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Elijah Leilua Dobbins
July 19th, 2017
7lbs 3oz
20 in
I can never start these blog posts very rationally. When writing my kids birth stories down I
feel like all I can say (or shout at the top of my lungs) is, “MY BABY IS
HERE! MY BABY IS HERE AND HE’S MINE MINE
MINE FOREVER AND EVER!!!!!!” And that’s
his birth story. He’s here and that’s
all that matters!
But I know myself and I know that future Hillary will want
detailed details of it all. After all, a
life-changing event doesn’t happen every day.
And our Eli Leilua has been a little life-changer around here that’s for
sure.
All throughout pregnancy I was going over my other birth
experiences and revising my goals, trying to decide what kind of experience I
wanted to have. I toyed with the idea of
going natural. I also toyed with the
idea of getting induced early and having as unnatural a labor as possible-
epidural and whatever else they would be willing to give me, I wanted THE
WORKS. In the end, as I looked at my
other experiences I figured out if there was anything I would’ve changed and
how much pain I was willing to feel for the sake of the “experience.” Because I figured out that that is what I was
wanting- a little more of the experience of childbirth. I had been induced with my other two
(although with Hannah my water broke on it’s own which is what sent us to the
hospital) and although I had felt some contractions with Hannah, I always felt
like I still didn’t know exactly what it was like to have a baby. But then again I knew that I didn’t want to
be in pain just for pain’s sake. I’m a
person who likes being in tune with my body, but I also kind of have the
philosophy of if you don’t have to be in that much pain why would you? So after a lot of back and forth, the happy
medium I arrived at was that I wanted to go into labor naturally and feel
contractions. Then go to the hospital,
get that epidural, and have smooth sailing from there. Another factor in the decision-making was
Andrew’s brother Hyrum’s wedding which was the same day as my due date (and my
birthday!), July 29th- in Virginia!
We knew I wouldn’t be going but we were still holding out hope for
Andrew to be able to go for a day or two.
So our hopes were 1. that I would go into labor naturally, 2. earlier
than the 24th (which is the day
we decided it’d be too late for Andrew to go if baby wasn’t born by then) and 3.
that baby boy would be chunky. We knew
that last one was not completely in our control, especially if we wanted him to
come early, but after four years of pediatricians worrying about our kid’s
weight gain (we’re talking 0.89th percentile for weight…and that was
at a good appointment), we really were hoping for some chub on this boy.
And guess what?
Almost everything went exactly according to plan! I went into labor completely naturally for
the first time, and had the whole experience of hurrying to the hospital with
contractions. It was TEN days early AND
he was our biggest baby yet at 7 lbs 3 oz!!!
Okay so backing up now.
I’m not going to talk all about the pregnancy because it was just
horrible and I wont need any help remembering that in the future. But I will say that I had been having
contractions for the entire 3rd trimester, which was a new
experience for me. I was dilated to a
two at my last appointment which was also new and great because I don’t think I
had ever been dilated before labor with my others. On the 18th I had been having a
little more painful contractions but was still just so unsure of what real
labor contractions were supposed to feel like that I just continued about my
day telling myself not to be a pansy.
That night they were still painful so Andrew and I stayed up till about
1am timing them. But they were irregular
and never got quite close enough so we gave up and went to sleep. Then the next morning as Andrew was getting
ready for work (he is usually gone before we wake up) I told him I wasn’t sure
he should go to work yet because I still felt like this COULD maybe possibly be
the real thing. To help distract me from
the pain a little we went downstairs and watched some TV. When the girls got up he got them breakfast
and everything and did other morning stuff, all while I was going back and
forth trying to decide if we should go to the hospital or not. Finally I called my doctor’s office and
talked to them about it. My contractions
were consistently about 8 minutes apart by then and plenty painful. They told me I should try to wait till they
were 5 minutes but that if I did come in now they probably wouldn’t send me
home. So we waited a little longer and
then I decided we at least better call somebody to watch the girls and start
getting the ball rolling. By the time we
were getting in the car to go to the hospital- the girls safely off to my good
friend Jami’s house until my mother-in-law who was in town could come pick them
up- my contractions were about 4 minutes apart!
