I'm just going to start this post with a trigger warning. Death is not what is being described, but this post in going to involve the processing of some birth trauma, and so if this is something that may trigger you, I would strongly encourage you to not read.
Last night I sat down to start watching season 10 of Call the Midwife. I was pretty excited for this. Jordan was working late, the kids were in bed, and I'm a pretty big fan of the show. I've even read the books the show is based on. I got halfway through the first episode and then I couldn't go on. I was a complete mess.
Now I do cry a lot more since having kids. Like every time we watch Encanto, and the point in the finale hits where the townspeople show up and tell the Madrigals to lay down their burdens and let them help? Yup. I cry. Every time. I know it is coming and still I cry. So at first I chalked this experience up to that.
Except I couldn't stop crying. And along with the tears came the flashbacks.
The delivery room.
The red button on the wall getting pushed and help being called for.
Finding myself surrounded by doctors.
My baby getting rushed away.
A feeling of defeat.
I didn't realize I suffered from birth trauma until I was in the process of giving birth to Gwen. I had a healthy son and didn't feel that I should have anything to process or deal with trauma from. But now, for the first time, I'm going to actually sit and write and process what happened. So please bear with me.
Anson's Birth
It took us almost a year to get pregnant with Anson, something I know I have shared before. My pregnancy with him was about as smooth as they could go. I kept up my running until my midwife suggested I stop at 32 weeks to safe my pelvic floor. I even ran a half marathon at 20.5 weeks. I felt good. Anson was due October 18, so my plan was to still teach for the first six weeks of school, and then start my mat leave the Friday before my due date. Both Jordan and I were late babies, so we just assumed our kids would also push well beyond its due date.
The third week of school I got the strongest urge to make sure that I sat down with the three teachers who were taking over for me and make sure they knew where I was in each class and what my plan was for the next three weeks. I didn't actually think anything would happen, but figured better late than never.
I was also convinced our baby would be HUGE. I was 9lbs14oz, and Jordan was 9lbs at birth. So I didn't have any newborn clothes ready, only size 3mos. That same Friday I felt like I should hit the store and just pick up a few newborn things. Just in case. So I did. I then went home and, as was my custom, curled up in bed with our cats and took a nap.
Jordan came home and woke me up. His parents had stopped in. We were renovating our bathroom and they wanted to see the process. As I groggily made my way downstairs (seriously, I can see this happening as if it were just yesterday), I felt a sudden gush. I actually thought I was peeing myself, although I was vaguely aware that I didn't feel like I needed to pee. I remember clenching my legs to no avail, and at some point asking everyone to get out of the bathroom. My in-laws left and I went back upstairs. Jordan came up to find me in clean pants and smelling my old ones. I remember saying, "Well, either I just peed my pants, or else my water just broke."
Sure enough, it was my water. I was 36+2 weeks. We ended up at the hospital for an induction. After about 21.5 hours of induction, nothing was happening. My midwife looked at my belly and informed Anson that he had about 5 minutes to kick active labor into gear or else we were going in for a c-section. Within 5 minutes active labor started and in about 5 hours Anson was born. My midwife held him up for me to see and I got to announce "It's a boy" as we hadn't known the sex. He was placed on my chest and it was one of the most incredible experiences of my life.
And then he got pulled off and the peds team was called in. The midwife noticed something funny about how he was breathing and they had to take him to the NICU. I got stitched up, taken to see him (couldn't hold him yet), and then put in my room, where I spent the night listening to the couple beside me with their baby, all while wishing beyond all hope that I could have had my boy with me.
Anson and I spent the next five days in the hospital. Of the nights we spent there, I got to have him with me for one. The other nights were spent listening to other moms with their babies. Time spent trying to breastfeed, but because of his jaundice and the fact that he was early the nurses had be pump and bottle feed him. Every three hours I would go in, snuggle him, give him a bottle and then go back to my room and use the hospital pump to pump milk out that I would then give him at the next feed.
We got sent home on the Thursday. On Saturday we were told we had to take him back for another night because of jaundice.
By the time we got home, Anson was in the clear. There was never anything seriously wrong with him, he was just a bit early. In fact our doctor ended up declaring at his two month check up that you would never believe he was early and that he was right on track for his actual birth date.
Once he regained his birth weight I was able to stop only pumping for feeds and we were able to breastfeed.
So happy ending.
Which I why it never hit me that the whole process had been traumatic.
