Labor began at six in the morning on St Patrick's Day. Ian was supposed to work at Indigo that night and rake us in a boat-load of cash. It became clear around four in the afternoon, that this in fact, was the real deal and that little Liv was already impeding on our financial situation. Bless her. Contractions were consistently six minutes apart until eight at night and then the puking began. We called it at eleven, loaded up the car and headed to the hospital. By the time we had arrived, I was dilated four centimeters. The nurse filled up the jacuzzi and I labored for three and a half hours in the tub while Ian held the puke bucket under my chin when I needed it. I opted to go au natural and, as the pain intensified, I could feel myself leaving my own body. When I got out of the tub I walked around for a while, leaned up against Ian during some strong contractions, flopped myself over the end of the bed ... anything I could do to remain vertical and keep things moving along. Around five, it was time to push. My doctor came in around this time and we pushed for an hour as Ian held one of my legs. We joke that this was certainly not part of his birth plan. He envisioned the privacy curtain starting at my stomach with him near my face, oblivious to the happenings 'down there.' Not the case at all. He was the best coach ever. He told me how to breathe, when to breathe, when to start over, and when to give it a little more.
And then the first look of concern came from the doctor. I heard her say, "double nuchal" and had no idea what it meant. The cord was wrapped around her neck twice, and she wasn't breathing. Ian told me later, she looked like a mummy. They untangled her, went to suction her lungs and nose and the machine wasn't plugged in. They got it running and within seconds, I heard her scream. I pushed the rest of her body out and then she was on my belly. That part happened so fast that I didn't even know it was occurring. Ian cut the cord and she fed within seconds as I cupped her little wet head. Our baby girl was here. And with shameless cliche, I can write ... there truly are no words for that moment.
The next part I will write in spared detail. You can google "manual placenta extraction" if you don't know what it is, and care to find out. It became more clear after the baby was on my chest that there was a bigger problem at hand. The books say that pushing out the placenta is easy in comparison to actual birth. Mine didn't want to come out though. We tried and tried and tried, but it had broken into pieces. With much patience and diligence, the doctor got it all out after about an hour. It was far worse than the actual labor. My placenta was ravaged. She actually showed us the pieces and said, "she had never seen anything like it." The topper was how the cord had been attached to the placenta for the duration of the pregnancy. Most cords are attached by veins and tissues that take up an area the size of a half dollar. Hers was attached by three thin veins that could have separated from the placenta at anytime. We were the talk of the ward. I went back two days after she was born to go see a lactation counselor and her first comment to me was, "oh, that was you." My doctor said that most other doctors are quick to rush women to the OR in those situations but that she had learned a lot of the extraction techniques in her midwifery training. In the end, her comment was, "well, everything that could've gone wrong, did. I'm glad you guys came home." The birth, the extraction and the stitching were all done sans medication. I still feel like a fucking warrior.
And in the words of Uncle Clinto, our dear friend in Nicaragua in reference to us coming home, "sometimes you just know what you need to do." Yes, things may have been very different there. But they may very well have been exactly the same. The thought of doing that at Vivian Pellas Hospital in Managua with doctors that don't speak English ... well, no thanks. The important thing is, we're all healthy and happy, and things turned out just fine in the end.
To Liv! (life)
Born on my Grandmother's 93rd birthday. The first phone call ....
