Our Birth Story: Brooklyn

When we found out we were pregnant with Brooklyn we were quite young and had only been dating a few months. We had talked about starting a family soon and this was something we anticipated happening so it didn’t come as a big surprise to us. To our families on the other hand it was likely a HUGE surprise. 

I had a very normal pregnancy with extreme nausea and vomiting so I was put off work at 28 weeks pregnant. We prepared. We celebrated. We had a gender reveal. We had a huge baby shower. Everyone in our life was so excited to meet baby Brooklyn. 

In the last few weeks of my pregnancy I had a lot of contractions. We rushed to the hospital each time just for the contractions to subside after a few hours. I believe we made three trips into labour and delivery before we actually were in labour. 

I was doing everything I could to induce labour at this point. Walking on my treadmill, bouncing on an exercise ball, squats, lunges, eating plates FULL of pineapple. One evening I went to take our dogs out and when I came back inside I told my husband that I had peed my pants and needed to change. After I changed my new pants were wet too. I didn’t know a lot about pregnancy and labour at this point so I always envisioned your water breaking as a big spectacle. I had never thought about your water breaking but just leaking. We decided to head into the hospital where they assured me that my water had broken but they did not have the staff for me to safely have a baby. They sent me home and told me to return when my contractions started or when they called me. Almost 48 hours passed when we finally went back to the hospital. They started an induction with the pitocin IV drip. Things progressed rather slowly to start. I had three things on my birth plan. 

1. Give me all the drugs
2. I’d rather an episiotomy then just tearing
3. Please dear god no forceps. 

My contractions started to get really bad so I got into the bathtub and quickly told Jonathan to go grab a nurse because I needed something for the pain. When she got into the bathroom she checked me and told me that I was 10cm and we didn't have time for any pain medications. I pushed for a while and Brooklyn was stuck in the birth canal. Her heart rate kept dropped everytime I would push so they threw oxygen on me and yelled at me to push harder. This baby needed to get out now. They prepped an OR and told me if the baby didn't come out fast they would be doing an emergency C-section. I was so scared. They held these massive metal forceps up in front of my face and told me they were going to use them. I cried even more. The pain I felt when they used the forceps was unimaginable. The forceps slipped off Brooklyns head and they had to try again. 

Yikes.

They successfully pulled her out the second time and as soon as she was delivered she was completely healthy and perfect. They put her on my chest. I was shaking and crying in pain but I was so in love with this little girl. I ended up having third degree tearing and required a lot of sutures but I was so grateful for having a vaginal birth with no epidural even though it wasn’t the plan. I was just so surprised at the strength that I had to find within myself. It was empowering. I had decided after that, all of my future births would hopefully be unmedicated and not augmented. If you’ve been following along you’re probably aware that my next delivery didn’t work out quite like that but that’s okay!