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As I neared my due date for Miss E, I of course began to wonder when she’d arrive. Thankfully I had been able to keep up with prenatal pilates and barre so I wasn’t too uncomfortable, but I still couldn’t wait to meet our baby girl. Miss F had arrived a week past my due date though, so I had mentally prepared for Miss E to be a little “late” as well (I actually really dislike the word “late” in this context because I personally believe in most cases babies arrive when they’re ready).

I declined cervical checks until 40 weeks, but at that point for me the pro of potentially nudging my body into labor outweighed the various cons. I was 1.5cm dilated and 60-70% effaced, but with posterior positioning (the cervical opening moves anterior, or forward, for labor). I knew from my birth with Miss F (which you can read about here) that things could still progress quickly from that point, but mentally I resigned myself to more waiting.

That evening I got a pedicure with my mom (who had come into town so she could stay with Miss F whenever we went to the hospital), and then went on a dinner date with Dan. Afterwards I began having noticeable cramping and was sure I was in the early stages of labor. The cramps fizzled out overnight, though, and then for the next week the same thing happened each night. Some nights the cramps would be more intense, sometimes less intense; sometimes they’d happen for several hours, sometimes only a few minutes. I tried to encourage my body along by taking lots of walks, curb walking, and doing the Miles Circuit, but nothing seemed to make a difference.

At my 41 week appointment I was 2cm dilated, still 60-70% effaced, with mid positioning, and I had my midwife, Sarah, do a membrane sweep (for me at this point, the pros outweighed the cons–I’d rather have a sweep than a medical induction). Sarah was comfortable letting me go to 42 weeks, but we have a friend whose baby experienced severe, lifelong complications from being that late. Given this, we decided we weren’t comfortable waiting quite that long and reluctantly scheduled an induction for 41+2. Sarah was confident that once we started an induction my body would quickly take over and we could shut off any medications, but I still was disappointed. I had such an incredible unmedicated birth experience with Miss F and the uncertainty of more interventions weighed on me.

Over the next day, I did as much as I could to mentally prepare myself for the induction and soaked up time with Miss F and Dan. Since I was past 41 weeks I had an NST (non-stress test–basically 30 minutes of monitoring baby’s heartbeat) and BPP (biophysical profile–an ultrasound checking on various markers of baby’s health). One thought that had been lurking in the back of my mind was that perhaps my body didn’t have enough carbs to get labor started. I had been diagnosed with gestational diabetes (I’ll write more on this soon) and had been able to very successfully control it with diet, but I had been eating a relatively high protein and fat and low carb diet (following my favorite dietician’s, Lily Nichols’, guidelines). The evening I was 41+1 I decided to “sacrifice” one meal and eat a high carb dinner–I actually ate the same meal I did the night I went into labor with Miss F.

Around 2am my normal nightly cramping started. It was relatively mild and would subside in certain positions, so I was sure it was no different than the previous nights. I tried to purposefully lay in positions where the cramping was the strongest, and eventually they weren’t subsiding, although they were still very mild and ten or more minutes apart. I was too wide awake to fall asleep, so I folded some laundry and made a batch of peanut butter-oatmeal energy balls to pass the time.

Around 4am I decided that I should probably try to get some rest, in case this was indeed the start of labor, but I was pretty restless in bed which woke up Dan. I told him that I was having more regular cramping, possibly mild contractions, but that they were very irregular and far apart. He was also convinced it was no different than all the previous nights, but after I had to breathe through a few he began to time them. While they were still seven to ten minutes apart, some were one to two minutes long, so we began to think that perhaps this was the very early stages of labor and both tried to rest.

By 5am I was uncomfortable enough that Dan began loading the car with our hospital bags and my labor snacks, and I begged him to stop. I wanted to labor at home as long as possible, and because it seemed like labor had just started, I was convinced I still had a while to go. I didn’t want to show up to the hospital barely dilated and told Dan I at least wanted to wait until Miss F woke up for the day around 8am so we could get some quality time with her before leaving for the hospital. But suddenly at 5:30am, the contractions got immediately stronger and I had to focus to breathe through them. They also jumped to just two minutes apart and still a minute or more long. Dan made the executive decision that we had to leave for the hospital, so I donned my labor gown and texted Sarah to let her know to meet us there (she wasn’t on call that day but still wanted to do the delivery, bless her). We handed off Miss F’s monitor to my mom, briefly woke Miss F to let her know her baby sister was coming and give her one last kiss, and headed out the door.

The drive to the hospital was excruciating, as the contractions were getting stronger and stronger and I had to sit relatively still. At this point I was vocalizing a lot to cope with contractions, which I never had to do with Miss F, so I knew Dan had made the right decision to make us head to the hospital. At 6:00am we somehow got a close parking spot at the hospital but it still took forever to walk into the LDRP wing because I had to stop and rock back and forth during every contraction. Once inside I turned down the security guard’s offer for a wheelchair (sitting was the last thing I wanted to do!), we quickly got checked in, and I was taken back to triage.

