Julia's Birth Story

So, I know this is about 8 weeks later, but things have been a little busy :) Several people have asked me about my birth story and I meant to post it weeks ago. I really wanted to make sure and fill people in on some of the details because they heard I ended up being transferred to the hospital with complications.

So as many of you know, I was going to have Julia at a birthing center here in town. Our experience there was so personal and wonderful. On Sunday night, we were at home and had put Nicolas down for the night. Jeff was working on some reading for school and we were going to finish up sanding and painting a glider that we had been given. I was on my hands and knees helping Jeff stretch the fabric to cover the footstool and all of a sudden felt a sharp pain. I remembered this pain all too well from 1 1/2 yrs earlier. I told Jeff that I thought I had just had a contraction but not to get too excited. A couple of minutes later I felt the pain again. I remember thinking that God had a wonderful sense of humor and that maybe He just wanted to show me that He was indeed listening! I had been discouraged earlier thinking I would never go into labor. So after a couple more of these, I grabbed a piece of paper and pen and asked Jeff to keep track of the contractions and their length. We called a friend at that time (around 10:45 p.m.) who was going to come stay with Nicolas when we went into labor and let her know that we were in the early stages of labor...haha...or so we thought. Not even 30 min. later, we called her back to let her know that we had already called the midwife and were on the way to the birth center. The contractions were at that point 3-5 minutes apart! We didn't know they were going to progress that quickly!

When we arrived at the birthing center, I was 80% effaced and dilated to a 7. The midwife informed me that if she broke my water at that point, I would probably be done in about an hour. As appealing as that sounded (to be done in an hour) I was definitely in pain and didn't want to be messed with at the time so I told her I wanted to just labor for a while and think about it. Well, after several more contractions my water broke. I was now at a 10 and ready to push. I remember looking at the midwife and saying, "I don't think I can do this!" But she looked at me and assured me that I could. When we took our birthing class, they had told us that usually when women get to the point where they don't think they can do it, that's when it's time to push. It's that last part of the labor where the adrenaline kicks in. So after pushing for about an hour and 15 minutes, Julia was still not here. She would descend and they would tell me she was almost out, but nothing. I looked at the midwife and birthing asst. and was wondering what was going on. At that point, the midwife informed me that the baby was a lot bigger than Nicolas and bigger than she had originally thought. Apparently she was getting stuck on my pelvis and wasn't able to turn so she could come out. They told me if she wasn't here in another 15 minutes, I was going to be transferred to the hospital for an emergency c-section. I pushed for a while longer but nothing happened. So, in what was the longest 5-10 minutes of my life, I was transferred to the hospital.

When we arrived at the hospital, it was pretty much a whirlwind from there on. They took my blood, started an IV, asked a million questions, etc, etc as I continued to have back to back contractions. I was so terrified that I was going to have a c-section. After hours of active labor, pushing and no pain meds, I decided that if I was going to have to wait until they got my lab work back and wait to be prepped for a surgery, I would take a small amount of narcotics. The nurses walked out and it was at that point that I had the urge to push. I had heard from other women who had gone through labor with no pain meds (including my mother) that there comes a point in labor when you are ready to have the baby that you get an overwhelming feeling to push. Your body takes over and you can't stop it. When the nurse walked back in the room, I told her that I had to push. She told me very nicely that I had to wait for the doctor to come in and check me and he would then tell me what to do. I'm sure they have their reasons for making you wait, but at that point I thought, "Are you kidding me???? I can't wait!!! I can't NOT push!!!" The doctor came in soon after and informed me that the baby was still in an awkward position. I told him that I wanted to try and have the baby naturally and he said they would give me the narcotics, give me a very small drip of pitocin to intensify the contractions and see if the baby would reposition herself. If she did and everything seemed to be going well after that, then he would let me push. He said that if that didn't work, he would have to perform a c-section. At that point, I was still in so much pain and overhwhelmed. All I could do was ask Jeff to pray. A couple hours had elapsed and I had received medication and pitocin. The doctor came in to check me and said in a rather surprised voice, "Wow. There's a baby. It looks like we can have you push. After 2 contractions, Julia Noelle Wiesner arrived into this world. The doctor announced her arrival with, "Wow. She's big! And look at all that hair!" She was 7 pounds 15 ounces and 20 3/4 inches long....2 1/2 pounds bigger than her brother and almost 4 inches longer!

So that is our birth story! It was a lot different than I had envisioned and expected but isn't that how things normally are? We are still a little perplexed as to how and why things ended up the way they did but we know that God was not surprised.