Maddy surprised (and delighted) us by coming three days before her due date. I had gone to my 39 week check-up on Monday morning and the midwife had asked if I wanted to get my membranes swept, I said I wasn't sure and she said we could just do a "light sweep" and then try again at 40 weeks if she hadn't come. I agreed because I was really ready to meet my baby girl!
The rest of the day I had some low back pain and period-like cramps that made me curious if I was starting my birthing time or if it was just the result of the check-up earlier that day. That night around 10:30 p.m. I started having contractions that had an obvious start and stop time, but they were still coming at random. We ate dinner and watched the first presidential debates and laughed our butts off at how ridiculous a certain orange-haired candidate was and then tied to get some sleep as we were fairly certain my birthing time was indeed starting. I of course could not sleep at all, the contractions were a bit powerful but mostly it was my excitement and nerves that prevented any sleep. At around 3:30 in the morning the contractions got very powerful where I had to use my relaxation techniques to get through them. I got up and went downstairs to start timing them and eventually woke James up around 5 to help me time them and start preparing the car and loading the bags for the birthing center. At around 6 am I paged the midwife and let her know that my contractions were ranging anywhere from 8 to 10 minutes apart and were getting increasingly powerful. She listened to me having a contraction on the phone and decided it would be best to come in as soon as possible. We called Grandma Lind to head over to the house and James packed up the car. I was equally concerned that we were going in too early and too late because I had no idea what to expect after Micah's labor that was completely atypical.
Grandma Lind came over about half an hour later and we woke Micah up to let him know where we were going and tell him Grandma Lind would be watching him. He was so excited to have her here that he was completely fine with being woken up and waved us out the door. Around 7 am we headed to the birthing center and it was definitely hard to relax through my contractions in rush hour on the 405...but we made it! They checked me when we arrived and I was 5 cm dilated and 60% effaced so they said ok-you're staying! So we set up shop in the birthing room and I of course immediately asked to get in the tub. I was denied because it was too early and she didn't want to slow my progress so I had to find other ways to get through my contractions. I was disappointed and found it hard to get comfortable in any other position I tried (birthing ball on floor, bed, toilet, etc.) After a couple hours I asked to get in the tub again and they checked me to see how I was progressing. I was now 7 cm dilated so I was approved to get in the tub (hallelujah!). I was SO much more relaxed in the tub and my contractions stayed at around 4 to 5 minutes apart. I was able to lay my head down and relax completely through the contraction and then was talking and joking in between contractions-the tub truly is the best place to labor. I told the doula it was sort of like a mini vacation (in between contractions) because I was in a huge, warm jacuzzi tub and we had a babysitter!
My contractions stayed the same for quite some time so they eventually had me get out of the tub to move around. Around 1:30 my midwife came in to tell us our options since things weren't really progressing. She said we could go outside and walk around for an hour and see if my water broke or if my contractions got closer together but that if things didn't progress we'd need to break my water. I was exhausted from hours of contractions and the last thing I wanted to do was walk and wait another hour only to end up breaking my water after so I said I would prefer if she just broke my water then. She did, and it was very unpleasant! Shortly after my contractions felt more powerful and had more pressure so I demanded to get in the tub even though they wanted me to wait. As soon as I got in the tub I knew I was headed into transition as it became much harder to relax. My contractions stayed further apart but they packed a punch and turned into a pushing contraction shortly thereafter. All I can say is that I forgot how awful this part was. I think with Micah, since I'd been having back to back contractions for hours and when my water broke my body started pushing him out on it's own, my experience was much different....pushing came with some relief. This time...not so much. I really had to work hard to push and I was utterly exhausted and started to feel panicky. Despite my calm throughout the contractions, the last few minutes were anything but peaceful. I screamed at the top of my lungs, swore I "couldn't do it," and yelled at the midwives and doulas (and hubby) to give me space and stop talking, lol. I was sufficiently traumatized by the experience and swore immediately I would never do it again. They told me to reach down and catch and I said no because I was so frazzled and in pain, but then when she came out fully I did reach down and bring her up to my chest to hold her. I was so in love with her and she just cuddled right up to me and settled down-they had to make her cry to make sure she got the fluid out of her lungs but she seemed so content in my arms. She was COVERED in vernix-so much more so than Micah was. I immediately wanted to verify she was a girl but had to wait a couple minutes until they checked her out-but then I checked...twice! I was so excited to confirm that I had delivered a sweet, healthy baby girl!!!! I held her in the tub until the umbilical cord stopped pulsing and then they clamped it and Daddy cut it. I handed her to daddy and then they helped me to the bed to get cleaned up and deliver the placenta. I really was struggling with the pain of everything even after delivery and was surprised how much more cognizant of it I was this time. I remembered with Micah that I was in such a daze that I didn't even really know what was happening as I delivered my placenta and got stitched up. This time I didn't need any stitches, which was great, but I think the difference was that with Micah they let me hold him the whole time they stitched me and cleaned me up, and this time they had daddy hold her until I delivered the placenta and got cleaned up. I couldn't wait to get my hands back on my precious baby girl and kept asking for her. They finally brought her over and she immediately latched on to nurse (apparently she was already rooting when daddy was holding her!) She knew just what to do!
Daddy and I marveled over her for a couple hours and tried to work on latching her on the other breast (less successfully... but we eventually figured it out again at home). The birthing team came back in awhile later to weigh her and do all of the usual newborn procedures and then we got to settle for a bit before packing up and going home four hours later. We came home and greeted Micah with open arms but he didn't want anything to do with us at first, he just wanted to "see the baby," so we let him peek in on her in the carseat and check her out. Then we thanked Grandma Lind profusely and went on to have our "Big Brother/ Happy Birthday party" that we had we promised Micah - complete with cupcakes and presents from each child to one another, and one for big brother from Mama and Daddy. Micah was most excited about the cupcake, of course, and talked about it weeks in advance. We gave him his new Daniel Tiger toy, which he loved, and the next morning he opened his gift from Maddy, a Melissa and Doug ice cream scoop set, which he couldn't get enough of. He gave Maddy her lamb lovey and Cupcake book too.
We are so in love with our newest addition and we are all adjusting to being a family of four. As expected, Micah has some very big feelings about this huge transition and we are doing our best to support him through it while dealing with our own feelings of exhaustion and overwhelm. One thing is for sure though, baby Maddy is delightful, cuddly, and perfect and we feel so blessed to have a healthy baby girl!
