Baby Jace, and the Story of His Birth

        WARNING: This blog post is my birthing experience of Jace. I have in no way tried to make it appealing for all readers. It is my memory and set of experiences of what happened.  If it is too graphic for you, stop reading or toughen up a bit. There ya go, you have been warned ;)

     After being a week "overdue" I was starting to get a little bit anxious about our baby finally coming. I was handling it really well, but eventually had a few meltdowns worried that Paul would have to leave before the baby would be born. The midwives came to visit us on Tuesday, May 13 which would put me one week overdue. We had a nice visit, and I was a little emotional and they checked everything then left. Every week they have said see you next week. But this time they didn't. I didn't think much of it until that night, then I started to think about it and realized they hadn't said that, so I became hopeful that baby would make it before Paul had to leave. I scheduled a prenatal massage for that night, and had her work on the labor reflexology points. That night Paul and I finished our Harry Potter marathon that we started on Sunday, and I started having a few contractions here and there. They were not consistent and didn't get more intense, so I tried not to think much of it or get too excited incase nothing happened.
     A little after midnight I woke up to contractions. I went to the bathroom and experienced my "Bloody Show." I figured that is what it was but I wasn't sure and it made me a little nervous. I went back to bed and tried to sleep, but my contractions continued to be regular. They were at that point between 8 and ten minutes apart. I tried to rest and sleep and was able to stay in bed for another hour or so. I then started to get a little more nervous as I continued to have more "Show" each time I used the bathroom. I didn't know what to expect or anything so I had Paul call the midwife. Good thing Paul called and not myself, because I was losing my midnight snack halfway through the phone call. She had us track the contractions for half an hour then report back to her.
     My wonderful husband Paul stayed up with me and played Farkle while we tracked the contractions. They were between 2 and 5 minutes apart-ish at that point. Lily had us try to get some sleep and see how things went. I thought she was crazy because they were so close, but I trusted her judgement and I didn't want to have the midwives hovering over me while I was laboring. I tried to lay down and was able to sleep for maybe 45 minutes, but laying down made my contractions more intense. I let Paul sleep and just got up and paced the house breathing through each one. I tried to eat a coconut water popsicle to give myself some electrolytes since I had now lost my "lunch" about 3 times and was able to eat about half of it before I thought I might make myself sick again.
     At about 6:30 I finally woke Paul up and had him call Lily again. She had us track contractions again and they only continued to get stronger and stronger. We tracked them together for half an hour then reported back. She said she would send over her attendants to check vitals. At this point I was getting anxious and wanted to fill up the birthing pool or get in the shower to help myself relax and ease the contractions, but Lily told me to wait. so I did my best. I continued pace the house and let myself sink into the trance of "laborland" where I was basically zoned out of everything but listening to and working with my body.
     Sara showed up finally showed up around 7:40, mind you this is partially from Paul's perspective because I was zoning in and out each time I had a contraction. He talked me through things and paced with me a little bit and I was able to breath through most of them. After Sara checked vitals I asked her when I could get in the water, and we finally started filling up the tub, but I had to wait for it to be filled and I seriously felt like the pool would never finish filling up!
     At this point I truly started to question my ability to go through with all of this because the contractions began to be very intense and even squeezing Paul's hand made it hard to get through. Thankfully the pool was nearly full and Sara let me get into the water. I am grateful that the midwives weren't over at my house tracking my every contraction because I was able to relax and do my thing. When Sara did show up, I thought it might bother me or that I might not be able to relax quite as much. Especially since I like to pretend I am tough and don't like other people to see me in pain,  but I was able to stay relaxed and keep doing my thing even with other people watching me.
     There was a night and day difference, truly, between being in the water, and being out of the water. As soon as I got into the pool I could easily manage the contractions. They just felt more like pressure. Also, I felt like it was time to start pushing. Slowly but surely our son started to make his entrance into the world. With each contraction I was able to breathe and push and work with him, and in between each contraction I was able to relax and almost sleep. It was great. I was able to put myself "into a state of deep relaxation," as quoted from my hypnobirthing cd track. As I think back on it, I really just remember breathing and pushing, then just total calm, then more breathing and pushing, and more total calm. And it wasn't even pushing pushing. I was just breathing with my body while it kind of did its own sort of pushing thing. I don't think I opened my eyes very much through most of the process. Paul sat in the tub with me and dabbed my face with a cool washcloth which was a huge blessing for me. In the beginning, Paul didn't want to really be in the tub because after the baby is born, it is a little gross, but he was such a champ and sat with me the whole time.
     Slowly but surely baby made his way. My body started to get tired after a while especially my legs, but thankfully the water made it so there was less resistance and work that I had to do, so I didn't run out of energy. I felt a pop and mentioned something to Lily. She said, "did you feel the pop in your head?" or something like that, and my cheeky response, while i was still zoned out and in labor land, was, "no but I sure felt a pop in my vagina!" That pop apparently was my water breaking. The baby started to crown and Lily said, "Kylee reach out and touch your baby, he is almost here." I said something along the lines of, "I think I will wait until he is here." Lily did have a mirror that she put into the water so that Paul could look down and see that there was a baby. Glad I didn't look, 'cuz man that would have been weird to see! Somewhere during this phase of labor someone made a comment about keeping calm or something, and Paul started to sing "Soft Kitty" from big bang theory to me. I laughed in my head, but I was relaxed and zoned out so my outward appearance was just a small smile on my face, but Paul saw it and knew that I had acknowledged his comments. Multiple times the midwives asked me, "are you sure this is your first baby?" I am interpreting that to mean that I took things and handled them very well?? Anyway, several more contractions, pushes and breaths....
