Chloe’s Birth Story

I’m finally feeling a bit more clear-headed and wanted to share Chloe’s birth story. Even though I had gone through all of this before, I really loved reading stories from others prior to delivering. So, here is her birth story : )

First of all, I was convinced she was going to arrive in the middle of our house project chaos and come early. But to our surprise (and relief), she was a week late. My OBGYN had asked me on my due date if I wanted a membrane sweep to move things along and I said no- I really wanted her to just be here when she was ready. However, when I had hit 5 days past my due date and had to schedule a date for induction, I decided to go in to get that. I’m not positive that is what helped, but the chances were high. That next morning I woke up at 2:45am with continual, steady but lightly painful contractions over a two-hour period. This is exactly how I remember it with Parker- they started consistently and closer together, but later on, the pain came in (intensely). So, I hopped in the shower, Tyson took Parker and Trooper to my parent’s house around 5am, and then I decided to try and rest in bed and wait it out until they started getting a lot more painful. Well, just as I decided to get back into bed and ride them out, they stopped. I couldn’t believe it. I would get one maybe every hour? I was so frustrated. So, we just decided to do some morning errands and then around noon they picked back up again. This time, they were consistent and more painful, yet still not as painful as I remember so I waited as long as I could. The pain kept increasing and I just decided that we should head to the hospital in case things progress quickly. As we get to the hospital, I was about 4 1/2 cm dilated and the contractions were quickly getting so incredibly painful. I asked for the epidural as soon as I could get it, but the hospital was busy that day so I had to wait way longer than I wanted to. In the meantime, I knew from last time that I didn’t want any pain meds (they made my head feel too loopy last time).

The epidural finally came and the relief was everything. I felt like I could handle anything once that was in place. I was still shaking (I shake a lot in labor), so it took me a bit to get myself to calm down and relax, but before we knew it, just as the nurse was about to check to see how dilated I was at that point, my water broke. A full-on movie-style, huge balloon popping break. It went everywhere! All over the nurse, all over the table. We were cracking up. And then she goes to check my cervix and she looks at me and says “lindsay! don’t push! if you can control it all, you are about the have the baby and I need to get the midwife and set everything up.” I was considered a low-risk pregnancy so they had a midwife deliver (my doc was not there). She was just as amazing (the nurses do most with you anyway!).

Very similar to my first delivery with Parker, I pushed for about 10-15 minutes. In both deliveries, I have been so amazed at how easy and quick the pushing is. I know it is different for everyone, but at least in my experience it was always what I was so afraid of and it just so happened to be the easiest part.

So, with a few last hard pushes there she was. Our little Chloe Jean. Born Saturday, June 26th at 8:37pm.

They passed her right to me, covered in everything (when Parker was born they wiped him off fully first, but they’ve changed protocol since, which is really great). I was crying. I didn’t cry with Parker, probably because I was kind of freaked out about it all. But this time, I felt like I had waited so long for her, and I couldn’t believe she was here. They were tears of joy, tears of relief, tears of amazement… I also couldn’t get over how tiny she was- it actually made me worry for a minute and I even asked them “how much does she weigh??” as if they just knew (I had been holding her the whole time) haha! She was 7lbs 8oz. I haven’t seen a newborn in a while, clearly. She just seemed so little.

We moved to our recovery room for the night and had to basically be up all night with nurses in and out checking on us. I also couldn’t sleep the first night because I was watching her every move. So, the two of us spent a lot of time snuggling. Although it has been a bit painful, she has been such a great little eater. I was surprised at how much I was feeding her, but I was so grateful she took to breastfeeding well and it was such a special time to bond each time. My milk supply is so much fuller this time around and I really think the skin to skin and constant feeding has helped that.