Birth story - Vita and baby Leonardo

I always felt that my little boy would be born early and I never really expected to reach the due date. No particular reason, it was just a strong gut feeling. He got super low and head down very early, probably at least 17 weeks, and stayed like that. At the 33-week scan, the doctor said it looked like he was going to come early, maybe even too early.

I kept procrastinating with the writing of the birth plan and packing my hospital bag right until the last moment. I ended up completing both the day before I went into labour. It was Saturday, and I felt so relieved once everything was ticked off my to-do list. I really felt ready for the first time. I think my baby boy felt it too and decided to go ahead and start the whole process.

On Sunday, I just didn't feel right. My belly felt weird and the baby felt very low, so I decided to skip my workout that day. I kept working out throughout the entire pregnancy right until the day I went into labour because I knew labour was going to be a marathon and so I trained for it. I had some sort of tightenings in my belly the whole Sunday afternoon, but didn't think they were surges. At 11PM, we went for a walk before bed and that's when I started feeling those tightenings coming in waves and getting stronger. They became painful when I lay down to sleep. I tried to track the surges for a couple of hours and they were 3-8 minutes apart but they weren't progressing. They were too uncomfortable to sleep through but I was able to fall asleep in between them, so that's how I spent the night. There was also some bloody show in the middle of the night.

The next morning, I had a regular appointment with my midwife where I picked up my third trimester blood test results and found out that I was Strep B negative. Such a relief! The surges were still around 5-8 minutes apart. I went for three walks that day and the surges would come every 2-3 minutes when walking, but would get spaced out again when sitting or lying down (well, to be fair, lying down was out of the question because it was too painful). I would say the surges were uncomfortable and slightly painful when walking. I had to slow down or stop through them, but they weren't progressing. Every time I came back from a walk, there was a bit more bloody show, but if I was at home, there was nothing at all.

I spent another sleepless night. This time in the kitchen, sitting on a chair in between the surges and then leaning on my bar table and swaying my hips through them. They were still very irregular. Always lasting around a minute, sometimes a little more, but the frequency was all over the place. Anywhere from 2 minutes to 15 minutes. At this point they’ve been going on for more than 24 hours.

Hubby and I tried nipple stimulation a few times and the surges would get closer together but only while we were doing it. As soon as we stopped, they would become further apart again. They were gradually becoming more painful, though.

The next day, the surges kept becoming more intense, and when I went to the loo at around 1PM, I found even more bloody show and something that looked like little clots, which scared me. Apparently, they were pieces of the mucus plug. But I got worried and wanted to be checked out at the hospital. The surges were also becoming quite difficult at that point.

The hospital is 20 minutes away and I had only two mild surges on the way there. When we arrived, I don't think that anyone took me seriously because I was standing, talking, and walking normally. I don't think they believed I was in labour at all. When I got checked by the midwife, I was at 3-4 cm with the waters bulging. I was far along enough to get admitted but not enough to get to the labour room. They monitored the baby for an hour and then sent me up to the maternity ward. I had to share the room with two other women and their partners, so no privacy or cozy, intimate environment.

It was around 5PM by then. I knew that if I didn't get to advanced labour by 9PM, my husband would be sent home. That terrified me. Again, not ideal for the hormones of natural labour. As my contractions were still irregular anywhere from 2 to 15 minutes, the midwife said that I would need to be at 6cm for me to go to the labour room where hubby could stay with me. I was determined to get there but I had less than 4 hours.

We walked the corridors of the hospital. We found a private little corner with a window where we could have some privacy, so we stuck our faces outside and just enjoyed the sunshine. The hospital room also had a lovely balcony, so we enjoyed some evening sun there, too. Suddenly, my surges became 2 minutes long and they were happening every 3 minutes, so I only had 1 minute of rest in between. And they were getting more and more intense. At this point I had a bit of a wobble. I remember thinking that I wanted an epidural and that I couldn’t do it anymore, I wanted to pack up and go home. I instantly recognized the signs of being in transition. I went to the loo and there was even more bloody show. As the surges were on top of each other and I was still up in the maternity ward, I started freaking out a little bit.

Hubby called for the midwife and we were sent down for another examination. I could still walk and talk OK if I really focused. When the midwife examined me, I was at 7cm! The water broke right there while being examined, and she told me she could see Leonardo's black hair. Hearing that, I cried happy tears and felt renewed energy again. They hooked me up to the monitor for another 30 minutes. Luckily, they knew how I felt about lying down, so they did all the monitoring standing up and swaying over the bed.

This was around 8PM. The midwife and both my husband and I were sure that the baby was going to come before midnight. We were wrong! I always read that transition never lasted more than one or two hours, but in my case it turned out to be much longer. It lasted 5 hours, until 1am. When the midwife came to check me just before 1AM, I was at 9cm, and she helped me stretch all the way to 10cm. That was pretty painful.

