As many of you may have read in the update to the post "All hands on deck" Darwyn made her way into this world in a somewhat stop and start fashion. On Tuesday March 20th I experienced the first tell tale signs of labor. I was especially pleased by this development because Jean had asked us to bet when Darwyn would be born and I had said that I thought I would go into labor on the 20th and Darwyn would be born on the 21st. I based this guess entirely on how things had gone with Max. He was also due on the 16th (albeit of April) and I had had the first signs of labor with him on the 20th and delivered him on the morning of the 21st. It wasn't much to go on, but when one is trying to guess when their baby will be born, evidence is scarce. But I was not bothered by the fact that my success was largely luck. James girls love to be right.
So you can imagine how well I took it when, that evening, I went to bed with contractions and the next morning woke up with no baby and no labor. Darwyn, it seemed, was out to thwart my plans. I was mighty grumpy and declared to Gus that the baby would never be born. The probability that a baby will be born on any given day gets smaller as you move away from the due date, I argued, and that meant that as the days passed I became less and less likely to ever give birth. Gus, being mathematically inclined, looked rather pained at this argument. He tried to explain some nonsense about lack of independence of events, but I would not be comforted by logic.
The morning passed without a single sign of impending labor and Gus and I decided to bike to our midwife appointment that afternoon. The midwives brightened my mood considerably. First, they told me I was already 4cm dilated. Second, they told me that I was absolutely right that my stop and go labor was an extreme injustice. Finally, and best of all, they told me that a membrane sweep would probably start it again. So I got the sweep and Gus and I started home. I made it 3 blocks to the library and by then I was experiencing contractions. I told Gus I wasn't biking anymore and he would have to go home and get the car. So much for bragging that I biked to and from the midwives 41 weeks pregnant.
At home the labor progressed quickly. The irregular contractions promptly became regular and quite painful. Gus filled the tub and I lounged in it while he called the midwife's pager and left a message. He informed them that we thought I was in active labor and the they should likely head over soon. The midwives had told us that labor would progress quickly this time and that we should call them as soon as we suspected active labor. They usually return pages within 5 or 10 minutes, so when we had still not heard from them 20 minutes later we were becoming a little alarmed. I told Gus to call again, and this time make it sound more urgent. This time he said, "She is definitely in active labor. Get your butts over here." End of message. Twenty more minutes....still no midwives. Gus called the other midwife's pager. The answering machine cut him off, beeped randomly and made a variety of other alarming noises. This was not good.
I tried to logic with Darwyn. I explained to her that since she was so into stop and go labors, now might be a good time to stop. She had other ideas. The labor proceeded with gusto. Just as Gus and I were trying to come up with plan B, the phone rang. The midwives were on their way. The pagers, they explained, had malfunctioned. Somehow the whole pager system was down. Emily (whose pager Gus had initially called) had gotten a strange feeling about her pager and happened to ask Michelle to call it. When it didn't ring they knew immediately that Murphey's law meant we had called. Emily managed to get her messages and the midwives were suitably alarmed by Gus's "get your butt over here." Michelle grabbed the nearest second midwife she could find and raced for our house. "Is she feeling the urge to push?" she asked Gus over the phone. Luckily I was not and the midwives made it to the house in enough time to set up and be calm and collected when Darwyn arrived.
I decided to deliver Darwyn in the great birthing tub we had set up outside. I highly recommend water births. The heat and water felt amazing. Gus got in the tub with me and declared that he would like a beer. The whole experience was reminiscent of spending a summer evening in an outdoor hot tub....well except the pain, screaming and disgusting stuff floating in the water. Fortunately, Gus is not squeamish and he ignored all of this. He told me I was amazing and pretended the experience was not in the slightest distasteful. Fortunately, he did not have to pretend long. We got into the tub and after four pushes and just 3 hours of active labor, Darwyn was born.
As if to add one final alarm to her stop and start entry into the world, Darwyn decided not to start breathing. The midwives set her on my chest and she looked up at me wide eyed and alert. She seemed calm and fascinated by her new environment, but not particularly interested in this thing called inhalation. The midwives rubbed her vigorously, but she only regarded them with curiosity. She started to develop a blue tinge. I became alarmed. The midwives cut the cord and rushed her over to their hospital on wheels, conveniently set up in the adjacent bedroom. One puff of air and we heard a lusty cry. Darwyn had finally made it.
"Good thing," Gus told me. "Our name choice would have been rather unfortunate if she had been naturally selected."
Congrats you guys. That is quite a story! We can't wait to meet her.
ReplyDeleteCory, Holly, Ella and Daxton xo