Pushing

Before I had our baby we took a birthing class in preparation for what to expect and I remember leaving the class feeling educated and ready.  We were that couple that checked out the hospitals when we were 10 weeks pregnant deciding where we should deliver and took the birthing class when I was 20 weeks pregnant.  To say the least we wanted to be on top of things.  Time passed and I continued to read my books and then the next thing you know I am 39 weeks pregnant and my water broke.

While in class the teacher informed us that most women actually don't experience the "movie like" water breaking episode but of course prepared us for what to do if that happens.  Of course it happened.  I'm the type usually if there is any chance that something could happen to you, it's going to happen.  So my husband and I were sitting on the couch watching TV and he had just cracked a beer when I felt this weird pop (like a rubber band snapped without hurting).  It was a new feeling that I hadn't experienced before, but we had chalked it up that maybe she had dropped some more because that seemed logical.  Then within minutes I knew she hadn't dropped because I had fluid coming out of me to spare you from further details.

Then we didn't know what to do.  I wasn't having any contractions as this point, but knew that once your water broke you had to deliver within 24 hours so I assumed that calling our doctor was the right thing to do.  So we took our sweet time getting ready for the hospital calling family ect, and then on the way is when the contractions started.  I was using my handy dandy iPhone app to time them out to get a feel for where things were at.  By the time we got to the hospital is was around 10:00pm and I figured it would be hours before I would be pushing so I had some time to really soak this whole laboring thing in.

Next thing I know about and hour and a half later is that I was 10cm and ready to push.  That's when I panicked a little bit because it came so much quicker than I had envisioned.  So then the nurse tells me to give a push... and that's when a world of emotions and fears ran through me.  I was so afraid of disappointing my husband and concerned about him being proud of me for being able to deliver our baby.  I of course feared $h!t**g the table as most women are and just so unsure of what I was doing.  This now routes back to the beginning of the story about how you can take baby classes and read books, but no one ever tells you how to push.  Maybe it's something you can't explain?  Anyways, I remember the first push i gave being red in the face and I felt like I was blowing up a balloon which you can imagine did nothing to get the baby moving.  It took me awhile to get it figured out and I won't lie at one point I wanted to quit and tell them that I was going to need to opt for a C-section because it was just so hard.  I thought I was a tough cookie and I give props to every mother in the world because it's not easy.  The thing I struggled with the most was the nurse would tell me "you're getting closer", but I would get frustrated because I'm the kind of person who wants to know exactly how close, or tell me how many more pushes I need to give you.  I felt defeated... Then the nurse took my hand to feel that her head (TMI) and that's when I found this new jolt of motivation to get her out and finally hold her.  Finally at 2:59 in the morning and an hour and a half of pushing we had our beautiful baby girl.

After all is said and done if I had someone ask me for some pointers when pushing, I don't think I could give any helpful advice.  Maybe that's why they don't cover it in class.