Our Birth Story, Part 1

It is now August and our little Beavlet has been born, has a name, and is five months old. Cameron Lauren Rask was born on March 12, 2012 at 10:06 pm and weight 7 lbs, 1 oz and was 21 ¼ inches long. That extra quarter inch is quite important to his father, who has already asked our pediatrician how tall he’s going to be ***rolls eyes*** I haven’t been good about updating this blog (obviously), partly because I’ve been busy with Cam, but more because my computer has been having internet connectivity problems. Just as mysteriously as it stopped working, it has started again, so now I can update y’all of the goings on of Cam’s life. Let’s start at the beginning: the birth.

We'll do this in parts because I'm going to tell the whole, long story with details to preserve the memories for myself and our family as much as to share them. If you haven’t learned it yet, be careful what you say in front of women who have given birth because if they see any opportunity, you will find yourself being regaled with the epic saga which was the birth of their child. It was, after all, the most important and interesting birth EVER, so why wouldn’t they do you the service of sharing? And, ladies and gentlemen, I am no exception. But, of course, Cam’s birth was unique and special among births and of particular interest to EVERYONE I am sure so it’s OK for me to do it, right? Hee hee hee.

 I was told, however, by our Labor and Delivery nurse that we had one of the most special births she’d seen because of how there was so much love and support in the room, how everyone worked together, how POLITE I was (more on that later), and OF COURSE how adorable Cam was. She may say that to everyone, but I don’t care. She said it to us, so I’m going with it.

We will begin our story at the beginning of March, about 2 ½ weeks before Cam was due. It was March 1st, I was 37 weeks along and was elated to learn that I was 1cm dilated and 70% effaced and baby was at a -2 station . My doctor said to me, “Well, I’m on call this weekend! It would be a great weekend to have a baby!” I left feeling in my heart of hearts that I would not be going back to work on Monday, and I was ready! I had been having some serious pain through my whole pelvis as the baby moved down…man, it hurt. Also, I was tired, moving around being that big all the time! If I didn’t have to waddle around the halls of school anymore, I wouldn’t have been brokenhearted.

 But, the weekend passed, Monday rolled around, and I rolled my enormous self out of bed and dutifully headed for school. And I did it day after day after day after day, each day preparing as if I would not be back the next day. But, I always was.

 Friday, March 9th rolled around and with it came my birthday. I headed for school that morning and about halfway there, I started to have THE! WORST! BACK! PAIN! I! HAD! EVER! HAD! It wasn’t coming in waves like contractions would and wasn’t associated with any other pain or pressure or anything else that would have indicated to me that I was in labor, but something was WAY different and I was WAY uncomfortable. I even pulled over a time or two to adjust my pants, seatbelt, jacket, anything I thought would help. By the time I got to school, I was in tears. It was seriously the worst pain I’d ever had. I pulled it together and got out of the car and walked into the school, telling myself that if the pain continued I would call my doctor because SOMETHING wasn’t right. At the very least, it would get me out of school for the day. The pain subsided, however, and I could still feel Baby Boy movin’ around in there plenty, so I knew he was fine. I’d get a twinge of that familiar back pain off and on throughout the day and BOY did hit act up again when I sat in the car, I wondered if I would be done driving for the duration of the pregnancy, but it never got bad enough that I called the doctor. My 34th birthday passed, so did the weekend, and still no baby.

 Monday the 12th arrived and dutifully, I got up to start my day and what I was sure would be a grueling four days. My last day with the kids was to be Wednesday with the teacher work day on Thursday to be my last day for work and on Friday, my long term sub would have her first day, doing meet-and-greet open house conferences with the families. I really, REALLY didn’t want to make it to Wednesday to avoid what I knew would be a tearful goodbye, but I figured that I’d make it, since nothing had happened yet. Time was getting short, so I did take the time to move our packed hospital bags into the trunk of my car, JUST IN CASE. My family has a history of short labors, so if my water broke at work I wanted to be ready.

However, the day passed with no active labor manifesting itself. The Braxton Hicks contractions which had befriended me sometime in my second trimester and never were too far away were VERY present throughout the day, never enough to warrant a call to the doctor (longer, stronger, and closer together, they told us) but juuuuuuuuuust enough to render me EXHAUSTED by the end of the day. My ankles and feet had swollen to their most epic proportions yet, so I took off early to go home and put them up!

 I got home, threw on sweats, grabbed a blanket, and flopped myself dejectedly on the couch, firing off a text to Jeff informing him that there was no way I could pull off cooking that night, if he wanted to bring home take-out or cook himself, that was up to him because I was NOT equal to my usual kitchen duty that evening (he got a lot of those texts in my third trimester…). My one consolation was that the Timbers’ opening match of the season was going to be on TV, which would be a great distraction for me!

I was texting with my friend Kristin, waiting for the match to start, and we got to talking about when she went into labor, and how I was afraid I wouldn’t know when I was in labor. She told me that her water had broken and if felt like a rubber band snapping somewhere in her abdomen, followed by a GUSH! I told her that only 10% of women have their water break as their first sign of labor, so I was sure that wouldn’t be me.

 Famous. Last. Words.

Jeff got home and took some chicken out of the fridge to start cooking. I rolled over to see if I could get a few Zzz’s before dinner was ready. All of a sudden, I felt a “ka-thunk” in my lower abdomen. I remember thinking, “Oh, man! THAT’S all I need, for my intestines to act up!” That thought lasted about a split second before all of a sudden, I felt the telltale “GUSH!” “Uh…honey,” I said to Jeff as I headed for the bathroom, “My water just broke.” I was too busy worrying about what was going on with my body to really notice what Jeff did next, but I do remember it was very fast, very furious, and involved at least four trips up and down the stairs at full tilt, frantically trying to put together nothing in particular. We’re seriously lucky he didn’t end up as a patient down in the ER himself. We called parents, gathered the last few of our belongings, and headed for the hospital.

My contractions changed the minute my water broke and lemme tell ya, they hurt. Nothing I couldn’t handle though…although I knew that part was coming later. The traffic on the way to the hospital that cold and rainy evening was mercifully cooperative. We didn’t have any freeway driving to do, but we knew from experience that the particular route we had to travel could be quite snarly and slow during evening commute time, which was when we were having to make the trip. But, we were blessed and made it to the hospital in about as quick a fashion as could have been expected. I’m quite glad, if we’d been waiting at stoplights or behind slow drivers, I’m pretty sure Jeff’s blood pressure would have done something really bad to him.

 I remember being so…nervous, scared, excited, everything all rolled into one. I was so excited that FINALLY our baby was coming and couldn’t FATHOM that I was about to see him and kiss him and hold him, but at the same time I was really SCARED because…well, let’s be honest, this was gonna HURT!!! It already did hurt, and this was just the beginning. I DESPERATELY wanted to do it unmedicated so I knew I was in for A LOT because even if I didn’t make it through, it would have to get REALLY BAD before I hollered uncle. So, there was going to be a baby soon, but in the meantime there was going to be pain. Epic, legendary pain. Talk about mixed emotions. Thus ends part 1 of our Birth Story. Part 2 to come shortly!