In the United States the first Monday in September is
traditionally the day when we celebrate work. We call it Labor Day. It is a
national holiday and we have the day off so that it is a long weekend. Work in
this sense is the kind where we go on a daily basis from 9-5 or whatever your
profession’s time frame is.
This year Labor Day meant a little more to me than just work
– and the joy of having a three day weekend. It was ironic because I gave birth
during this weekend and spent some time in the Labor and Delivery area of my
local hospital. Needless to say, my daughter arrived just shy of actual Labor
Day so she has a wicked sense of humor like her mom.
It all started Sunday morning. I woke up feeling fine and
feeling a little odd that my baby’s due date came and went. I went to the gym
as usual and came home. I was making plans to have brunch with my sister and to
go run some errands together. That plan fell short very quickly when I got a
very painful cramp that I had not felt during my pregnancy. I told my sister
not to worry that it probably was nothing. Until it was something because not
even 5 minutes later, I had another cramp and felt the need to go to the
bathroom to urinate.
My bathroom visit gave me the visual cue that this was in
fact active labor. I came out of the bathroom to announce “Guys, it’s time”.
This set the house in a frenzy because my mom had just come over with
groceries. When my husband notified her that it was time to go to the hospital,
she wasn’t sure what to do with the groceries she had just purchased. She
rushed home to put them away.
My main concern, outside of breathing through the
contractions was, I need to eat something. I knew I wouldn’t be able to make it
through labor without food in my stomach. So my sister ran to get me a bagel
and cream cheese because that was the quickest thing that could be prepared and
eaten on the way to the hospital. Once
she arrived from the local deli, we were off and my sister spent the night with
my dogs. It was very comforting to know they would be in good hands.
We met my mom outside and I tried to talk her out of not
coming to the hospital but being a stubborn Italian woman, there was not much I
could do to convince her. We jumped in a cab and when we got to the hospital, I
proceeded to eat my bagel. We saw the doctor outside the doors and her comment
was “Just don’t eat anything you don’t want to see later."
After completing my breakfast, we went up to the Labor and
Delivery floor. We registered and proceeded to wait in the triage room. As I
was timing my contractions and feeling like I was going to die, the other women
in the room were reading books. I kept thinking, they must be getting induced
or they are much stronger than me. It was the former.
My doctor came in to tell us there were no beds available
yet as there were many people who decided to give birth that same day. “Must have something to do with Labor Day and the
full moon,” she said. I continued to wait and breathe and finally she came to
ask the women waiting if we could jump ahead. Luckily they figured out I was in
active labor so they let me go ahead of them. When we finally got set up with
an IV and on the fetal monitor, I was 4-5 centimeters dilated. It was painful
but I was breathing through it as much as possible.
Eventually I was moved into my own delivery room and the
doctor notified me that I was only at 6-7 centimeters. The pain at this point
was excruciating – breathing techniques and digging into the bed weren’t doing
very much to help me through the intense and unending contraction.
Incredulously I said to the doctor, “That’s it?” At that moment, I asked the
nurse for an epidural. She got that going because there was no way I would make
it through the next couple centimeters without some pain assistance.
The anesthesiologists came to administer the epidural which
baffled my mom. She was couldn’t understand what they were doing so I explained
to her that it was for pain. She was worried about the ramifications. Once I
got the epidural, things were definitely better. I could still feel the
contractions but not the pain. One side of my body however became completely
numb and I couldn’t feel it. I tried to move my leg around to get some
circulation going but it wasn’t much help. It was like moving a boulder with a
feather.
I progressed from 7-8 centimeters but then my contractions
got weaker. My baby wasn’t yet quite in place to come out. Finally I got to 9
cms but my contractions weren’t any stronger. They decided to give me pitocin –
a medicine to make the contractions stronger. But as the contractions got
stronger, I was feeling pain on the other side of my body. So the
anesthesiologist was called in to give me some more medication. Apparently this extra medication didn’t make
my baby happy and she was stressing out in my stomach. Her vital signs showed a
change and she ended up pooping inside of me.
At that point the doctor came clean and said that I had to
start to push because the baby needed to come out. I wasn’t yet at 10 cms but
it would have to be done. So delivery began.
Oh and how could I forget that moments after I got the
epidural, I began to vomit incessantly? It seemed like every two minutes whatever
was in my stomach decided it didn’t want to be there anymore. The doctor didn't know earlier that her comment about eating would come to fruition. If it weren’t for
this, delivery wouldn’t have been so bad. But every time I pushed, I wanted to
throw up on the doctor. I’m sure that she has had this happen before but I
couldn’t do it. I couldn’t just gag on myself or the doctor to try to push.
Less than an hour of delivery, my little cookie was born and
as the doctor stitched me up, my husband took a million pictures. My mom nearly
passed out from all the blood she had seen come out of me and especially from
seeing the placenta being delivered. I am not sure how she didn’t throw up
herself but her face said it all. For a few days after giving birth, my mom
couldn’t stop saying how much blood I had lost. I told her that she probably
lost just as much but she retorted “Yeah but I didn’t see it.” I had to give
her credit – those screens must have been a good thing. I could see a lot of
what was happening in the plastic visor that covered my doctor’s face.
It is a wonder how so many women go through this type of
work on a daily basis. Somehow we labor and deliver babies all over the world
every minute of every day. Not only do we celebrate mothers on Mother’s day but
we should also honor them on Labor Day as well.
