Lost Some Sleep

Lost Some Sleep

I lost some sleep last night. But I am hoping it will mean improved sleep in the future.

Patrice is 15 months old. I love her to pieces. I do not love the postpartum depression and anxiety that came with her. Yesterday was a bad one. The weight of anxiety settled in my chest. My thoughts went haywire, the panic level rose and rose and rose. It came, it hit, it suprised, it scared me.

Now, I’ve known since the day she was born there were some things I regretted. Bear with me here. I had planned an all natural, unmedicated birth. Her labor was by far the most intense of my three. I swear each contraction started at my toes, shot up my body and overwhelmed me. I knew yelling was counterproductive, but the birth was so primal, I yelled. I used the birthing tub, my midwife did counterpressure, hubby counted through each contraction and swayed with me.

And yet, toward the end, my midwife offered me nubaine through my IV. I accepted. They got 1/2 a shot of medication in and had to stop because Patrice’s heart rate dropped. Then started a very intense pushing phase. Patrice was stuck, her cord was wrapped around her head, shoulders and neck. I would push, her heart rate would plummet and she wouldn’t come down.

I remember hearing my midwife ask for an operating room to be opened. Then I heard her say “push, push for your baby NOW!”

Out she came. Blue.

My midwife cut her cord, she turned pink and was yelling.

I have struggled with feeling like I failed. I told my midwife shortly after her birth, “I know I will regret the decision to take the meds, but it was wth right decision.”

Promptly, I forgot the right decision part and was consumed by the feelings of failure. I have struggled with that ever since.

Many people have told me I did a good job. My midwife, and she would know, huh? My hubby, but what does he know about birth? My midwife told me she hoped I could some day embrace my birth. That I did a great job and could stand tall about my unmedical birth. Recently hubby and I talked about it again. He so patiently reassured me. He said, “I saw Patrice when she came out, that cord was all over her. It was a struggle. Maybe your body knew it needed the medication to get her out. [Midwife] and I talked about it, she asked me how sta-dol had helped you with Sue’s birth, we decided medication might be good. You didn’t, we did. You never asked for it, we offered it.”

I still heard failure in there. I still heard me needing, not able to get Patrice here without help. I felt some better, but the pain was still there. Until last night.

He’s right, I never asked for it. I wasn’t on the verge of asking for it. People I trust greatly, offered it. I trusted them before then, and after then, why not then? Of course, then. And it did help me get Patrice here, without a surgical birth and safely. She was in distress. I had to push without the help of contractions. Simply by sheer force of will. And I did it. If that little bit of Nubaine allowed me to birth her safe and sound, then I did the right thing.

That thought process may not sound like much, but it is so freeing to me, it caused me to almost wake up my hubby to tell him, late at night. I wanted to call my midwife and spill it all to her, again, late at night.

A weight has been lifted. I can now embrace Patrice’s birth. I may have lost some sleep last night, but I have turned a corner.