I was not sure if I wanted to share her birth story since it is a very personal experience and I had a really long and traumatizing labor. I finally decided to do it because we can all learn from difficult experiences and all that matters is that a healthy baby was brought into the world. No matter how hard the process was, it was a beautiful battle and all worth it at the end. It will also be fun for her to read it when she grows up and I really wanted to document the birth story for us to be able to remember the details for years to come.
It all started on my 41-week prenatal appointment on Wednesday, August 30th. We walked into the office and the doctor checked me, as expected. I hadn't made any progress, even though I tried EVERYTHING that they recommended to induce labor naturally. I was a little anxious and disappointed as the doctor decided to schedule an induction for the next day. They explained the different risks of going pass the 42nd week of pregnancy, so I agreed to the induction. My husband and my mom were both with me at the appointment and told me to stay calm since it could still happen naturally.
Thursday, August 31st arrived and I had no contractions or signs of labor. It was around 10 at night when we got a call from the hospital to let us know that they had a room ready for my induction and that I should come in as soon as possible. We grabbed our bags and headed to the hospital. When we arrived, they checked me into a private room (best part of that hospital!) and the nurse started to hook me to an IV with the pitocin, which is the fluid that causes the induction. They also gave me a medicine to help "thin out" the cervix.
It was around midnight, already Friday, September 1st, when they advised me to get some sleep and that hopefully labor was going to start happening in afternoon of that day. I fell asleep and started feeling some contractions at around 2 am. They gave me a pain reliever and that made me really sleepy. The nurse woke me up in the morning (around 7 am) to check my cervix for dilation. I was only at 2 cm. For reference, you need to be at a 9-10cm to be able to start pushing the baby. A few more hours went by and nothing... I was feeling contractions but no significant progress was happening. I remember that we tried walking the hospital hallways, I use the bouncing ball to help with progress and we took some pictures to kill time. I was feeling pain but it was manageable.
I was trying really hard to stay positive and calm so I didn't get too frustrated with the fact that after all those hours the induction method they used did not work. I had dinner and after a few hours the nurse and doctor arrived to explain the next method that they were going to try. It was basically a "balloon" that they insert in your cervix (a little TMI!) and it is supposed to expand the cervix to help with dilation. Please remember that I'm not a doctor, but this is what I remember from their explanation. I remember that process being painful, especially as the hours passed. It was already 10 pm (so 24 hours since we arrived at the hospital). I fell asleep and spent the night with contraction pains and also pain from the "balloon" that was expanding inside of me, ouch! The next morning, so September 2nd, came and the balloon came off on it's own (again, extremely painful). After that, we finally got some great news! I had made some progress and it looked like the baby was probably going to come that afternoon. All this time I had a monitor strapped around my belly to check the baby's heart rate. We continued walking and I did some more exercises in the bouncing ball. I found that the pain from the contractions was not that bad if I was in the bouncing ball rather than staying in bed. When the pain got really bad, I asked for an epidural. I remember being scared about the epidural but I was really fast and not painful at all. Once I got the epidural, the pain went away and I was able to get some really great sleep. I was still feeling pressure, but no pain.
More hours went by... dilation was really slow so they increased the pitocin and I got some more sleep. I was already in my third nurse (the other two had ended their shifts) and she was so sweet and patient with me. She knew I had been through a lot and was very understanding. The first two were honestly not the best. It was already Saturday afternoon (remember we arrived on Thursday at 10pm). The sweet nurse checked me and I was ready to start practice pushes! Finally! We did a few practice pushes and then the real pushing started. I pushed and pushed for two hours... yes, TWO hours of pushing. Insane, I know! The baby's head was crowning but something was happening and she was not able to come out. A few doctors came in and we tried multiple positions for pushing, but her head was positioned in a way that was not allowing her to come out.
After all the pushing, multiple doctors coming in, trying different positions and my mom having a little meltdown... they decided to do a c-section. I remember feeling terrified but also a little relieved because I was so, so exhausted. They wheeled me to the operation room and gave me a spinal anesthesia. I threw up on the way to the operation room, probably from being so nervous or from the exhaustion. My husband was allowed in the room once I had the anesthesia and he held my hand the entire time and started to whisper sweet things to keep me calm.
After a few minutes, at 9:36 am on Sunday, September 3rd, we heard her sweet cry! It was a surreal moment that I will never forget... the best one of my entire life! All those hours of pain, frustration, exhaustion... and she was finally here and and all the bad was suddenly forgotten.
