Every Birth Experience is Unique
I have had 3 kids with 3 vastly different birth experiences and rather similar breastfeeding experiences.
With my first pregnancy, I was 23 years old and I had a very easy pregnancy. My water broke at 37 weeks. Labor started about three hours later and the contractions quickly went to five minutes apart. At that point I went to the hospital and was told that I was only dilated to one centimeter and to go home. (I could go into a rant here about the importance of caring nurses on a labor and delivery unit, but that is another blog.) My contractions quickly escalated to one minute apart and I went back to the hospital at 7 PM, two hours later, and luckily a different nurse was on and I was allowed to stay. I managed my pain by walking through each contraction. The contractions remained a minute apart for the next six hours where I had a natural delivery and only had to push for 15 minutes. The doctor I had was a family practice doctor, and he very much believed that nature was going to take care of 90% of births with no intervention. He was a perfect fit for that pregnancy for me. I felt great after that delivery and was itching to go home almost immediately.
Breastfeeding went fine, although knowing what I know now, I would really like to go back in time and reassess some things. She latched well, but for the first 2 weeks it felt like rocks were being pulled through my nipples for the first 2 minutes of every feed. My nipples leaked non-stop for 4 months and my breasts were definitely in overproduction mode. I am pretty sure I could have just fed my kids from across the room if my husband held the child in the right spot with its mouth open. I went through the exact same song and dance with the next two kids for breastfeeding. The birth stories, however, were vastly different.
My second pregnancy went well, but this child was significantly larger than the first. I found myself going for an ultrasound early on to be sure it was not twins. He was measuring 7 lbs 6 oz at 36 weeks, so I underwent an induction 2 weeks later. Being forced to stay in a bed did not work well for me for managing my pain, so I had an epidural. The size of my son’s head made the seasoned OB utter, “Oh my god! What are the shoulders going to look like?” I laid there thinking, dude, you are literally 3 feet from my head, I can hear you. My son did look like a linebacker in that little incubator to be fair. He was only 8 ½ lbs but had a head circumference that was not on the chart. I was not as itchy to get home immediately after that delivery, but again, I did just fine.
My third delivery did not go as easily. Everyone always says that births get easier with each successive one. I found the opposite to be true. This labor was also induced for the same reason the second one was induced. This baby was also large. People had long stopped asking me when I was due and were asking how many I was having. Again, I opted for an epidural because I was not allowed to walk around to manage my pain. I am rather sensitive to most meds and was doing well with the induction. When it was time for the next dose of meds, the nurse decided to give them because she did not want the labor to stall. Shortly after that, my uterus went into tetany- it was one long sustained contraction. Then came the drugs to reverse that situation and allow the uterus to relax.
Within the next hour or so I was almost fully dilated, but now her heart rate was falling with contractions. The OB said we needed to do a c-section STAT. I had worked for hospitals for years and always heard those overhead STAT announcements. I always felt badly when I heard them called for the OB floor. It was unnerving to hear them at that moment and know those STAT calls were for me. I suddenly had a team in my room prepping me for the OR. In a flash I was in the OR and put under general anesthesia. The umbilical cord had prolapsed and was cutting off her oxygen during contractions. My daughter was out and thankfully doing well. The well-timed c-section saved her life and prevented probable brain damage. I, however, was hemorrhaging. The meds that reversed the induction were now not allowing my uterus to contract fully, which is what it needs to do to stop the bleeding after the placenta pulls away from the wall of the uterus. My blood pressure was now 50/0. The OB managed to get my uterus contracting again and the bleeding stopped. The anesthesiologist eventually got my blood pressure back up to survivable levels.
When I was finally stable, I was sent to recovery. There a nurse asked if I was having any pain at the moment that I was first opening my eyes. I said a little, so she injected Demerol into my IV. I was not recovered from the anesthesia enough to handle that, so I promptly stopped breathing. I remember the feeling of needing to breathe, feeling too tired to do so and watching a small version of myself curling up and going to sleep instead of taking that breath. My husband (an ER doctor) stood over me and kept my breathing until the meds wore off enough for me to breathe consistently on my own.
I ended up with a massive infection after the c-section and was in the hospital on IV antibiotics for almost a week. My daughter did just fine, but she was HUNGRY. I tried feeding her as frequently as I could the first few days (basically until my nipples were bleeding), but she needed some formula supplementation to satisfy her. Looking back, I am not sure if the highly medicalized birth caused me to produce less colostrum at the time, or if this baby who was over 9 lbs and initially hypoglycemic just needed more than I could produce. Normally large babies tend to lose more weight in the first week. She gained a full pound that week. And as with the prior two babies, breastfeeding was painful for the first 2 minutes of each feed for the first 2 weeks, then went very smoothly. And I would still love to go back in time and evaluate myself and the babies!