Reflecting now I’m so excited that it all happened the way it
did…although at the time I was pretty much just hating my life.
We got to the hospital about 10 am- wheelchair, room, gown,
checked- and I WAS DILATED TO A FIIIIIIIVE!
Yeeeeeeeeeeah girl. If I hadn’t
been in so much pain, I would’ve whipped and nae naed all around that room in
celebration. Then I asked for the
epidural. That got done and I was more
than ready that anticipated smooth sailing.
But it never really came. Like I
said MOST everything went according to plan.
But possibly the biggest part of the plan- the pain management part-
didn’t. For some strange and terrible reason
the epidural didn’t fully work. I kept
waiting for it to kick in but the pain was not lessening and I was getting
frustrated. When a nurse came in later
to check me and put in the catheter, she definitely did it assuming I was numb
because she was not gentle at all. When
I winced in pain and kept telling her it was hurting she looked skeptical at
first, which was a little infuriating to be honest, and then looked confused
when she realized I really was feeling EVERYTHING going on down there. The anesthesiologist came back in and checked
everything and then just told me that it worked with gravity and that I
probably wasn’t sitting up enough or something.
Between her and the nurse’s reactions to me about my pain, I was upset
and felt like they were implying that it was my fault, that I was doing
something wrong. I even told them that
my other epidurals didn’t seem to have this problem and they just shrugged that
off. I’m usually a pretty obliging
person and not very confrontational- but in that moment I definitely felt some
of that pregnant woman craziness bubbling up ready to start screaming and
telling everybody off.
Eventually, after I continued to report that ‘no, it’s not
getting better’ and ‘no it’s not just PRESSURE, it’s PAIN,’ they gave me some
other medicine in the epidural to help (I don’t remember what it was…Andrew
might so I’ll ask him). I’m really wary
of medicine because of my dizziness issues, (everything seems to have the “may
cause dizziness” side effect) and I had a bad experience with something they
put in my IV when I gave birth to Audrey, so I was nervous. But they assured me it wouldn’t go anywhere
near my head, it was going to go straight down to my lower half. I wasn’t completely trusting them any more
but I figured it was worth a shot. Turns
out it did help, whatever it was. But
all it did was take the edge off, as they say, and put me into a major brain
fog where I was in and out of sleep and saying some random things to Andrew. Earlier he had put on The Nanny for us and I
remember feeling like Fran Fine was in the room with me.
Now here I should write a little about Andrew’s experience
at that point. All he could do the whole
time was sit there and try to help me make decisions and try to advocate for me
to these annoying rude nurse ladies. By
the time we were settled in with this new medicine and left alone for awhile,
it was just him and Fran hanging out, with me kind of there kind of not just
groaning through contractions- WHICH I WAS STILL FEELING (I’m a little bitter
about that “epidural” if you couldn’t tell).
Anyways, Andrew told me later that while I was in and out of
consciousness every episode of the show that came on was something to do with
babies and childbirth. There was one
where Fran was considering going to a sperm bank, then one about Gracie
learning about how a woman gets pregnant, and there was even one about Brighton
learning about circumcision! Andrew was sitting
there, the only one watching this odd coincidence happening. I can only imagine what the nurses were
thinking as they were coming in and out to introduce themselves at the start of
their shifts. Maybe they thought Andrew
was a man who just really wanted to be very prepared…and The Nanny was his best
idea for that preparation! Anyways, it
was funny.
After a few hours of mild relief the pain starting being
really intense again so I called the nurse and insisted they check me. I wasn’t messing around with any of my normal
politeness, “Oh I think maybe I’m more dilated” “Can you please check me when
you have a chance?” “Oh is there anything I can do for YOU while you’re in
here? I can roll off the bed if you want
to lay down!” Okay exaggeration. But I did assert myself better than usual,
trusting myself more and that I know my body and what I’m feeling better than
they do- I said “I need to be checked now.”
