Paolo's Story about the Birth

I just found this while cleaning out my email inbox. Thought I'd share it with you all. Ah, the memories.


Paolo Says:
This is a bit of a story, and some of you have heard it, so bear with me. ;-)

Jen and I went into our regular midwife appointment on Wed the 11th (Tristan's due date), and we discovered that Jen was suffering from preclampsya. It wasn't yet alarming, but everyone decided it would be best if we coaxed him out of Jen rather than wait for him to take his time.

We went home to pack, and do some laundry, get our friend Kelly to sit for the pooch, and then off to UW hospital we went.

Upon arrival, we found out that the birth plan that Jen had so painstakingly written unfortunately wouldn't matter very much. She was hooked up an IV, several monitoring cables, and told to stay in bed. She was then given a cervix "ripener", which was supposed to prepare her for induction.

As a side note, nobody ever tells you that induction is a multi-day process. Apparently, we've seen a few too many TV shows, and we expected Tristan to arrive within hours of the drugs flowing. Not so.

After 12 hours of overnight cervix ripening, during which she was poked and prodded hourly, she then got hooked up to Petocin, which was then supposed to start contractions. She started at the lowest dose possible around 9am, and it was turned up every 40 mins or so. By 8pm she was getting real contractions which required the prodigious use of the coping techniques we learned. It mostly consists of "breathing", which to a non-birthing male, sounds absolutely crazy, but apparently works.

During the next 5-6 hours Jen went through many many full on contractions, arriving every 1-3 minutes depending on the position. Unfortunately, in about the last 3 hours, her contractions turned into back labor, and it made her feel like the contraction never really ended, so there wasn't a rest period in the middle. She hung in there like a trooper, and refused all pain medication.

At around 2 am she had had it, and the coping techniques weren't working so well anymore. Our amazing doula, Caren, decided to get the midwife to come check on the progress. Jen was at 10cm (the requisite amount of cervix dilation). The doula then broke her bag of water, and tried to get Tristan to drop.

Unfortunately, very much like his father, Tristan was having none of that plan. Jen was pushed into many positions over the next 3 hours to try to get him into place (since we assumed he wasn't dropping because his positioning was poor). By about 4:30-5am, Jen's contractions weren't getting Tristan anywhere, he had receded back to his comfortable position in her uterus, and her cervix was back at 7cm.

Another side note, as a male witnessing a live birth, if men had to give birth, the human race would have ended long, long ago. From my point of view, aside from my amazement at Jen's ability to cope with prodigious amounts of pain, and my happiness at her providing us with a son, for me, labor is not the magical thing I had once assumed it would be. It's an ugly affair, usually with a very happy ending. I just know I could not handle the pain, constant direction of my body positioning by doctors and nurses, the lack of control over my own body, but mostly the pain. That being said, Jen's experience was probably different than mine. ;-)

Anyway, at this point, we were offered and recommended a c-section. Jen was at the end of her ability to cope and saw the chance for a successful end to the labor, and took that option. I think that if this had been the recommendation after 1-2 hours of pushing, she would have been upset, but she really gave it her all. She found strength I didn't know she had, and am exceptionally proud of her. I hope he remembers what his mom did for him, but remembering my time in adolescence, I think I'm hoping for a bit too much. ;-)

Anyway, they explained the procedure, which was great, but they also talked to Jen and me through about 5 sets of contractions. That was the hardest part for me. I knew that the pain relief was just a short trip to the OR and needle stick away, and to see her still cope and deal with resurgent back labor contractions and have the strength to talk to the doctors about the risks of the procedure again impressed me immensely.

They then wheeled her back to the OR and started to numb her up. I had the opportunity to wait around for 30 minutes, until they were ready to operate. It's hard waiting for your wife to be cut open after zero sleep for 30 hours or so. Watching labor makes my complaining kind of quaint. ;-)

Anyway, I went back there, and she was blissfully unaware of anything under her nipple level. They cut her open, but didn't let me watch, much to my chagrin. A short time later a 9lb 10oz and 22.25 inch long Tristan Kai Raden was born. He was properly positioned and everything, but just too big for Jen to deliver. He is very happy and healthy, and 1 day after his birth starting to get the hang of breastfeeding.

Jen is doing well. She's tired and feels like she's done a gazillion sit-ups, which she did. She's healing well, and finally got her IV shunt taken out about 30 minutes ago. If she continues to do well, it looks like we're going to go home on Sunday afternoon.

We all seem to be most awake in the afternoon, so we are accepting visitors in then, from about 3-7pm. The room's not so big, but folks are welcome to stop by if they want to. We've loved all the flowers, but we're running out of space for them...

You can also call my cell or Jen's, and we may answer if we're able to or awake.

The redux of the c-section is that I'm on baby lifting and changing duty for the next 2 weeks, so I guess I won't actually have much time during my "time off" from work. ;-)

Paolo

Breast feeding, just hype?

Apparently, breast feeding, or at least the modern mania for it, is more a product of PR than good science. Makes me very sad for the hours i know that myself and others have spent agonizing over not being able to breast feed for as long as we thought we were supposed to. Ah, the drama of being a mom ;)

Here's the Atlantic Monthly article (or just click on the title bar of this post): http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200904/case-against-breastfeeding

Books about Parenting

Here is a list of parenting books suggested on one of my list-serves. I have highlighted the ones that I have read or definitly recommend: (to be clear I've only read 3 1/2 of them ;)

What's Going on in There?--Eliot
Unconditional Parenting--Kohn
Emotional Intelligence--Goleman
Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child--Gottman
Your One-Year Old (series)--Ames
Blessing of a Skinned Knee--Mogel
Everyday Blessings--Kabat-zinn
Parenting from the Inside Out--Siegel
The Mindful Brain--Siegel
Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves--Aldort
Becoming the Parent You Want to Be--Davis
Touchpoints--Brazelton
Positive Discipline--Nelsen
The Power of Positive Parenting--Latham
The Scientist in the Crib--Gopnik
The Female Brain--Brizendine
Sippy Cups Are Not for Chardonnay--Wilder-Taylor
I Was a Really Good Mom Before I Had Kids--Ashworth
Operating Instructions--Lamott