Growing up and even in adulthood, my second biggest fear (first = frogs) has always been childbirth. When I was little, I just knew by the time I had babies, men would be able to carry and birth them. So at 27, I was really scared when I found out I was pregnant because that meant I would have to eventually push a baby out.
I was much more afraid of the actual delivery part than I was of the labor part. I just KNEW I could handle the contractions. I have a really high pain tolerance and my uterus is super strong because I’ve really never even felt menstrual cramps (more on this later). What I was afraid of was the actual pushing the baby out part. I’m not even going to go into detail about WHY I was scared of this because the details are gross.
So, here I am, 4am the day after my due date, timing contractions while lying in bed…and they didn’t even hurt, because of my strong uterus and incredible pain tolerance. Suddenly, I heard and felt a pop from my insides and felt a gush of water. So I got up, went to the bathroom. More water, definitely not pee. So I went and cleaned the kitchen, because that’s what you’re supposed to do when you’re in labor right?
After I cleaned the kitchen I woke A up and we headed to the hospital. We forgot the iPad so we turned around and got it, because I have a really high pain tolerance and the contractions that were 2 minutes apart didn’t even hurt.
We get checked into the hospital, the nurse checked to see if my water had actually broken and she said it hadn’t, but when she checked my cervix for dilation, there was a HUGE gush of extremely warm water. I was so shocked at how much it was and how warm it was.
A few minutes later, I was brought to reality. I do not have a high pain tolerance, contractions hurt, and I am a big baby.
I was crying and begging for an epidural... which I had already planned to get anyway, I just wanted it IMMEDIATELY. Two hours later I finally got it. My family came in; we hung out, laughed, and told stories. It was nice and I was pain free.
At this point, baby didn’t have a name yet and we had called him Bubby the whole time I was pregnant. Maverick and Cyrus were top contenders on the list. We had the TV on during this relaxed pain free time and the movie Maverick was on. A and I exchanged glances like “ok that’s a sign, his name is Maverick.”
At noon, I was 10cm, but baby had his head turned weird so they had me lay on one side for a while, then on the other side for a while. I began feeling pressure (but no pain) in my butt and the nurse said I was ready to push. It was just A, the nurse, and I in the room for a while as I did “practice pushes”. People started filing in after a few minutes, nurses, pediatric people, my doctor, students????....there were a lot of people and they all cheered for me while I pushed. It was nice. After a couple pushes and my doctor yelling “THINK ABOUT YOUR BUTT” at me, I guess he realized my pain free pushes weren’t very effective, so we kind of played tug of war with a towel. It was hard but everyone was cheering and it made it kind of fun. After 30 minutes of pushing, Maverick Redd was born. He was 8lbs, 7oz, 21.75 inches long, and perfect.
He is three years old now and still perfect.