Mild contractions started at about midnight on Sunday night.  At around 2 am, the contractions were about 5-7 minutes apart, lasting about a minute long, but nothing consistent and nothing I felt was “hard” labor. I couldn’t talk but I wasn’t feeling doubled over in pain. I laid on my side and took deep breaths, trying to relax everything. B was great with stroking and rubbing my back and making me feel as comfortable as possible. At around 6 am, during a contraction, I felt a ‘pop’, a gush, and knew my water broke. I called Bethesda and they told me to take my time and come on in. I had a little oatmeal around 5 am and was feeling pretty good. We both got cleaned up, B loaded the car while I laid down on the bed and waited for him to come get me.

We got to Bethesda around 7:30 (we really took our time getting there) and went to triage. They checked my vitals and asked me if I wanted an epidural. I said no I wanted to try this naturally. In the middle of another contraction, the triage nurse told me to “hee hee haw” and the slow deep breathing I was doing was going to cause me to hyperventilate. At that moment I thought this was going to be the worst experience of my life. It turns out the next nurse on the rotation for a patient was pushed back and we ended up with a nurse who was very familiar with the Bradley Method and the only midwife at Bethesda was there that day working a shift!! I couldn’t tell you how incredibly happy I was when I found this out. At around 8:00, the midwife checked me and said I was 6-7 cm. I was so absolutely thrilled and was shocked I was that far already. When I got into my room, it really started to get intense, about a minute or two apart lasting about a minute. I ended up being really vocal throughout the whole thing but it seemed to help deal with the pain. All of a sudden I felt the “urge to push” (at about 9:30) and they told me to push when I felt I had to. I was laying on my side and wasn’t quite comfortable and that’s when the nurse offered me a bar so I could squat on the bed. Totally awesome! They never counted or directed me to push they just let me do my thing and after about 25 minutes of pushing, she was born. I couldn’t believe how fast it went and how soon you forget the pain afterwards and going natural was so totally and completely worth it.

The whole time I was there, every time my nurses switched over, the new nurse would make a comment about me being their “natural birth mom” and the “mom who squatted” and how that never happens there. The L&D nurse said I made their month because they never get a chance to do unmedicated births. The funniest part was, about ten minutes after I had her, the anesthesiologist showed up to ask me if I wanted the epidural! His facial expression was hilarious when he saw the baby and realized I didn’t use any medications.

Just wanted to share. I couldn’t have done any of it without B’s support and love.