Afterwards, I started pushing but no matter what I did, I didn't feel like I was making any progress. I always dreamed of breathing my baby out and experiencing the Fetus Ejection Reflex but after so many hours of labour, my uterus was so tired that if I wasn't physically pushing, nothing would have happened at all.

I continued standing and moving around, then squatting during each surge. I squeezed my husband's hands, and towards the end I started nearly crushing them because my surges were insanely intense. They were getting more and more painful each time, and I felt the urge to push, but I didn’t feel the baby moving down.

After two hours of fruitless pushing, I called for the midwife. She wanted to check if the baby was making progress with each contraction, so she got me to lie down. It was agony! She said he was making a little progress with each push, but she was getting worried that I'd been pushing for almost three hours and my surges were dying down. They were 5-10 minutes apart now, and she started talking about using some oxytocin to augment the surges if they didn’t pick up. But I was absolutely determined not to be exposed to any medications and was ready to do anything to birth this baby naturally. I instinctively knew that it was all due to being horizontal. Throughout the whole labour, sitting or lying down stalled everything. As the baby's heart rate was perfect and he didn't seem to be in distress at all, the midwife gave me another 30 minutes to try and speed up the surges naturally. She brought me some cookies (at this point, I hadn't eaten anything for 12 hours), hubby made me drink lots of water, and I started pacing up and down the labour room. Instantly, surges started happening every 2-3 minutes.

The midwife told me to stop swaying while pushing because the movement took away some of the strength from the pushing. I also realised that I'd been holding back because I was afraid of the pain. As soon as I realised I needed to be really brave and push into the pain, things started progressing. More and more of his head started coming out with each surge. His head came halfway out twice before finally coming out all the way. I knew my baby boy was stretching me, so the tearing would be minimal.

My funniest memory is having to run to the delivery room with the baby's head halfway out between my legs. It was a very funny feeling and surely an even funnier sight because by this point I was almost naked. By the time I got to the delivery room, he wiggled his head back in. The most interesting feeling ever! With the next rush, his head and the entire body flew out like a cannonball. I couldn't believe it was all done! My husband shouted, "He's so little and so beautiful!". I collapsed on top of the bed and didn't even have the energy to look back at him for the next 30 seconds. But then I turned and saw my little boy. He was little and so beautiful!

We had skin to skin for a couple hours. I birthed the placenta naturally after around 5 minutes. Leonardo latched right away and completely effortlessly. He didn't cry at all. He's now 4 weeks old and our breastfeeding is still going great. He's the happiest and most peaceful baby, and we're all getting plenty of sleep at night.

The "ring of fire" was definitely real for me. When he was crowning, that was actually the most painful stage for me. The whole pushing stage was also very painful. I expected pushing to be a relief but regular contractions were a breeze compared to the pushing contractions. But that's not surprising at all considering that my baby was born with the brow presentation. Instead of coming out with the back of his head which is only around 9cm across, he came out with his forehead or the front of his head, which is 14.5cm. 50% wider! All the textbooks say it's physiologically impossible to birth a baby vaginally with a brow presentation, that's why c-sections are normally done right away. Unless the baby is very small (mine was quite small) and the mother has a wide pelvis (not sure about that one, I have quite average hips).

My baby and I achieved something impossible. We were an inch away from a c-section, but in the end we made it. And I only got a tiny first degree tear with one stitch (my hubby and I did perineal massages for a month before birth). I'm forever grateful to the midwife for letting me try to birth my baby naturally and for not telling me about the brow presentation. It would have definitely freaked me out and success would have been impossible.

Due to being stretched out to crazy levels, my postpartum recovery was very painful. I was in agony a few hours after labour and any movement at all was very difficult. I couldn't walk for more than a minute or two for 2 weeks, and to be honest with you, I struggled more with the postpartum than the labour itself. But now I'm 4 weeks out and all is good. I’d say I'm about 95% recovered.

Baby Leonardo was born with a massive conehead, but due to the brow presentation, his cone was at the top of his forehead. A few hours later it was already gone. Brow presentation only happens in around 1 out of 2,000 births, so I never expected for it to happen to me. But it did, and we survived. Now I feel like a superwoman, and I'm not afraid of the next time I give birth because I'm sure a normal birth would feel like a walk in the park after something like this. :-)

I wouldn't have made it without the digital pack. The information was so helpful, but the best tool for me was the up breathing. I used it right until the end and didn't even need my hubby to count for me. It was the best pain relief out there, and without it, I don't think I would have managed. My husband watched all the videos as well and was a wonderful birth partner. He kept saying that I was so strong, that he was so proud of me, and that I was going to get huge (hahaha, that's an affirmation from one of Ina May's books – it helps dilate faster!).

Even though it was challenging, I look back at my labour and delivery with pride. It was doable and manageable right until the end. If it had been a regular birth, it would have been even more manageable. When you know that it's temporary and that you'll get a break after every rush, everything is doable. We're all warriors and we can do anything!