Raylie's birth story

I had a doctors appointment on Tuesday, February 17, where they checked my cervix and I was not dilated at all but baby was at a plus 1 station.  I wasn't having contractions at all at that point.  After that appointment I did have some contractions but nothing major and I figured they were just from being checked.

Later that night on Tuesday I had some contractions around 9:00/9:30 that felt pretty strong.  However, since I had been having these kinds of contractions off and on over the past couple weeks I figured these too would stop in an hour or two and be more of the prodromal labor I had been experiencing since December.  I was able to go to sleep around 10:00 even though the contractions hadn't really stopped but seemed to have slowed down.  At 1:30 I woke up from contractions and finally decided to start timing them around 2:00am on Wednesday, February 18th.  The contractions were coming every 5 to 7 minutes and lasted approximately 45 seconds to 1 minute or 1 minute and 20 seconds.  They were not progressing or getting more intense so at this point I still thought they would fizzle out.  After another hour of these contractions not stopping (while changing positions/sitting/standing), and possibly feeling more intense, I decided to get up and walk around the house while chugging water to see if I could get them to stop and I could get some sleep.  Instead of stopping, the contractions started coming every 2-3 minutes and hurt enough that I was stopping and breathing through them, although I knew they did not feel at all like what active labor feels like.  At 3:30 (thirty minutes after I started walking around) I decided that maybe I should call the midwife on call to see what she thought.  I still expected the contractions to stop and be nothing.  The midwife suggested that I should come in since they were coming every 2-3 minutes just to see what was going on and that then I would be in a safe place to have the baby should I really be in labor.  I was hesitant since I figured that this was still my "false" labor.  As soon as I got off the phone and Jonathan asked me what was up I started crying (my first indication that this was possibly real this time yet I was still in denial).  I then called my mom to come be with Ryder and again started crying as I was telling her we had to go in, still feeling silly because I was sure the contractions would stop before we even got to the hospital.

On the way to the hospital the contractions did not stop, instead they seemed to be closer together and more intense.  I was right in assuming that labor in the car would be awful.  It was not fun because I really felt like I needed to stand up through the contractions.  When we arrived at the hospital at 5:00am they checked my cervix and I was dilated to a 1 which showed progress since the day before when I was a zero.  To be admitted into the hospital you have to be having contractions and showing progress (dilating) so they suggested I walk around for an hour and be checked again.  The first lap around the labor and delivery floor I had about 4 contractions that made me feel like I needed to stop and breath and began to have to lean on the wall through them.  I started to get excited and think that this might actually be real labor.  The next lap around and I knew this was real.  The contractions were coming every 10 feet or so we would walk and I could no longer walk/talk through them without extreme discomfort.  I began to feel like things were happening quickly and wanted to tell my mom to come in to the hospital even though we hadn't been admitted yet.  Our third lap around the floor was much more intense and I was really working through the contractions.  I decided that I could not walk anymore and started getting a strong desire to get admitted and into our real room, I knew at this point that things were happening very quickly.  I told Jonathan to text my mom and have her head in.  Finally an hour was up and at 7:10 my midwife, Mary Koske-Vogt, came in to check me.  She watched me through some contractions and then gave me the option to keep laboring for awhile or get checked.  Since they would not admit me until I was showing progress I opted to be checked, because at this point I knew things were getting serious and I really wanted to get a room!  She checked me and thank goodness I was now dilated to a 5.  In 45 minutes I had gone from a 1 to a 5, Mary was impressed with how quickly I had progressed and said that she would get them started on admitting me.  It felt like an eternity, but it was probably only about 10 minutes, and finally we were on our way to the room.  While walking there I had to stop 3 times to labor and joked that I was going to "bust this baby out."  Everyone laughed but I knew that it was no joke...

Almost immediately after being in the room the contractions started to feel really strong and I felt as though everyone was moving in slow motion while my labor was fast tracking it.  The nurse couldn't get the IV in my arm, which was torture to have her digging around in my arm while I was laboring, so they called in the specialist.  While waiting for that my contractions got even stronger.  My midwife came in to check me then momentarily left the room (thinking she had a little while before baby came).  I had one contraction that felt like transition and I had the fleeting thought of, holy hell this is awful I don't want to continue!  However, the next contraction my water broke, and since I was standing, it went everywhere... I told them, "my water broke!" and they all started stripping my clothes off while the next contraction started.  With this contraction I told them, "I'm pushing!"  My midwife told me to blow out the birthday candles (a technique to stop pushing we had discussed in centering) and ran across the room without gloves to squat behind me ready to catch my quick little baby.  I just kept saying, I need to get on the bed, I need to get on the bed.  That contraction barely let up and somehow I flung myself onto the bed and with the next contraction out came my sweet little baby.  She was so fast that I was only in active labor for 1 hour, pushed 2 times, and we were only in our room for 20 minutes by the time she was born.  Jonathan barely got to be involved since it was so quick and my mom missed it completely.  I must say, the quick delivery made up for the 3 1/2 months of contractions leading up to it!

Raylie Marie Pearson was born at 8:09 AM on February 18, 2015.  She weighed 6 lbs 10.9 oz and was 18 3/4 inches long.  She also had a full head of dark brown hair.  She is perfect.