Riverson Pierce Roubinek

My pregnancy came to an end last Thursday morning at 3:55am on October 28, 2010 when little Riverson Pierce Roubinek took his first breath.  While it wasn’t the birth I had planned for, it turned out better than I expected.

On Tuesday, I had my last weekly appointment where my midwife stripped my membranes.  I told her that I had tried everything to put myself into labor, including pregnancy massage and spicy food, among other things.  Bottom line, I was getting desperate to get this baby out!  I found out I was dilated to a 3, still, but after she stripped my membranes, she said she would be very surprised if I didn’t go into labor that night.  Well, I didn’t go into labor and I was so upset about it.  I ended up going to bed, giving up on the idea that contractions would start.

Wednesday night, we had my parents over to grill out for the first game of the World Series.  Good things started happening during the game, but unfortunately, those good things were not on the baseball field.  They were in my belly!  Contractions started.  I wasn’t sure it was the real thing, but I started timing them just in case.  At first they were 5 minutes apart.  I took a shower and stayed busy around the house, hoping to encourage the contractions to continue.  It must have worked.  I was definitely in labor by about 11 and I knew I wanted to stay home for a while to labor at home.  I spent every contraction on my hands and knees or with the use of the birthing ball.  The only comfortable position was like this.

By about 2:30, my mom asked how far apart they were and I told her they were 3 or 4 minutes apart.  We both decided it was time for me to go to the hospital.  I woke Jeff up and told him I needed to go.  My mom was planning to stay behind with Langston until my step dad could get there to relieve her.  We walked out of the house about 3:15 and by this point, my contractions were VERY intense.  Before we got out of our neighborhood, I had to find a comfortable position and that meant I was back on all fours.  My booty was facing the windshield.  My head was on the back of Jeff’s seat.  My knees were in my seat, and my hands were on the console.  Jeff said, “Are you ok?”  All I could say was, “It REALLY hurts.”  He immediately turned on the hazards and we were headed down the highway as fast as we could go.  Fortunately, it was a quick trip and we pulled up to the emergency room entrance.  Jeff tried to get me a wheelchair, but I told him I wanted to walk.  The ER nurse tried to get me to ride in the wheelchair to Labor and Delivery but there was no way I could sit that long.  I decided to walk, even though the walk was long.

When we got to Labor and Delivery, they immediately put me in a room and told me to put a gown on.  After I did that, they hooked me to the monitor and the nurse started asking me lots of questions.  They were dumb questions, but I know she was just doing her job.  However, she asked me THREE TIMES how much I weighed and how tall I was.  All the while, my head was hanging off of the bed and I was in EXTREME pain.  I could not get in a comfortable position and tried to get on all fours in the bed.  I wanted to go without an epidural, but I told Jeff, “I don’t think I can do this!”  She still had not checked me to see how far along I was, but continued to ask me questions.  Jeff finally told her, “These contractions are getting to be really close together.”  After that, she decided she would check me and asked me to get on my back.  After another minute or two, I was finally able to stand being on my back.  She checked me and said, “She’s fully dilated.  We aren’t going to have time to wait for Aliza (my midwife).  This baby is coming now.”  She started hollering for other nurses and asked for someone to call the nursery.  I could sense the nervousness in her voice and it started to make me nervous.  Fortunately, I didn’t have time to let that nervousness bother me too much.  I started to feel the baby moving down and almost immediately, I knew I needed to push and I needed to push VERY SOON!  Within a minute, I heard a pop and saw the nurse do a little “jump back” .  My water had broken and it sounded like a water balloon had splattered on the floor.  The poor nurse got a little soaked in the process.  When I say “poor”, I mean “I feel so bad!”  The nurses were trying to get me to calm down and were telling me NOT to push.  I thought they were crazy and I was yelling back at them telling them I had to get the baby out and I HAD to push.  At that point, my body started taking over  and I couldn’t help but push.  The nurses told me that anytime I felt the urge to push, I needed to pant like a puppy.  So, like they said to do, I found a spot on the ceiling to concentrate on and I started panting like CRAZY!  I felt like an idiot, but at that point, I didn’t care.

Two pushes later, and he was out, at 3:55am!

The first thing I said was, “I feel soooo much better.”  They took the baby over to the warmer and did all of the necessary things they needed to do.  He weighed in at 8 lb 6 oz and was 21 1/2 in long.  He was almost a pound bigger than Langston and two inches longer.  I’m sure it helped that he was in over a week longer than Langston.

It seemed like forever before I was able to hold him, but eventually, they brought him to me and the first thing I noticed was how much he looked like Langston did as a newborn.  He had a head full of hair and a face that looked just like his brother.

More of the story and many more pictures to come……

Part two can be found here.