Lily's Birth Story, Part I: The Christmas Pizza

I don't really know how to start this post.  Ever since Lily's birth people have asked me, "So, how did it go?"  I appreciate the question, but honestly I don't know how to answer.  I usually say something like, "It went well, we had the baby, we are both healthy, it hurt..."  I don't know how much detail you want, so I'm just going to tell you the details that I like about the story.

As most of you know, we were planning for a homebirth, and that homebirth happened.  Would I do a homebirth again in the future?  Absolutely.  But not for the same reasons I chose to have a homebirth this time.  Here is the post I wrote about my original decision to have a homebirth.

We had an appointment with Karen, our midwife, on Friday, December 23rd.  She asked if I wanted to have an exam to see if I was dilated at all.  I had had several days of cramp-like contractions spread out over the past couple of weeks, but I declined the exam.  I basically didn't want to know if I was dilated because I didn't want to get my hopes up that things would be happening soon.  I just wanted to trust my body and let things happen as they would without getting worked up about it.

On Saturday, the 24th, I woke up with cramping again.  It wasn't too bad and I knew from the other days that it would get worse before it got better and tapered off in the afternoon.  I had several things I needed to do to get ready for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, so I got to work early before the cramps got any worse.  That morning Ben and I made fattigman, a really time-intensive Norwegian cookie that my family makes for Christmas.  After setting off the smoke alarm several times we finally got the hang of it and made a pretty decent batch.  Part of me thought that maybe if I called down the help of my Norwegian ancestors we would have the baby soon.

That morning I also made cookies and a pumpkin pie.  I worked quickly, knowing that if I didn't get the kitchen cleaned up early I may not get to it at all.  I'm glad I listened to those instincts!

By late morning I was having some discomfort, but it wasn't any worse than it had been on previous days.  I kept working.  Then at about 11:30 I had a real contraction that made me stop and lean over the counter for a minute to breathe.  That hadn't happened before, but I didn't want to get my hopes up that I was actually in labor, so I kept cleaning.  I laid down and watched a movie with Tommy and the contractions started coming about every 12 minutes.  Still thinking this was probably just false labor, I mentioned it casually to Ben, who also figured it was probably not real labor yet.  I had probably just overdone it in the morning and needed to rest for a little bit.

By about 2:30 I decided that I should probably lie down and try to get some sleep.  If this was real labor, I knew I needed to be rested for the long night ahead.  If it was false labor I knew a nap would probably make it go away.  Either way, I was tired and needed to lie down.  I tried to sleep for about an hour, but woke up every 8 minutes with contractions.  They still weren't too bad.  I just laid in bed and breathed with excitement and anticipation.

At about 3:30 I got up and showered, thinking the hot water would feel good.  It did, and by the time I got out of the shower I was pretty convinced this baby was coming that night or early Christmas morning.  I had labored for 15 hours with Tommy so I figured I was in it for the long haul with this one as well.  Contractions were still about 8 minutes apart.

We have a tradition in our family called The Christmas Pizza.  It's an artifact from Ben's family when they lived in Brazil.  It's just what it sounds like.  Every Christmas Eve we buy a big pizza from Papa Murphy's and cook it on Christmas.  That way we don't have to cook a big fancy meal on Christmas Day.  We can just stay in our pj's all day, stuff ourselves silly with pizza, nap, play with toys, and just hang out.  It's a great tradition.

I still really wanted to get that darn pizza.  "Leave me!  Save yourselves!  Get the pizza!"  I insisted that Ben go get the pizza and that he take Tommy so that I could have some peace and quiet before really heavy labor set in.  Ben didn't want to leave me, and neither did Tommy.  I kept insisting that he go, that I would be fine.  I figured I still had several hours ahead of me.  Looking back, it's so funny that the pizza meant so much to me.  I think I knew this Christmas was going to be unique and I wanted to hang on to as much normalcy and tradition as possible.  It was completely irrational, but at the time I thought, "If we don't get the pizza, what are we going to eat tomorrow?"  Never mind that we have at least 3 months of food stockpiled in our home, not counting the 40 freezer meals I had prepared a few months ago in preparation for the baby.