So they did. And I was at an 8 I
believe and the doctor suddenly realized that she had forgotten to break my
water and that was probably part of why I was feeling so much “pressure.” Once she broke my water I went to a 10 within
a few minutes I think (it’s all so fuzzy) and everything was ready to go. I was feeling pretty much everything by now,
all the pain, all the fingers, and instead of feeling frustrated I was just
extremely emotional and felt despair and helplessness about how to deal with it
all.
Upon reflection, once again, I realize that I think I really
could’ve handled it all pretty well if I had been prepared for it, if I was
planning to do it naturally. I’ve had a
lot of practice with ‘mind over matter’ because of pushing through my long
vertigo episodes and I seem to have a high pain tolerance (even if those dang
stupid nurses wouldn’t believe that). But I didn’t plan to do it
naturally. And there was really no
reason I should’ve been in the situation I was in right then- we had planned
for a hospital birth, we got there with plenty of time, I HAD AN EPIDURAL. Maybe people will tell me that I was silly to
think everything would work out perfectly, that I should’ve had a back up plan
in case things didn’t go according to plan.
And that’s probably right. But
here’s the thing…everything DID go according to plan. There was no reason, no reason I should’ve
been in this situation, except maybe that I wasn’t being listened to by people.
I was beside myself with emotion, what I
remember most is that I was laying there tears streaming down my face saying
over and over again “this wasn’t the plan, this wasn’t supposed to happen like
this, this wasn’t my plan….”
Okay enough of my sob story, the point is that this is the
hour my Eli came into the world. It was
around 2 pm. My doctor wasn’t there to
deliver me but the doctor who did, Laura Zaugg, I ended up liking even better
than my own doctor. She said she was so
sorry I was in so much pain and that she would be gentle but at the same time try to get it done as quickly as
possible. The main moment I remember and
the thing I’m surprised to say made it actually a very special experience to be
feeling everything down there was the moment he came out. Maybe this is TMI for some people, so don’t
read this part if you don’t want to. But
I vividly remember feeling his head come out and the rest of him
following. For some reason it was very
cool to me to know and feel the exact moment that he was here and it very
suddenly turned my tears of anguish into tears of absolute joy.
They gave him to me and he was calm and had his deep dark
eyes wide open with this adorable bewildered look on his face that he has
continued to have every day. It seems to
be his resting face- raised eyebrows, wide eyes, and looking slightly confused. He was immediately a peaceful influence for
me. He has had that effect on our home
now too ever since we brought him home.
Even though it was a hard experience overall I feel grateful
that I seem to be blessed with fast labors and relatively easy recoveries. I only took the prescribed narcotic one time
and then was off even the Ibuprofen and stool softener by the time I was home
from the hospital. I believe I only tore
a little. This recovery did seem harder
than my others though and the nurses said that it’s normal for the cramping to
feel worse and worse with every kid.
Funny, you’d think it’d get easier.
Honestly, it was not a terrible experience to give birth
naturally, or almost naturally. I guess
the problem was simply that it wasn’t my original plan and so I wasn’t
prepared. Andrew held and squeezed my
hand during every contraction and it was a good thing to be so dependent on him
and to feel him having more of the experience with me.
The biggest surprise of all to me is how quickly I felt like
Eli isn’t our last one and that I could do it again. Newborns must have this magic power over
people. Within the first week I was
saying that I knew I wasn’t done. With
how terrible pregnancy is and how hard giving birth is and how tiring the
newborn stage is- and all of this back to back to back no breaks in between to
recover- it’s kind of a miracle that any mother has more than one or two
kids. There’s just something about my
children that makes me want to have more of them. I cant get enough. Eli is already so big.
So that’s his birth story.
And now I can shout HE’S HERE HE’S HERE AND HE’S ALL OURS FOREVER AND
EVER AND ETERNITY!!! I feel so much love
for my life and my own family. It’s
literally my dream come true.
(some of the pictures are out of order. and this is not even half of them...more to come!)
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| pictures they drew for baby brother |
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