While I am happy with our decisions to do hospital births with our daughters, triage is the one experience I wish we could have bypassed. In order to be admitted my dilation had to be checked (I was 6cm dilated and 100% effaced with my water still intact), and baby’s heart rate had to be monitored with a continuous monitor for a certain amount of time, which meant I was confined to a bed. Not only is laying in a bed one of the worst positions to help labor progress, but it also was extremely uncomfortable. All I wanted to do was walk around! Looking back on it, I should have spoken up for myself and told them I wouldn’t lay in the bed, but I was sure I’d be admitted quickly so I didn’t push back. We were stuck in triage for about an hour, though, because we got there right during the nursing shift change and they didn’t want to admit me to a room right in the middle of the patient handoffs.

As soon as the changeover was complete at 7am, I was admitted and our L&D nurse, Whitney, walked us back to our room. The walk again took a while even though it was just down the hallway, since I had to stop, vocalize, and rock through each contraction. Vocalizing is actually probably too mild of a word to use at this point–Dan later told me I was yelling and he had to keep reminding me to relax my jaw. Once we got in the room, hospital staff was still frantically getting it set up for a delivery. I made my way over to stand next to the bed, Whitney and Dan set a yoga ball on top of it, and I leaned my head and arms on the ball and rocked back and forth through contractions. Standing up was infinitely better than being confined to the bed in triage, and I could feel labor progressing. During each contraction I tried to visualize dilation happening so I would embrace the discomfort.

Whitney left to find Sarah, and Dan went out to the car to get my snacks, thinking we still probably had a few hours of labor and I’d need some calories. While he was gone I suddenly felt something change, and I initially thought I needed to poop right then. I quickly realized, though, that it was actually an intense urge to push and couldn’t quite believe that I already was near the end of labor.

Dan said when he walked back into the LDRP wing, he could hear me yelling all the way from the front desk–ha! That was definitely not how I imagined myself during this birth, but it felt like it was what my body needed to be able to ride out each contraction. Dan handed me an Outshine popsicle and the cool sugar was so refreshing. As soon as I could muster the energy to talk, I told Dan I needed to start pushing.

He rushed into the hallway to find Whitney, who was still looking for Sarah, and suddenly I was all alone in the room and involuntarily pushing–the closest thing I can relate the sensation to is throwing up, because I truly could not stop it. I realized I was quite literally about to push our baby out on the floor and all I could manage to do was squeak out “Help!” as Dan, Sarah, and Whitney rushed into the room. Sarah quickly reassured me I could start pushing and rushed over to my side right as my water broke with my first big push, dousing her in amniotic fluid. She urged me to slow down my pushing and breathe the baby out but I truly could not control the pushing reflex, and in three more pushes Miss E was born at 7:27am. If Sarah, Whitney, and Dan had been 30 seconds later, I think she would have been born on the floor!

Sarah quickly handed her up to me and encouraged me to sit down on the bed and hold her for skin to skin. I snuggled her while Sarah rubbed her vigorously. Her skin was bluish and she wasn’t crying, and I worriedly asked Sarah if she was breathing. Sarah reassured me she was, and was just taking everything in before crying. Her Apgar was 8 then, and five minutes later was up to 9.

Sarah, Whitney, and Dan helped me climb further into the bed. Within ten minutes, Miss E was alert and nursing for the first time. Sarah double-checked with me about administering a small injection of Pitocin for the placental delivery which I agreed to (again, weighing pros and cons), and she monitored my bleeding and progress with passing the placenta as I continued to nurse. Meanwhile, Miss E’s cord pulsed for a long time, so there was no need to clamp or cut it for probably 15 minutes, at which point Sarah helped Dan cut it. After I delivered the placenta, Sarah showed it to me with the amniotic sac still attached–so cool!

Because I pushed Miss E out so quickly, I did have some minor tearing that required a few stitches. Sarah gave me two lidocaine site injections–ouch!--and quickly stitched me up as I continued breastfeeding. At some point I realized Sarah’s jacket was covered in amniotic fluid since she hadn’t had a chance to don scrubs and I apologized, but she laughed and said it was totally fine and those were the types of labors she loved.

While my recovery with Miss F was pretty easy, my recovery with Miss E was a breeze. Because labor was so short I was not physically worn out, and for the rest of our hospital stay I frequently was up and moving around and had to be reminded to rest. Miss E nursed and slept well and was just the sweetest, snuggliest baby. Soon we got to return home and introduce Miss E to Miss F, who was just beside herself with excitement to meet her sister.

We are so grateful for a second healthy, beautiful baby daughter and do not take that blessing for granted. Miss E is actually our double rainbow baby, and one day I’ll share more about our two miscarriages between Miss F and Miss E. While the loss of our two angel babies is still heart-wrenching to this day, my perspective is now filled with so much more humility about and gratitude for our growing family.