The Birth Story (Part 1)

I figured it is about time to tell the story of Jack's birth. John has also chimed in here to tell his side of the story which varies a little bit from what I remember. Turns out we're both pretty...verbose...so I split it up into two parts. Enjoy!


It all started Friday, February 18th, exactly 41 weeks into my pregnancy. I had a doctor’s appointment that morning where my doctor wanted to check my amniotic fluid levels which had been slightly low earlier in the week. Knowing this, I had really taken it easy the previous few days and drank gallons of water every day. I was bummed that my tons of natural induction methods had all failed. I had walked for miles, eaten spicy foods, taken herbs, acupuncture, and a lot of other things. Nonetheless, for some reason I was confident that the doctor would send me home on Friday and that John and I would spend a great last weekend together. We had dinner reservations and plans. But, one look at my ultrasound and the doctor said that my fluid level was low and that my placenta looked “old”. Nothing like stating the obvious. So she said that we’d have to go check into the hospital. What? At that point it still didn’t seem real. She called the hospital and she came back and told us that they were a little busy so we should go get a bite to eat and come back in a few hours and check-in at noon.

John’s POV: We tried every natural inducement ol’ wives tale: THE salad from Caoti Café (an LA-specific inducement legend), eggplant parm, orange soda (Thanks, Anita), pickled cactus tacos. If Lisa had read about walking backwards with a bucket between her knees, I would have walked into the house to find her debating between plastic or metal. Pregnant women do not want to be induced medically. But it wouldn’t be the last time today where what we theoretically wanted got pushed aside to make way for the only thing we actually wanted, which was our healthy baby boy.

So off we went. We decided to head home to get the house in order and eat our last meal. Not surprisingly, my last meal at home was scrambled eggs. Seemed fitting. Then, with our bags packed, pillows in the trunk, we headed off to become parents. We parked in the parking lot (no pulling right up to the door in labor) and slowly walked into the hospital. It was sort of like checking into a hotel which was not what I had imagined. But things never turn out as planned.

John’s POV: TV fails us again. No rushing to the hospital while Lisa performs outdated Lamaze exercises to keep the baby from shooting out onto the floor of our Hyundai Santa Fe. No male orderly shoving Lisa into a wheelchair and racing her down the hall to the O.R. Our biggest drama was that the 5 got a little backed up where we didn’t expect it (Sigalert failing me when I needed it most), and we had to use the Glendale Freeway instead of the 110. Too bad. Lisa had stashed garbage bags and an old beach towel under the driver’s seat to save the upholstery of our still-kind-of-new car, and I thought such foresight should have been rewarded with actually being necessary. Oh, and for the record, Lisa refused to allow me to drop her off at the front door of the hospital. I picked my battle there, as I was saving up my insisting for the epidural.

We checked in and got settled in our big delivery room. I got into my hospital gown and plopped down in the bed. They strapped a fetal heartbeat monitor on my belly as well as a contraction monitor. Then they put in an IV which didn’t feel that good. Next up? A drug called “cervidil” which would be used to get my cervix all ready for delivering a baby. My cervix was no where close to going so the doctor thought this drug would be helpful before giving me the labor inducing drugs. So they put the cervidil in (a strip of paper that is placed against the cervix) and I was told to chill out for 12 hours. Oh, fun. 12 hours in a bed where I can’t really move that easily. I think I first felt what could be described as menstrual cramps and then things got painful. From around 9:30 pm to 2:00 am I was having contractions. And they didn’t feel good. And kept getting worse. At 2:00 am, they started the induction drug, pitocin, through my IV drip. Immediately the contractions got even worse. I guess no one can describe what it will feel like but, damn, it was as bad as I had thought. I wanted to stave off an epidural as long as possible so that left me writhing in bed for hours. Because I was so hooked up to so many things, it was hard to get in different positions to manage the pain. But John was there and he helped me immensely. He massaged my back and watched the monitor to tell me when a contraction was coming and when it was almost over.

John’s POV: We got a little cocky. 6 hours of pretty much no discomfort, we decided it would be cool to have visitors, so Lisa’s mom and sis stopped by with dinner. We ate, and talked and hung out like the heavy lifting was days away. Then we decided we should get some rest to prepare for the real deal, the pitocin, at 2 am. And of course, as soon as we lay down, the contractions began. And then we realized that we should have done the sleep thing a while ago, because that ship had sailed. Columbus-style. Like to the other side of the planet.

A few hours after checking into the hospital and before the real contractions started.

To be continued...