Large Families Today

Our seventh child is here. After the most medicalized birth process I have ever had, I was pleased to meet him at 3:28 am on June 25th. He also has almost pitch black hair - after three blondies in a row. Finally a baby who looks like me!

Before Seamus was born, I had never had an epidural - or an induction beyond having my water broken while already in labor.  In fact, I was always the most non-medical patient and needed little intervention besides someone to catch the baby. I had never even had an IV in my hand before. But on Wednesday, June 24th, I went to my 38 week prenatal appoint pretty swollen in the 90 degree heat. I had started to call my ankles “trankles” because they looked like small trees. I also had trouble with swelling in my hands because of the heat.

At my appointment it turned out that I had high blood pressure - very unusual for me. My blood pressure is usually something like 112/68 and it was coming up repeatedly at 136/92…the “92″ being the disturbing number. I also had protein in my urine. These are all early signs of pre-eclampsia a condition that can get very dangerous very fast if not properly looked after.

Since I was already 4 centimeters dilated, my doctor told me to go to the hospital.  I said, “so, is this like, pick up my husband and get my kids ready for the night” go to the hospital? Or is it just “go to the hospital and get checked out” go to the hospital? My doctor said, “go pick up your husband.”

So, off I went…picked up hubby, made sure Lydia was prepared to babysit for the night and then made sure John took me out for a quick lunch first - since I knew they wouldn’t let me eat at the hospital!

Off we went - and then we sat in the hospital the majority of the day. I was continuously monitored and constanly getting blood drawn for this lab and that. We were, quite frankly, getting bored. And we kept thinking, if this is so emergent - why isn’t anything happening? We were starting to wonder if we should just go home. But after some late labs came back and we had a discussion with a nurse and then the doctor about the dangers of pre-eclampsia, we decided to go ahead and induce. Basically, our doctor said we could go home, but that I’d have to be on bedrest until the baby came. Having six other kids, that wasn’t really an option for me. Not to mention the fact that I would just be sitting around waiting for something bad to happen. It just felt like it would be better for both me and the baby if we “encouraged” him out right away. Even though I was only 38 weeks, I was pretty sure he was “fully cooked” - especially if my other births were any indication. And since I was 4 cm, I wasn’t worried that I wouldn’t be able to be induced.

However, since by this time it was already about 8pm and I was exhausted and ready for bed, I asked for the epidural. Why? Especially since I’ve always been against them? Well, honestly, I knew that once they broke my water and gave me a little oxytocin, that I’d have maybe five or six hours before I’d have to start transition and pushing…and I needed to rest. I thought that if I could just lay down and nap a little through my labor, I’d be able to get through the pushing phase. I know the risks of epidurals more than anyone. I have studied them thoroughly. But I didn’t need another birth “experience,” I needed my baby to come out quickly and safely and I needed to be rested in order to do that.

You know what? It worked brilliantly! I’m not sure I would ever do it again, but for what I needed it to do, I was able to rest and relax and get my labor going without raising my blood pressure even more. After my labor got going around 1:30 in the morning, I was very grateful for the epidural because I usually have very easy labors until about 8 cm and then it’s fast and intense. I could tell from the amount of pressure I was getting that I was in the “hardly catch your breath between contractions” phase.

Pushing was unusual. Because I didn’t have the painful sense of urgency to get “that baby out of me,” I really had to concentrate. I also really think that my natural childbirth experiences helped me because even though it wasn’t as painful (it was still painful though) - and I wasn’t missing the burning ring of fire - I knew that once the baby started to come through, if I could just stay on top of it and push and push - more than I had contractions for - he would come out quickly. And he did. I started pushing all 8lbs. 10 ounces of him at 3:14 and he was out 14 minutes later.

Really, after having had a 10 + pounder naturally, I wasn’t at all bummed out that little Seamus came to us early! He was still bigger than Matt (my first) and Matt was two weeks late!

After the birth, my doctor (who is more like a midwife), asked me if I felt I had lost anything in the experience by having the epidural. I thought about it and said that really, I hadn’t, but that’s largely because I had done it before the “regular” way. I missed, certainly, that adrenaline rush and the euphoric feeling after you work so hard for what seems like forever and you get your baby! I think that feeling must be essential, in some ways, to the bonding experience for first time moms in particular. I can’t imagine not having had my natural births to rely on for my knowledge of my body and of birth.

During my first birth, I had no idea what was coming. I got to transition and really thought to myself that if it got worse than this, I would die. I didn’t know that I was 10 cm and ready to push - it also didn’t help that my “doctor” made me lay flat on my back and push straight up into the air for two hours. But that birth - along with the episiotomy (it’s been 17 years and I can still feel that) and the other hideous and humiliating things that I went through - inspired me to learn more about birth and how to do it “better.” Which I did - the next five times, including a homebirth and a waterbirth.

I’m sure there are some in the natural childbirth movement who will be able to give me statistics about pre-eclampsia or whatever and tell me that I should have waited it out and had Seamus the old-fashioned way. But truthfully, for me, the only necessary outcome was a healthy baby - which was what I got. And after reading this story about a terribly tragic unassisted homebirth, I am glad I always try and err on the side of the baby - and not the experience.

As I have learned over the last year with Alex’s Type 1 diabetes and now this birth, while doctors might be trained to be a little more interventionist than I would like sometimes, they are not (as my ex-husband would have you believe) evil people who just want to make money off you. They are (mostly) very good people who just want to help you get through your problem and make you well. I certainly think that there is a lot in the health care system to reform, but the fact that there are places in the world where Type 1 diabetics starve to death because they can’t get insulin makes me overwhelmingly sad. And the fact that there are mothers who are so into having their own birth experience that they don’t put their child first makes me so overwhelmingly sad. Maybe God didn’t create synthetic insulin - or epidurals - but he created the people who did…and perhaps we should trust that a little more than we do.

Anyway…Seamus is here - he is well - and the Hogan’s are very happy that everyone is home, safe and well!