Finally...Miles' Labor Story

The short version:

My youngest child apparently was very eager to meet his new family. He came out at roughly the speed of greased lightning. The midwives have informed us that if we have another child, we need to head to the hospital pretty much the instant I have my first contraction. I tend to agree since Miles' labor took a grand total of 4 hours from first contraction to final push. We went "au naturale"...no drugs, no forceps, no suction cups...and my girly parts are quite thankful for that.

The long version:

G was out grocery shopping while I napped with Dylan when the fun began. I managed to ignore or write-off the first few contractions since they were pretty far apart. By the 5th contraction or so, I started to suspect that it might, in fact, be the start of real labor. Just like with Dylan, it mostly felt like I needed to poop…you know those innard-twisting gas pains you get? Like that. So around 3 pm I got myself out of bed and went to the bathroom. By the time G showed up twenty minutes later I strongly suspected that the Schnegglet was on his way. He asked me if the contractions were regular and I said, “I don’t know…I’m too busy trying to poop to time them!” So he decided to go ahead and head out for one more stop on our grocery list.

While he was gone I started packing my hospital bag (since I’d superstitiously refused to pack it in advance…you’ll note that my theory panned out. No bag packed = baby showing up a week before my due date). So I’m running around gathering up my belongings and packing an overnight bag for Dylan with pauses for fairly frequent contractions when Dylan wakes up from his nap. I went in and chatted with him for a bit but was afraid to try taking him out of the crib for fear of getting hit by a contraction. So I sat in his rocker next to his crib and read him a few stories. At one point, Dylan got a little worried watching me sweat my way through a contraction, so I tried to explain what was going on. I reminded him of the story we’d been reading and told him that mommy’s muscles were pushing so that the baby could come out and informed him that he’d get to meet his baby brother the next day. (All-in-all I think I did a pretty good job maintaining a semblance of normalcy with Dylan through the contractions.) Then we decided to call Gramma. Dylan played in the crib and Gramma played long-distance babysitter while I again hit the bathroom (pretty sure I spent about 2/3 of my labor on the toilet).

G came home to the news that yes, this is definitely real labor and started getting Dylan ready while I hung out in the bathroom and continued chatting with my mom. He finally couldn’t take it anymore – he made me hang up and get my butt in gear. So I went to hit the shower. In the meantime, we started timing my contractions.

Funny side story? For the timing I yelled “Schatz! Noch eine!” (Sweetheart! Another one!) every time another contraction started. Ever since then, Dylan has run around yelling “Schatz!” whenever he wants his dad. He still refers to his dad as Schatz nearly 1.5 months later…

In any case, when G started timing, my contractions were already about 3.5 minutes apart. So he’s all, “what does that mean?!?” Not wanting to freak him out, I informed him that we didn’t leave for the hospital when I was in labor with Dylan until my contractions were about 3 minutes apart. Then I told him to call the hospital and let them know the status.

Of course the midwife ruined all my attempts to keep my husband calm when she told him to get me to the hospital ASAP since second labors are generally quicker. (Which definitely turned out to be the case for me…) At the same time, G’s unsuccessfully trying to get a hold of his mom. As luck would have it, they weren’t answering any of their telephones since they’d gone to take their car to the shop and forgotten their cell phones. So G starts calling his sister to arrange for her to watch Dylan. By this point my contractions have progressed to about every 2 minutes, too. All-in-all, my less-than-calm husband is starting to seriously freak out…G-style.

On the other end of the spectrum, I’m taking my sweet time since my labor with Dylan was so much better at home. Eventually G’s panic won out, though. As I’m entertaining Dylan while doing my hair and makeup he came upstairs and informed me that “we’re going to the hospital, not the bar!!” I finally finished up and we were ready to leave for the hospital. I did made G take the time for a few last-minute pictures…here’re the last shots of the Schnegglet on the inside… at 39 weeks 1 day.





Just as we were pulling out of the garage G’s sister called to tell us that her parents were home again and could take Dylan. So we headed to their house (and passed G’s dad on the way, he’d come to pick Dylan up but since he was already strapped in and they live 3 minutes away we figured it’d be faster to just drop him off ourselves.) So we took him to his Oma and I gave him goodbye kisses and waited out a contraction before jumping in the car again for the ride to the hospital. (I got a little teary-eyed saying goodbye to Dylan for the last time as my only child but thankfully a contraction hit and then I was teary-eyed for an entirely different reason.)

I’d been scared sh!tless of the ride since it was so horrific with Dylan…but it ended up not being so bad. At one point I said to G, “this ride is a lot quieter than the trip with Dylan.” He said, “well this car rides a lot quieter than the RAV did.” I laughed and said, “I’m talking about me…if you’ll remember you told me that Dylan’s first word was going to be “f*ck!”

We made it to the hospital around 6 pm and the midwife told us she figured we’d headed to a different hospital since it took us so long to get there. (At which point I thought G’s eyes were going to fall straight out of his head he was rolling them at me so hard). She also started asking all sorts of questions about my pregnancy and previous births. Turns out there was a paperwork mix-up since there were two Olschnoegger’s pre-registered at the hospital – they’d pulled my sister-in-laws records and weren’t finding my info quickly enough. (Cousin Paul was born on July 22nd). So G answered questions for the midwife and I provided the occasional answer he didn’t know from my position in the bathroom of the delivery room…(told ya I spent 2/3 of my labor on the toilet).

The midwife finally came and got me off the toilet to check my progress. I was at 5 cm. It was about 6:15 pm. She asked me how I’d envisioned my labor and I told her I’d like to go natural if possible since I thought the epidural was the start of my problems with Dylan’s labor. She called the OB and gave him my status and told him that I was having “good contractions.” I suppose that’s one way of looking at it.

Things progressed very quickly from there. By this point my contractions were pretty much constant and I was clinging to G to make it through them. Around 6:30 I informed the midwife that “I lied. I want the epidural, please.” She told me it was too late for the epidural since I’d already made it to an 8. Pretty sure that’s the point at which I started begging. She called the OB and they agreed that we’d passed the point of no return…I was doing this without drugs come hell or high water. About ten minutes later I told the midwife that I had to push. She called the OB to let him know that it was time. Turns out he almost missed it. (At one point the midwife was quite peeved wondering what was keeping him so long). The pushing was a turning point…now I wasn’t worried about drugs or wondering if I’d survive the never-ending contractions. Now I had something to DO. (And the upside to not having an epidural was being able to feel what I was doing…much more effective).

While pushing my way through a contraction, I christened the Schnegglet. In a classic Hollywood move, I gave G the evil eye and said, “his NAME is MILES.” His eyes were about the size of saucers as he just nodded in agreement. Poor guy never had a chance.

And so, at 7:02 pm – just about exactly four hours after I went into labor and an hour after we got to the hospital, we welcomed Mr. Miles William into the world.