Christina Corinne’s Birth Story

It all started on Wednesday, August 27th. I was 38 weeks and 5 days pregnant and I had a doctor’s appointment that afternoon. I was only 2 centimeters dilated, but to my surprise, my doctor decided to strip my membranes. I started having contractions that night, although I thought they were just cramps and that they would stop at some point. There didn’t seem to be any pattern and that continued throughout the entire next day. I went to bed early on Thursday, August 28th and at 9:20pm I felt a leak. A few minutes later I felt another leak and then another minute later, I got a big gush.

I arrived at the hospital at 1am on Friday, August 29th. I was officially 39 weeks pregnant. The contractions now seemed to be pretty consistent at 7 minutes apart, but they still were not painful. I was still only 2cm dilated. I walked the halls of the hospital, and soon the contractions were much stronger. By 5am I was back in my room. The contractions were 5 minutes apart but since they were so long, there was very little time in between them. Some of the contractions were so unbearable that I felt like I was climbing the walls trying to escape them. Every time I got a bad one I thought I could not possibly take another. Although I had been holding out as long as possible, when I was checked and was still between 2 and 3 cm, I knew I had to get the epidural.

The hardest part about the epidural was staying still while they did it. I got one of the really bad contractions when the doctor inserted the first needle and I swear the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, was to stay still during it. Thank goodness I had an amazing nurse who really helped me through it.

As soon as that contraction was over, immediately I felt better. My legs never went completely numb, but there was no pain. At 6am, I was checked and was amazed to find out I was 6 cm dilated. Turns out that I wasn’t progressing because I was so tense and the epidural fixed that problem.

The nurse helped turn me onto my side and twenty minutes later I was fully dilated! I started practice pushes every few minutes because the baby still wasn’t low enough. The nurse also helped to stretch me out. When the doctor came in about thirty minutes later, I was ready to push for real.

After the first set of pushes, my doctor told me she was going to have to do a small episiotomy otherwise I was going to tear. It was no big deal, I couldn’t feel it at all. In the next set of pushes, out popped Christina’s head and she started making sounds immediately. Then, the rest of her came out and I got to hold her for the first time. I delivered the placenta and got stitched up without any pain, while I watched my little girl across the room.

She had a full head of brown hair, weighed in at 7 pounds and was 20 ½ inches long. Her Apgar scores were 9 and 9. We nursed right away and she has been doing a great job. I can not believe how beautiful and perfect she is. I feel like the luckiest girl in the world.