She was 7 lbs 9 ounces and was 21 inches long. We spent three days in recovery and in pure bliss with our new baby girl. The hospital was really great with encouraging skin to skin, so we spent all our time there bonding, learning how to breastfeed and cuddling our sweet girl.
The sweet nurse that assisted us for most of the labor process. She was so kind!
To our daughter, Mila Sofía, we love you more than words can even begin to describe. Thank you for making us the luckiest parents and for teaching us what unconditional love looks like.
With love,
Mami y Papi
It was around midnight, already Friday, September 1st, when they advised me to get some sleep and that hopefully labor was going to start happening in afternoon of that day. I fell asleep and started feeling some contractions at around 2 am. They gave me a pain reliever and that made me really sleepy. The nurse woke me up in the morning (around 7 am) to check my cervix for dilation. I was only at 2 cm. For reference, you need to be at a 9-10cm to be able to start pushing the baby. A few more hours went by and nothing... I was feeling contractions but no significant progress was happening. I remember that we tried walking the hospital hallways, I use the bouncing ball to help with progress and we took some pictures to kill time. I was feeling pain but it was manageable.
At around 6pm of that day the doctor came in and let us know that the method they used to induce labor originally was not working so we needed to try something different (not really great news). They decided to let me eat and we basically started from the beginning.
I was trying really hard to stay positive and calm so I didn't get too frustrated with the fact that after all those hours the induction method they used did not work. I had dinner and after a few hours the nurse and doctor arrived to explain the next method that they were going to try. It was basically a "balloon" that they insert in your cervix (a little TMI!) and it is supposed to expand the cervix to help with dilation. Please remember that I'm not a doctor, but this is what I remember from their explanation. I remember that process being painful, especially as the hours passed. It was already 10 pm (so 24 hours since we arrived at the hospital). I fell asleep and spent the night with contraction pains and also pain from the "balloon" that was expanding inside of me, ouch! The next morning, so September 2nd, came and the balloon came off on it's own (again, extremely painful). After that, we finally got some great news! I had made some progress and it looked like the baby was probably going to come that afternoon. All this time I had a monitor strapped around my belly to check the baby's heart rate. We continued walking and I did some more exercises in the bouncing ball. I found that the pain from the contractions was not that bad if I was in the bouncing ball rather than staying in bed. When the pain got really bad, I asked for an epidural. I remember being scared about the epidural but I was really fast and not painful at all. Once I got the epidural, the pain went away and I was able to get some really great sleep. I was still feeling pressure, but no pain.
More hours went by... dilation was really slow so they increased the pitocin and I got some more sleep. I was already in my third nurse (the other two had ended their shifts) and she was so sweet and patient with me. She knew I had been through a lot and was very understanding. The first two were honestly not the best. It was already Saturday afternoon (remember we arrived on Thursday at 10pm). The sweet nurse checked me and I was ready to start practice pushes! Finally! We did a few practice pushes and then the real pushing started. I pushed and pushed for two hours... yes, TWO hours of pushing. Insane, I know! The baby's head was crowning but something was happening and she was not able to come out. A few doctors came in and we tried multiple positions for pushing, but her head was positioned in a way that was not allowing her to come out.
After all the pushing, multiple doctors coming in, trying different positions and my mom having a little meltdown... they decided to do a c-section. I remember feeling terrified but also a little relieved because I was so, so exhausted. They wheeled me to the operation room and gave me a spinal anesthesia. I threw up on the way to the operation room, probably from being so nervous or from the exhaustion. My husband was allowed in the room once I had the anesthesia and he held my hand the entire time and started to whisper sweet things to keep me calm.
After a few minutes, at 9:36 am on Sunday, September 3rd, we heard her sweet cry! It was a surreal moment that I will never forget... the best one of my entire life! All those hours of pain, frustration, exhaustion... and she was finally here and and all the bad was suddenly forgotten.
She was 7 lbs 9 ounces and was 21 inches long. We spent three days in recovery and in pure bliss with our new baby girl. The hospital was really great with encouraging skin to skin, so we spent all our time there bonding, learning how to breastfeed and cuddling our sweet girl.
The sweet nurse that assisted us for most of the labor process. She was so kind!
To our daughter, Mila Sofía, we love you more than words can even begin to describe. Thank you for making us the luckiest parents and for teaching us what unconditional love looks like.
With love,
Mami y Papi
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