     And then, baby popped out. It was a weird feeling beyond explanation. I remember pressure, and a little bit of a burning sensation, then a pop as his head came out. Then another feeling to push and breathe and another set of stinging burning sensation mixed with pressure and another pop and the rest of him came out. I was still trying to remain relaxed so my eyes were closed as he made his grand entrance. Don't know what it looked like, but poor Paul got to watch it all!
     Lily snatched up the baby and plopped him on my chest and I just got to sit and look at my cute little messy babe. He started breathing while he was on my chest and I remember feeling like I had just witnessed the most beautiful and perfect experience in my life. The spirit was so strong, and amazing, but I didn't cry. Which is impressive, because I cry at everything. Paul says he almost shed some tears, but didn't quite.
     Paul and I just sat there for a minute with the baby while they checked his heart beat and the umbilical cord and his breathing. We mentioned to each other that he needed a name, and we actually checked to make sure he was a boy, which he was, and decided that we didn't know what to name him yet so we would wait a little bit. The midwives told me it was time to get out of the water so that I could pass the placenta, blech! Good thing they had me get out when they did, because basically soon as I got out of the water, before they were ready, here came the placenta! Sorry to be graphic but man it was all over the floor! They had just pulled me out of the tub and tried to get me to sit on a birthing stool with a bunch of pad things under it, like the ones you train your dog to pee on instead of peeing in the house. Guess I didn't want to feel like a dog because that placenta just popped right out before I ever got to the stool. No worries, the floor was covered with lots of plastic wrap so it wasn't a big deal that I didn't quite make it in time. They had me sit in that stool after the placenta popped out to "check" me. They said I tore just a tiny bit, but it was hardly anything and would heal quickly. That was a relief for me, because a lot of my friends tried to scare me with horror stories of tearing all the way. No stitches for me, YAY.  Paul got to hold the baby and cut the cord. It was really cute to watch him because he was so hesitant at first and worried about hurting the baby. He did a great job though. Once the cord was cut he took baby and carried him while I got myself cleaned up. Well not really cleaned up, just cleaned the placental painting that was up and down my legs off, and put on my "sexy" panties. Who knew you could describe a depends as sexy panties, (midwives say they are sexy because you can rip them right off), guess that is sexy. Anyway, yeah, I got to wear a depends. Weird. But hey it was actually kind of nice to not have to worry about my insides leaking out onto my bed. Depends have you covered man, like all the way around not just a little!
     While I was laboring, one of the attendants made the bed in the other room, so by the time Paul and I were kind of cleaned up, we could get into our own bed and snuggle with our little baby. We finally decided that we should let our parents know that we had a baby. I feel like everything happened so fast that we didn't even call them to let them know we were in labor. Truly though, I am grateful that Paul did not call or text our parents. I was able to labor in my own space and not worry about delivering a baby to appease everybody. We sent a text to just our parents and let them know. We didn't say much except for that Baby Burnett was born at 10:05 on May 14th. We had no name still, and the midwives hadn't taken him to be weighed and measured so we didn't want to tell the whole world quite yet.
     The midwives had me feed him for the first time before they took him and weighed him and measured him. That was interesting, breast feeding for the first time. But it was nice to have someone to give me pointers and advice because I really didn't know what I was doing. Sometime during all of this Paul jumped in the shower, which I am sure he was ever so grateful for. After they checked our vitals one more time, the midwives left our room to clean up a few things, and Paul and I had some time to ourselves. We sat and pondered for a minute about the name that we wanted and what we felt like we should name him, and made our decision. We both felt like Jace was what he should be called, and we had both had separate experiences over the past week that had brought that name continually into the forefront of our minds. The rest they say, is history. I don't remember how the rest of the day went.
    I took a shower at some point, which was heavenly, and also weird not having a massive belly to be in the way. It was also weird because instead of my massive hard belly I had a gelatinous belly that flopped all over the place because my muscles hadn't tightened up yet. Point of all of that, I got a shower. I fed Jace a few times, and basically rested in my recliner a  good portion of the day. Lisa came to visit for a few minutes, our neighbors came over, and we were brought dinner by the relief society president. I don't know if I took a nap or what I did, but thats ok. I remember the important parts.
     Those first moments with Paul and Jace and myself just sitting in the tub together gave me a feeling of completeness. Our family is starting to take shape, and our son is here with us. I feel more love than I thought possible. I can't wait to see what the future brings for our little family.

 

Our first few moments looking at our son. Look how little he is!

Paul was so supportive through the whole process. I am so grateful that he is such a trooper!

Just lookin at my baby. Man my farmers tan is awful!!!

First picture ever taken of Jace with clothes. He looks really chubby because of how he is swaddled. He really isn't too chubby yet. 

Jace Boy with his eyes open the day he was born. He really likes to have his eyes open. Unless he is sleeping. From the minute he started breathing, he has had his eyes open lots and lots of times.