This is Ethan's Hypnobabies Birth Story, which has only made me want
to have more kids!!!

       On the morning of Tuesday, January 16th, I headed to the
hospital to have yet another routine appointment.  They stripped my
membranes to prime the cervix for induction on Thursday.  I was
diagnosed with preeclampsia shortly before and spent about a week on
bedrest.  Because my health was starting to be affected, I agreed to
the induction, although truth be told, I was convinced he would be
born in December!  :)  I was hooked up to another NST for monitoring
because Monday he didn't look as reactive as they would have liked
to have seen.  So, since my blood pressure was a little high, I was
so huge (big baby fear on the part of the doctors), and he wasn't
reacting like he should, they sent me over to L&D to have the baby!
After a little bit of shock, we called the sitter to get Kyle and
called my mom to let her know to spread the word, since that wasn't
exactly what I thought I would hear.

Since I was stripped earlier that morning, it had been getting
progressively harder to walk around without feeling like I was
literally opening up down there.  Once we filled out the paperwork
at the front desk and got checked in (I swear it felt like we were
at a hotel or something!), the nurse started the IV for my GBS
antibiotics.  I didn't really mind the IV, since I had that with
Kyle, but I did have to drag the thing around with me.  I started
listening to my Hypnobabies scripts, but honestly, it still felt
like the BH waves that I had been experiencing for months!  Everyone
kept asking me if I could feel them, since they were registering on
the tape, but I said, yeah, only because I'm laying here on my
back!  That made them a little uncomfortable because I wanted to
lean forward during them but couldn't whilst strapped to the
bed.  :)  

After all the doctors came in and evaluated me and read my
birth preferences, they decided to break my water to get things
going.  I was showing a favorable cervix and they could feel the bag
of water, so away we went.  I luckily didn't need any other drugs to
get my birthing time going.  Ethan was still rather high  (-2
station) but I had dilated to about 5 since the stripping that
morning.  They broke my water after a few tries with the tool (I
don't know what it's called), and I gushed, and I mean gushed.  Not
only did I gush, I continued to gush for the next four hours.  I
soaked through I don't know how many chux pads!  My nurse said she
thinks I probably had at least 15 lbs of water, because of how heavy
the pads were that she was changing!  This was about 1:00 pm.  

I was still pretty comfortable at this point, and never even really had to
focus or get into center or anything.  I tried going OFF for a
while, in case things got intense, but honestly they never really
did.  I asked to get into the tub because I knew the water would
relax me and help to dilate further.  So we wheeled it over to the
tub, and it was awesome.  I gushed some more, but the jets were
great on my back.  Every pressure wave brought more fluids out and I
felt again, like I needed to lean forward during them to be totally
comfortable, but with the IV in, I couldn't submerge my hand and had
to eventually get out.  Also, the nurse had a heck of a time finding
his HR with the portable Doppler while I was in the tub, so I got a
little concerned by that.  It's ok though, he was just hiding and
actually was right where she was looking the whole time, it just
didn't pick up for some reason.

So, I made my way back to the bed, and sat upright with my legs
spread and kind of butterflied out so I could maybe help the pelvis
open up as well.  I asked about a birthing stool, which they
actually had, but it was too low and I felt like I was almost on the
floor so that didn't work too well.  The only thing that did was get
gushed on!  :)

In fact the best relief I had was when the pressure
waves picked up in intensity, I asked my husband to come over so I
could lean on him.  It felt so good to lock my hands behind his
head, and just let my body drop.  He was amazing.  I started to feel
like I needed to sit down, so I went back to the bed, and Aaron took
one leg, and the nurse took another while I breathed through the
pressure waves.  They would massage my legs and tell me that I was
doing great, and ask if I wanted anything.  

The only time things really got intense, and I don't say painful because it's not like anything else you can feel, was during transition.  I've read it a
million times, but now that I've experienced it myself, I know how
true these words are.  I truly felt like my waves were taking over
my body and there was no way I would get through them.  I remember
losing focus and starting to shake uncontrollably.  I could hear my
husband say "Peace", and if I consciously relaxed my body, the
shaking would slow down.  He kept telling me that I was doing great,
and when I would say I didn't know if I could do this anymore, he
told me I was in transition and almost done.  The baby would be here
soon!

I honestly don't know how long transition lasted, but to me, looking back, it was maybe 45 minutes?  So I got up again, because sitting down was just annoying me.  I got up and danced with my husband through some more.  Then I wanted to lean over.  It's weird, because I don't know why I wanted
to, but it seemed like I needed a different position or something.
As soon as I leaned over onto the bed, another rather large gush of
fluid was released and my body started pushing.  I said right at the
beginning, "Uh, I think I gotta push!"  The nurse was the only one
in there with us, constantly cleaning me up.  

She notified someone, I assume, and the two resident doctors (at a teaching hospital) were like two kids in a candy store trying to get suited up.  I guess that's what happens on a slow day at L&D.  :)  So they come in and check me, sure enough I'm complete.  I was back on the bed, but
wanted to be on my side, definitely not on my back.  My body pushed
a bunch of times like this, but I couldn't lift my leg because it
made my hip start to cramp.  When the attending doctor came in, he
checked me and saw that I still had a lip of cervix there, which was
all but holding my baby in, still.  He moved it away, and here comes
my son barreling down the birth canal from STILL -2 station!!!  His
huge noggin was keeping him too high up to put any pressure on my
cervix to dilate me on my own apparently.  I pushed for maybe 15
minutes and his head was born.

I don't really remember any pain during the birth just tremendous pressure like nothing else in this world.  Apparently, his shoulder got stuck and that's when things started to get panicky, for everyone but me.  Tons of people rushed in, the nurse pushed on Ethan from above, and doctors pulled me more open, and pulled on him to dislodge his shoulder.  (I am not happy
about this by the way, but we were totally unaware of what was going
on when it was going on.)  

The doctor told me to stop pushing at one point, and I thought to myself, "uh, yeah, like I have any control over this at this point!"  So, after he was born, his left arm wasn't moving due to the stretched nerves in his shoulder from birth but he weighed 9 lb 14 oz, 20 inches long, with a  15 inch head!
His apgars were great 8 and then 9.  He started nursing like a champ
as soon as dad got some bonding time with him.  

I think the doctor's took over mostly after he was born and threw out my wishes as far as nursing ASAP and not cutting the cord, but it was kind of
emergent that they evaluate his arm since he did get stuck.  I did
tear pretty bad, but I didn't feel any pain really.  They stitched
me up and I was moving around pretty well within an hour.
 

Hypnobabies kept me totally relaxed about everything going on with
this pregnancy and birth.  I really enjoyed the program, and I try
to talk it up to anyone who will listen.  :)  I felt better able to
know what was ahead of me by reading the birthing guide, as far as
pushing.  I remembered the low moaning/working sound, and that's
exactly how I would describe what I was doing.  It was awesome and I
SOOOO want to have more kids, but I think it might take some
convincing of DH if I want my way!

Follow up, his arm was evaluated by a neurologist and he got the all
clear.  In fact, his arm was significantly more mobile two days
after he was born so it wasn't really a huge concern for us.  YAYYY!