I was awakened suddenly when my water broke at 4:45 a.m. on Wed. Sept 3rd. We immediately called my midwife. She told
us what to do and to go on back to bed and see
if we could get some more sleep and hopefully contractions would start soon. I had a couple of mild contractions in the 5-6 hour and another couple in the 6-7 hour, but then nothing further. I rested, but never could get back to sleep.
Finally around 7:30 we went ahead and got up, had some breakfast and called the chiropractor for a final adjustment which we hoped might help get labor started. He told
us to get out and go walking to see
if that would help get labor going so we went to Walmart to pick up some last minute stuff before heading on home. We also went and picked up our friend who was going to be taking care of Lucas for
us. Then we all had some lunch and shortly after that the midwife showed up and she took all my vitals – temp, pulse, blood pressure etc, and listened to the baby’s heart tones. I had one minor contraction during all that, but still nothing to indicate that labor was imminent.
DH and the midwife then set to work to get all her gear set up and the waterbirth tub prepped so everything would be in place. Then she told
us several things to try in order to get labor going. I told her I was feeling a little tired since I hadn’t gone back to sleep after my water broke and she told me to try to nap for half an hour and then get working on trying to jump start labor. We knew we had a limited time to get the show on the road before we would need to end up going to the hospital to induce labor. She left so as to give me my space and I went and laid down to try to get my little nap.
I never did actually get to sleep. I think I rested for all of 15 or 20 mins and then almost at exactly 2:00 p.m. I had my first significant contraction. From that point on I was having consistent contractions every ten minutes. At the end of 1 hour
DH called the midwife to let her know that labor had started and was not diminishing.
The second hour the contractions got much harder and a little closer together at roughly 7-8 mins apart. Somewhere in here
DH got the waterbirth tub filled and ready. At some point the midwife suggested that I get in the shower to see
if the warm water would help make the contractions more tolerable, but also to get the baby to engage and start moving on down. It worked and after about a half hour in the shower the contractions were so hard I couldn’t stand up when they would come and they were less than 5 mins apart.
Finally I was able to get in the birth tub. Although it did not make contractions feel any better the feeling of weightlessness and buoyancy made it easier to genuinely rest between contractions. Within minutes I finally was feeling the extreme pressure of the baby moving down and was almost ready to push. However , a quick internal check showed that the baby was turned slightly and not presenting directly on the crown of his head. They had me switch to all fours and breathe my way through a couple of contractions to see
if the position change would get him to turn.
A final change in position to a semi-squat and I was given the go-ahead to push little grunty pushes with the contractions. We purposely went very slowly in my pushing phase in an attempt to avoid a repeat of the nasty tearing I’d had with Lucas’ birth. It worked and after slowly pushing for between 30-45 mins Jonas was finally born at 6:45 p.m.
Weight: 6 lbs 14 oz
Length: 20 ½ inches
Head circumference: 13 ½ inches
Pics:
Moments old
Being weighed
Cutie
Jonas' Birth Story 
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