In the end, it was kind of stressful.  Ben couldn't find his phone and refused to leave without it.  I wouldn't go with them because I didn't want to labor in public, especially as the contractions got worse.  Tommy was exhausted and threw a huge tantrum about going to the store with Daddy.  So as Ben combed our entire home for his phone I held  Tommy on the couch and watched the clock as contractions came every 5 minutes.  Tommy fell asleep in my arms after he cried for a good 10 minutes or so.  I was happy to have the chance to snuggle my little boy before he was no longer my baby.  It wasn't all that comfortable to have contractions sitting with a 40 pound toddler on my lap, but every time a contraction came I buried my face in his curly blonde hair and tried to be grateful for the moment I had to comfort one child while my body worked to bring my next child into the world.

Ben finally found his phone and hesitantly left to fulfill my wishes for a Christmas pizza.  It was nearly 5:00 by this point.  He was gone for 25 minutes tops, and in that time all I could do was go upstairs, get my water bottle, and fill it up in the kitchen.  Shortly after he left contractions jumped from 5 minutes apart to 2 minutes apart.  I dropped to my hands and knees with each one, tried to breathe deeply, and wondered how I was going to give birth without an epidural.  I thought if they were this bad already I wasn't sure I could endure it for another 10-12 hours.

Ben got home at about 5:15.  I had just called my mom to tell her I was in labor.  I told Ben the contractions were coming every 2-3 minutes.  They had only been coming that close together for about 20 minutes, I hadn't seen any blood, and my water hadn't broken, so I figured I was probably still pretty far off from actually having the baby.  I felt a little hesitant about calling Karen given all of those factors, but we called anyway.  Bless her heart, she left a family party to come deliver my baby.  She got to our home at about 6:15, along with her students, Kristy and Kam.

By the time they came I was in the tub.  It was amazing how much the warm water initially helped to relax my body and decrease the pain.  By the time my birth team arrived the contractions were one after the other. There was no relief.  I had a towel on the side of the tub that I buried my face in when the pain got really bad.  They all commented on how they were happy to see me with a smile still on my face.  That smile didn't last for long:)

Tommy was a real trooper during all of this.  After we called Karen, but before I got in the bathtub we let him open up one Christmas present, which I chose for him.  It was the movie Cars 2 and he was more than happy to sit at the computer in our bedroom and watch his new movie while Ben helped me labor in the bathtub.

Ben was an angel through all of this.  Besides indulging my desire for him to go get the pizza, he successfully corralled Tommy around and was there for me as I labored.  At one point before my birth team arrived I was sitting in the tub on the verge of tears telling him I didn't know if I could do this.  He looked into my eyes and gave me the most romantic pep talk in history, telling me that I was strong, that I could do this, that all I needed to do was picture the end result of having our little girl in my arms in a few short hours.  He made me cry, which made the contractions more painful, so I told him to stop being so sensitive and wonderful.  He is an amazing man.

Once my birth team was at our home we decided to do an exam to see how far along I was.  As you can imagine, I was kind of dreading this.  I was so afraid that she would say I was dilated to a 4 and that I would have 10 more hours of hard labor to go.  I still hadn't seen a drop of blood and my water hadn't broken even though contractions were basically coming one on top of the other.  They helped me onto my bed, checked me and the baby, and declared to the shock of everyone present, "Crystal, you are fully dilated!  You're a 10!"  None of us could believe that I had dilated that quickly and that I had done all of it with only Ben around to help.  My first labor pain was at around 11:30, contractions got regular and painful around 4:30, and by 6:30 I was fully dilated and ready to push.  Little did I know that the hardest part was yet to come.

Stay tuned for Part II!