Gwen's Birth
Three weeks before Gwen was born Jordan implemented a new system at work. This meant that the man was putting in roughly 18 hour days, 6 days a week. One week before she was born we moved. Had one of my best friends not swooped in to help organize our move for us, I'm fairly certain Gwen would have showed up that weekend. Instead she graciously waited until I was 38+5 weeks.
I remember watching TV with Jordan the Saturday night after we moved and finishing my report card comments (and sending them to my partner teacher for editing). After texting a friend and colleague that comments were done, she jokingly texted back "So baby tomorrow?" And we laughed.
The next morning we headed to Canadian Tire to get some things for the house. While Jordan was inspecting new locks for the door, I started feeling a trickle. And then another one. And then another one.
We went home, I called my midwife, and by that night we knew that my water had broken. The midwife said she would call in the morning if she hadn't heard from us overnight. Cue the next morning where there were zero contractions or signs of Gwen making her appearance. We made our way to the hospital for another induction. Our midwife and I shared a few laughs as we listened to Jordan on the phone walking through someone how to copy and paste in excel.
12 hours after induction and 36 hours after my water broke, Gwen was born. Her labor was easier than Anson's and minus a pre-term labor assessment around 32 weeks my pregnancy with her was fairly smooth (no half marathons, but you can't win them all). And then she was born. And instead of Jordan cutting her cord and me getting that immediate skin-to-skin, all I saw was Gwen's very blue face. She was immediately taken to the warming table and the midwives had to get her oxygen.
This was the moment when I realized I may have suffered birth trauma from Anson's birth. As I watched another baby taken to a warming table it felt like the longest 30 seconds of my life. Jordan stood by me and we held our breath and were certain an eternity had passed.
The got Gwen breathing and she was placed on my chest and the only time I put her down after that in the hospital was when the nurses came to check her blood glucose levels. After two nights in the hospital we got to go home.
But because of the busyness with work, the next few months were a whirlwind of trying to find a routine, trying to settle into a house, and trying to allow my body time to heal while also taking care of my two kids.
Despite the blue face, Gwen was fine (and is currently riding a stuff Pluto doll calling in her horse), and while the circumstances and stressors around her birth were not at all ideal, I still didn't think I had anything to be traumatized by.
Ella's Birth
Cue our Covid baby, haha. Aside from the normal side effects of three pregnancies and four years, my pregnancy with Ella went smoothly. It was definitely different due to covid protocols (Jordan didn't get to come to any appoints or the anatomy scan with me), but Ella and I were healthy.
At 37 weeks I was officially on leave, my house was ready, and I was feeling soooo prepared for my baby to come. Then Jordan came home, told me he had been identified as a close contact of someone who tested positive, and that set off about a week and a half of him isolating in our attic and masking around us so that I could still leave to go to midwife appointments. We had hoped for an induction as baby was measuring big, but ultimately the call was made to try and not induce labor while Jordan was still isolating.
He came out of isolation when I was 39 weeks. My mom came and took the kids for the weekend on April 30 and they came home on May 2. Everything was again ready.
I put Gwen to sleep and as I was leaving her room that night I again felt that trickle. Followed by another. Despite the fact that only about 15% of women have their water break naturally before labor begins, it happened for all three of my kids. We called the midwife and we didn't even have to go in for them to double check if it was my water. We called our parents, figured out the plan for the next few days, and went to bed. After about three hours I woke up to contractions. I timed them, texted with my sister the nurse, called the midwife, and we headed to the hospital.
While I didn't have to be induced I did have some pretty significant back labor and so, like with the other two, I opted for an epidural. Everything seemed to progress normally with Ella's birth except that it felt like it took forever to push her out. Once her head was out the midwife wasted no time in pressing the red call button and calling for help.
Ella was stuck.
All of a sudden our delivery room was flooded with people. I was surrounded by doctors. Three different doctors stuck their hands into me in an attempt to get Ella free. The third succeeded. I remember feeling like a failure. Being overwhelmed with this sense of defeat as I tried to push my daughter out but couldn't. It felt like I was killing her.
I remember watching this not crying baby getting carried over to the peds team and the warming table. I remember seeing blue hands and blue feet. And then she was wheeled away. I remember lying on the table and just crying. They stitched me up and all I could do was cry.
The doctor working on Ella came in to tell me what had happened. Her head had been out for about four minutes while the rest of her body was still stuck inside. I later found out it was moderate-severe shoulder dystocia (both her shoulders were stuck on my pubic bone). They had to monitor her for organ failure and neurological damage because all the oxygen from her body had started rushing toward her head when it was the only body part out. He said she was looking really good but that they were taking this seriously and covering all their bases.
Once I was taken care of I got wheeled out to see Ella.
