me contract for awhile. Usually after they break my water it is about a half hour until I am fully dilated, but this time I was dilating much slower and the pain I was feeling on my pubic bone was intense and so I knew that something was different. Finally I got to a ten at about 3 am and she had me push one time. Sure enough, she told me the baby was posterior. I knew something was different. I started to get a little worried. I had a sister who had a 10 lb baby who was posterior and she couldn’t get him out and she almost died. I started giving myself a pep talk about how I could do this, about how I would push my guts out and how I could get this baby out. We decided to let me rest and flip from side to side every few minutes to see if we couldn’t get the baby to flip. After about an hour, she checked me again and I couldn’t believe it, but he had flipped on his own. It was a miracle. She had me push about a half a push before she made me stop, because he was coming fast. She ran and called the doctor and I woke Mike up. The pressure was getting intense, but luckily my doctor only took a few minutes to get there. They told me to push and I pushed with all my might, then they yelled to stop and the doctor said “He is a big baby, slow down a little” I pushed one more push and out he came. One contraction and he was out. They put him up on my chest and everyone just kept saying “he is a big baby”.

They took him over to weigh and he was 10 lbs and 3 oz. My doctor said I won the award for biggest baby of the month and he couldn’t believe I got him out so fast. I have big hips  They cleaned him up told me he had red hair. I couldn’t believe it. He is so cute and perfectly perfect. Recovery has been pretty good. I have slept  And my mom has been a saint. He is such a good baby and a blessing in every way. He was so worth all the pain and agony. Matthew J Coburn, my newest love 