OMG Born in Indy

My mom held my right leg, D my left and I began pushing at 10:45pm on December 1st. At first I was pushing with my face, it felt like something was going to burst inside my head. That's not the kind of pushing you want to do when delivering a baby, I learned that pretty quickly. The nurse was very helpful and soon I could feel the difference between a good push and a bad push. The doctor wasn't in the room, she came in and left...it would be a while.

The doctor came back an hour later, she kept telling me I was close, D was counting down how many minutes it would be if she had a December 1st birthday. D was my support through the whole process, he would ask for another push, telling me I had one more in me (4 pushes per contraction vs. the 3 the nurse asked for), D was counting to 10 for me for each push, telling me "come on, she's so close." The baby had been "close" for a half an hour. I got sick. The nurse gave me the small container, I think I went through three of them. It wasn't a little sick, it was full on sick everywhere, my bed, my hair, my face and on the floor sick.

After that, I was tired, I was done. I had my fit. I told the doctor I needed help and asked if she could use the vacuum or forceps to help me. She told me I could do this, we'd put the baby at further risk if we used those instruments. She told me she could start braiding the baby's hair the baby was that close. I kept pushing, they asked if I wanted a mirror, I declined, I couldn't feel my contractions, D told me when to push, the doctor told me to push when I felt like I needed to.

I stopped, I had a contraction and I didn't push. I needed my strength, I need to gather my thoughts, gather my strength. It was almost 12:30am, I had been pushing for one hour and 45 minutes. I needed that break, the next contraction, I gave it everything I had, all my strength, all my focus and her head came out. There was merconium (she had pooped while in the womb), I had to wait to push her body out while the doctor cleaned out her airway. Besides the baby on my bladder throughout labor, the waiting was the most painful. I could see all her hair, but didn't hear her cry. I think my heart skipped a couple beats, but I wanted to get her out. With the next push, she was out and I heard her cry. We had a baby. D stayed by my side, the baby was taken to the warming bed in the room.



I told D to go look at our baby girl, to check to make sure she was healthy and count her fingers and her toes. The nurses were cleaning her off, giving her the APGAR test and it felt like doing everything else under the sun before they would give me my baby. They were asking for a name, like a lot of you have been, but I wanted to see her, to make sure she fit the name. When I finally got to hold her, I had to study her, watch her, and snuggle her.


30 minutes after that, we told the nurse "Grace, Grace Marie is her name." She was born the day my grandmother died one year ago, the name means blessing and my water broke because I tripped (so graceful), it was fitting.

Happy New Year, thank you for remaining readers!