This is the story of Ewan’s birth, not super graphic, but it’s got the basic details of timing and parts of labor. Read at your own discretion.

Last Friday the 19th I had another biophysical profile exam, which did not go as well as they had hoped. We had a less than friendly ultrasound technician. [Note to other future parents, for a valid exam the tech must watch your baby for 30 solid minutes looking for movement, this one tried to quit and fail us after 12 because I guess she had better things to do. Then she tried to insist it had been 30 minutes.] Never the less things looked less great than they did on Wednesday, namely, like my last two births the amniotic fluid was low.

I had been having contractions every night, for hours, as close as 6 or 7 minutes apart but they’d generally fizzle by morning. Very frustrating and tiring. Seemed like my body just couldn’t quite get pushed over the edge into labor. They had wanted to induce on Wednesday and so by Friday we were willing to consider induction if the test results looked worse after those two days. After a non-stress test that also looked slightly less reassuring than Wednesday’s we decided that today would be the day and we’d start the induction as soon as possible.

We sent the girls off with my mom to go to swimming lessons for the morning. I had made it through every lesson but the last one.

We had some lunch, and they tried to start an IV. It took three people and six attempts to get a working IV. I have a big bruise on my left arm from them unsuccessfully digging around for a working vein. I’ve never had this kind of problem before, eventually they got one settled in my right elbow.

The labor and delivery room with a better tub wasn’t quite clean yet so we walked around the hospital and I did the four flights of stairs to try to help the baby move down and hasten labor.

At 1:40 they hooked up the pitocin and my labor kicked off immediately. I had to wait hours for it to take effect with Josie and Celia, not in this case. I was right back into my normal nighttime pattern of labor I’d been having for the last week. I hung out on the ball, tried to do my squats, anything to get this baby moving on out. My doula was on her way and showed up a bit before 4. By that point my contractions were very much 2 to 4 minutes apart and required full concentration. Mostly I just want to be left alone during labor and not spoken to or touched much. I was trying to wait it out a bit before getting into the tub for the relief I had well anticipated.

By 4:20 I called uncle and decided to get into the tub as the only method of pain relief I had planned. The relief was instant and wonderful. The weight was off my back and the nurses were happy too because the monitors were doing a better job of watching the baby who was still doing well. After a while I even got enough of a break between contractions to fall asleep between a few of them.

Somewhere past 5, the nurse came in concerned that the contractions had slowed down some, but after she arrived the contractions picked right back up again and didn’t stop. Can we all say transition? I complained that they had turned up the pitocin, but they hadn’t, so I was hopeful I was indeed in transition. They actually turned the pitocin down because the contractions were just one on top of the other. I tried to move around in the tub to get things to progress again and by 6:18 I was starting to feel the urge to push during contractions a bit. My doula noticed, the nurse offered to find the midwife to check me and went out. I agreed to be checked. Next contraction or so, that’s it, I’m pushing, my doula goes running out of the room. She’s telling the nurse who is trying to page the midwife that I’m crowning, i.e. baby is coming NOW. Lots of people come running back in, trying to drain the tub and get me out. Because of the pitocin I’m not allowed a water birth. I stand myself up and enjoying the nice steadiness of the tub bars try to convince them that birthing standing right there is a good idea.

The midwife arrives thankfully and says that yes I can just have the baby right then and there, they just had to keep the baby from touching the water and everything is ‘ok’ on their end. The head is out, without any ring of fire pain. The midwife is nice and calm, tells me to give a little push to turn the body. I try to give a little push and ok the baby is born! 6:23. 5 minutes from when I started to feel like pushing. I turn to look and tell everyone ‘It’s a boy!?!?’ I was surprised. The midwife literally got to catch the baby in my case this time.

The cord was really short and so the midwife felt she needed to cut it so I could move out of the tub. Jordi cut the cord and they brought Ewan to the warming table to rub him and he was crying very quickly and loudly before even leaving the bathroom.

I got over to the bed and we all got in some good snuggle time. He wasn’t particularly interested in nursing but we spent some good time keeping warm and cuddling. Our doula Maria went home and we started settling in for transfer over to recovery. My parents arrived with the girls and Josie got to come in and meet Ewan. Celia was asleep in my dad’s arms even though it was only a bit past 7, it had been a big exhausting day. Jordi brought Ewan (yet un-named) over to the recovery side and gave him a bath and they did his initial examination.

I got moved over to recovery and waited for Jordi to get back with Ewan and my parents and the girls waited with me too. Once we were all together again we settled in to start to get to know one another. Josie held Ewan while Celia declined to leave my dad’s lap, she was still exhausted though awake.

We sent them all home to rest, the girls were out in the car ride home. Jordi and I tried to settle in for the night, even with the constant temperature, blood pressure and other hospital requirements. We woke up in the morning and started in on trying to get out of there! Plus we decided on a name. Took us until 7pm though to get home, lots of other people checking out the same day. He passed his hearing test too.

