Charlotte is Born Part Three

With the doula sent home for the night at our request, and the declarative statement from the head nurse notifying us that the baby would not come today, I finally was able to relax into a state of normalcy alone with my wife. After two years of limited company, it always feels a little strange to share an extended amount of time with friends, let alone a relative stranger. We were both happy to have our doula there to ease our worries, but sending her home for the night allowed us to reconnect and keep us feeling grounded in the reality that something special was coming soon.

We were instructed to get some rest after a full day with little progress, but while I was able to catch a few hours, Sami did not sleep that second night in the hospital. At five in the morning her contractions had intensified to the point that she woke me up and asked my to count her through them. This was something we had started practicing a few weeks ago. She found it comforting when I would count to twenty by fives. This routine helped Sami to focus and get through each surge.

"Five (two, three, four), Ten (two, three, four), Fifteen (two, three, four), Twenty."

At 6:30 a.m. we called the doula at home and she was at the hospital by 9:00. In the meantime, Sami continued to be examined about every two hours, each time by a different nurse or intern, which only confused and frustrated us as the numbers shifted between varying degrees of readiness. During the morning and into the early afternoon, Sami alternated between sitting on the toilet and standing over a chair. Between contractions, she felt the urge to use the toilet, and went and sat down. When a surge started, she would move from the bathroom to a chair between the bed and the couch. Her comfort zone was standing and facing the chair while leaning forward, hands rested on the chair's arms. She swayed her hips back and forth as either I, the doula, or both of us performed light touch massage on her back, stroking up and down with the backs of our hands. All the while, I would count off:

"Five (two, three, four), Ten (two, three, four), Fifteen (two, three, four), Twenty."

This constant routine, which also included periods of pacing back and forth while I followed along pushing the IV stand, caused Sami's legs to weaken, and the frequency of the contractions left no time for recovery. During our routine I also used a stopwatch to time the duration of, and time between contractions. That entire second day, they were coming every two or three minutes and lasting at least 90 seconds. Finally, after a five minute contraction that felt like an eternity, my wife, who plans everything out to the very last detail, and who has better judgement than anyone I know, made the decision to let the staff administer an epidural.

At first, I was a little disheartened by this, and attempted to encourage her that she could do without it. The biggest thing for me was that I didn't want her to miss out on that natural high we had learned so much about during our hypnobirthing classes. I thought that using the crutch of the epidural would undermine all of our efforts, and would render all of our efforts preparing for a natural birth by hiring coaches, studying and practicing, moot. Our doula suggested that we talk it over and come up with a decision together, but by this time, Sami's mind was made up. To be honest, I wasn't completely on board with the decision and left outside to get some air and clear my head, while the staff came and did their thing. I laid down on top of a short retaining wall on the sidewalk and dozed with arms crossed as people walked by.

When I came back inside 20 minutes or so later, Sami was asleep on the bed. I curled up on the couch and listened to my iPod. James Taylor. Easy listening. Half asleep, I heard an intern come in and say that Sami was at 6cm. This was the most progress we had made in nearly 40 hours. All it took was for Sami to listen to her body, which was telling her to relax, and that she was trying too hard. The epidural turned out to be a smart decision. If we would have tried to go without it, the doctor may have opted tfor a c-section since it had been so long since Sami had lost her amniotic fluid. Shortly after, a nurse came back and we were at 10cm.

They moved us back into the delivery room, the same room we had spend the first night and day in. It was quite the production when a procession of nurses and myself moved all of the furniture and our bags out to prepare the room for delivery. They wheeled in a plastic bassinet that the baby would be placed in, and it was at this moment when everything became real. The time was 4:00 p.m. and we had been at the hospital for 39 and a half hours. Two incredibly young interns were there with the doula and me. One of them gave us updates and instructed Sami to push. Sami was a natural pusher and the intern complimented her and seemed relatively giddy at my wife's strength.

At 4:40 the intern said she could see the top of the head when Sami pushed. I couldn't see anything because I was at Sami's side. She said that she absolutely had to hold onto my hand on her left, and the doula's on her right. I thought that Sami was entirely focused, and almost on another level of concentration, so I was surprised when she instructed the interns that under no circumstances were they to administer an episiotomy. Apparently, she was able to hear someone utter the 'p' word. Whether it was in English or Korean, I will never know.

At around 5:00 p.m. I saw the top of the head. I couldn't believe how much hair there was, and I relayed this to Sami who was thrilled, not so much about the hair, but by the fact that I could see and it was real. The doctors asked if she would like a mirror, but she declined, preferring to focus all of her energy on getting the thing out of her. Soon, a number of nurses joined in the tiny room. Too many I thought, and Sami became uncomfortably hot. One of the nurses, no doubt in need of a job, and the doula attempted to cool her off by fanning her with brochures or stapled packets of paper.

Sami getting fanned

At around 5:15 or so (whatever time it was, in hindsight, I will always remember it as the last possible second), the doctor came in. All of a sudden, Sami ceased to be the most important person in room as all of they young women swarmed to attend to the doctor. He slowly, but deliberately got all of his things in order including draping Sami's lower half with a canvass blanket that had an opening for the baby. Sami was instructed not to push while all this was going on, despite a desperate urge to. The doula had her opening her mouth and letting out short, breathy, "ha, ha, ha"s.

The doctor was extremely calm and made me feel comfortable that everything was occurring at the normal rate. It seemed like for the longest time I could only see that silver dollar sized piece of crown. Sami lifted her hips while pushing, and the doctor told her not to, but then said that she could if it made her comfortable. I was watching the whole time and thought that there was no way a baby was making it out of such a tight space.

Just as I was thinking this, however, her head popped out and a swarm of hands descended on her, one holding a suction squirter that they put into both nostrils. It was 5:36 p.m. I looked at her, coneheaded, purple and covered with slimy vernix, and a wave of love rushed over me. I was snapping pictures with my camera, no doubt thinking about this blog, when someone handed me the scissors and instructed me to cut. Then the baby was moved to Sami's chest. We looked into her tiny marble eyes, saw her red mouth and impossibly long fingers and both cried tears of joy. I was so proud of Sami this moment, and just couldn't believe how much work she put in to getting our baby out.

Pretty long baby for being 4 weeks early. Her feet look just like her mom's and her hands look just like mine.

Those are my hands there with the scissors.

I was about 5 or so minutes too slow, but you get the idea.

In hindsight, nothing really went according to plan during this, our first, birth experience. We weren't able to make it to our first choice of a birthing center, but we still had a birth plan listing all of our wishes. We wanted to avoid having an epidural, but Sami knew her body and made the correct call. We wanted to refrain from clamping the umbilical cord, but the nurses did this immediately. We wanted the vernix to remain on the baby's skin for as long as possible, but they wiped her down right away. We wanted to birth the baby in a position where gravity could help do the work, and we definitely didn't want her to strain. Instead, she birthed on her back (legs were just too tired to squat), and she pushed just like they do in the movies.

Despite all of this, we will always look back fondly on all of the steps taken during the nearly 42 hour labor. With each day that passes, we forget a little bit about the experience, but our love and understanding of our resulting daughter only continues to grow.

Baby (name undecided at birth) born July 26, 2011 at 5:36 p.m. Soonchunhyang University Hospital, Seoul, Republic of Korea