Still here. Looks like this baby just doesn’t want to compete with the also-soon-to-be-born-Monarch of England and will let it go first.

As compared with 28 weeks here.

Here’s two helpful tips I thought I’d share that I did with baby Celia that I found very helpful.

1. Diaper changing bucket – I picked up a cleaning bucket like this one and keep diapers, changing pad, wipes, wet bag and some extra clothes in it. I can move it around in the house to change anywhere, important when Josie sleeps in the room with the changing table and diapers. I took it to bed with us each night for the first many weeks until she stopped needing to be changed at night because then I didn’t have to get out of bed. (Note to first time moms: limit getting out of bed at night as much as you can)
2. Extra freezer – This isn’t entirely novel but I would recommend this to anyone who is willing to do some cooking ahead and wants to save money. I stuffed mine full and lived from it for two and a half months without having to cook dinner and some breakfasts. Even if you stuffed it full of things from costco, there’s nothing like knowing that every day you can just go downstairs and grab something for dinner rather than having to go to the store. Then when people asked me if there was something I needed from the store I could list one or two things most of the time (like eggs, milk, or bread) and we’d be pretty set. It was serious relaxation, home cooking that my toddler would eat and good nutrition to keep us relaxed for the early months of the new baby.

(Works for me Wednesday is a concept I’ve found on other blogs for ideas for how you do things that others might find useful, like here’s one)

We’re all healthy and we got out ASAP and made it home about 3:30 today, not too shabby considering all the hoops they want you to jump through. It’s great to be home and have gotten a nap in our own bed and stop being bothered for constant questions and checks. Hopefully we can get things back to normal for Josie, or at least the new normal.

So my fluid level is low, seems to be that my water broke somewhere up high and is leaking very slowly as opposed to the dramatic one last time. I’m having contractions that are stronger, but far apart and some other signs of early labor. But given the low fluid, we’re in for an induction again, hopefully it won’t take much this time and we’ll have the kid a lot faster. Like today would be nice, please? Josie told the baby to hurry up too.

So I may be running out of things to say here. Let’s get the important stuff done up front, the non-stress test yesterday and ultrasound today all showed a healthy baby and me. So the medical profession doesn’t demand to see me again until Tuesday unless things happen before that (please). Next week though I’ll be seeing them Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and ultimately Friday for an induction at 42 weeks.

Today I’ve been a bit more tired and sore but I’m feeling good about myself as a mom. I figured out the library book interloan system and got a big pile of books for Josie delivered to our local library that she has been dying to read (more Elephant and Piggie, Cat the Cat, Clifford the Dog in spanish, etc). Took Josie to sing-a-long and then after nap spent a solid three hours in child-led play including making a cool Halloween/fall themed art project. We don’t get too many afternoons where I can totally ignore the house (I figure I better practice ignoring it now for when I have two) and not take breaks from playing. I even got the camera out and took some pictures. And I got dinner on the table, which Josie rejected except for the cheese, but Jordi and I enjoyed.

We’re still here waiting. Had the acupuncture today and she went all out, I had needles all over the place, which was  fine with me. Then she took a few of them and ‘stimulated’ things more, i.e. circled them around a little which is less comfortable but no biggie. No major changes, I’ve got some lower back pain with contractions, but I also stood up for two hours afterwords playing with Josie at the park and outside which also tends to cause that. We’ll see.

Tonight I also got some good news/bad news is that our favorite Chinese restaurant, Qingdao Garden, is under construction until November.  Which is good because they haven’t answered the phone the last two times I’ve called so now I know they haven’t closed, but bad because I wanted Chinese tonight. Chinese food seems to cause contractions in me, I don’t know if it’s the salt or MSG or something, but I was hoping to piggy-back on the acupuncture to get things started.

Exactly tonight in my pregnancy (40 weeks 6 days) my water broke with Josie at 2am following a birthday dinner for our friend Wing at a (now closed) chinese restaurant. You can bet we’d have been back if they were still open. You may also remember though that that labor lasted for 42 hours from water breaking to birth, so we’re hoping for a non-repeat in that aspect.

And just like my first child, my due date has come and is about to be gone with no new baby. Today has been even particularly quiet for contractions. We made a night of it though and I took Josie into harvard square on the bus (“it went bump!” – Josie) and we had dinner with Jordi at the Border Cafe to get our salt intake for the week and followed it up with ice cream at Lizzy’s for Josie and chocolate at Burdick for me! Josie loved the cow on top of the ice cream store, but she wanted it to lick the ice cream (it was a statue obviously). Her ice cream cone per usual managed to melt and drip and be tossed before we all finished it.

did I make you click extra quick? Josie managed to buckle herself the entire way in. She is definitely over the weight limit at this point though, wouldn’t be if we got the bigger version, but she hated this seat anyway. She likes putting her doll in it now, we’ll have to throw it in the car though.