Charlie’s Birth Story

Hello friends! It’s been a LONG while since I’ve posted. Pregnancy and taking care of Jack and Remy took a lot of my energy over the past 8-9 months and keeping up with the blog fell to the back burner. I wanted to share more about my pregnancy with Charlie and was sad I didn’t, so I will give you a quick run down on my pregnancy before I share how he came into this world. 

I found out I was pregnant while Mitch was traveling and I was up visiting my friend in Dallas. We went to a pure barre class and I felt like I had heartburn, which was the first thing I noticed when I was pregnant with Jack and Remy, too. Heartburn isn’t normal for me, so I pretty much knew right then that I was pregnant. When I got back to Houston the next day I took a test and sure enough a super faint line showed up. I told Mitch when I picked him up from the airport  a day or two later and he was for sure shocked and scared 😉 The twins were only 13 months at the time, so it was kind of crazy to be pregnant again, but I’ve always wanted my kids close in age, so I was definitely so excited! 

The pregnancy was really similar to Jack and Remy’s in terms of morning sickness and being tired, but just less of everything. I was still really nauseas and tired with Charlie, just not as extreme. I also didn’t have the debilitating heartburn I had with the twins which was a welcome change. I still had it but it wasn’t nearly as bad. 

The biggest difference with this pregnancy was my activity level. With Jack and Remy I really wasn’t very active. I’d maybe get to the gym once a week, and I didn’t walk June very often because I was pregnant during Zika and was trying to avoid any and all mosquitos. With Charlie, I was keeping up with twin baby/toddlers, I went to the gym probably 4-5 days a week doing mainly Body Pump, barre and PiYo (pilates yoga) classes and walked every day. I felt strong and much more energized when I would workout, which you’d think would be the opposite, but it made me feel awesome. 

Birth Story

The entire time I was pregnant I thought I would have a scheduled c-section on August 16th. I had a c-section with the twins and I knew my doctor wouldn’t do a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarian), so I just accepted that early on and went with it. I was honestly excited about the fact that I could plan the birth to a T. My parents could get flights to come help us with Jack and Remy and I wouldn’t have to worry about a thing. But, as my pregnancy reached the 36-37 week, I started feeling a little apprehensive about a c-section. Charlie was head-down, I had zero complications and was feeling and doing really well, and I just felt like a major surgery at 39 weeks was unnecessary for me and for the baby. So, at my 38 week appointment (after she had already given me all my surgery prep info) I brought it up to my doctor, fully expecting her to tell me that she won’t consider doing a VBAC and I would have to find a new provider. To my surprise she told me that starting in July (this was beginning of August when I brought this up), the hospital and her practice started allowing VBAC’s and that I would be a good candidate. I was SO surprised and so happy that I was going to be able to let Charlie come into the world when he wanted to, AND with my doctor who I love and trust. 

So, the wait began, and we waited and waited. For the most part, I really felt lucky I was able to carry a baby past their due date since that was never in the cards for me with Jack and Remy. So many people are miserable and unhappy towards the end, but I think I was able to stay in a pretty good state of mind because I was thankful he was growing bigger each day. Jack and Remy were 4 lbs so I was excited for a bigger babe. With that said, after my due date came and went, I definitely started getting impatient and everyone’s questions about when the baby would come really started to get to me.

So this is how things started to go down. Monday, when I was 40 weeks 6 days, I felt awesome. I went to Body Pump and had a really normal day with Jack and Remy. The next day I woke up feeling a little off, and crampy, which was different than the many braxton hicks I had felt over the last few weeks. I also felt REALLY emotional. After I dropped Jack and Remy off at school that morning I went to Homegoods for some last minute nesting/toy organizing supplies and I started crying on the way to my 41 week Dr. appointment. I am really not an emotional person and it takes a lot to make me cry, so this was pretty weird and notable. 

Once I got to my apt they did a non-stress test which took FOREVER because I swear they forgot about me. This was my third week of getting this test, and it just shows the contractions you may be having and checks to make sure the baby is moving appropriately since I was past my due date. Since I had those weird cramps at Homegoods I was certain the monitor would pick up on something a little more this time, but nope, I actually had fewer contractions at this appointment than I had the prior weeks. After that, my Dr. checked me and I was about 100% effaced and almost 3cm dilated, which was pretty much the same as it had been the last few weeks. She also swept my membranes for the fourth time and we scheduled an induction for first thing Thursday morning if he didn’t come by then. After that appointment I remember calling my mom and getting really mad that she asked me again when the baby was coming, and went home and hung out till I had to get the boys from school at 2:30. After I got them from school I stopped at my friend Katie’s house for some things and then went home and started getting really crampy again, like I had at Homegoods. I didn’t realize it then, but these were definitely different, but I just attributed it to getting my membranes swept again. The most noteworthy part of these cramps were that they made it really hard to concentrate on things and made my patience non-existent with the twins. I ended up calling Mitch around 4pm crying (again with the weird tears!) because I felt so overwhelmed and couldn’t pick the boys up to calm then down because of the cramps. I definitely get overwhelmed with the boys some days, but this was different. I ended up calling my doula that night to tell her that we scheduled an induction and about the cramps from my membrane sweep and she told me to have a glass of wine, take a warm shower and go to bed. At this point I felt like I had a fever, and I think I was starting to get whatever Remy was fighting, so I went to bed. I remember thinking what awful timing to get a fever and get sick, when you might be in early labor. 

Around 10 or 11 pm the cramps turned into contractions that I could start timing, but they weren’t really painful enough to affect my sleep until about 2am. At 10pm the contractions were about 30-40 seconds long and very sporadic – about 11ish minutes apart on average.  Around 2am I started timing again since I was awake and they were between 7-9 mins apart and about a minute long. According to my contraction app, I must have fallen back asleep until 6, and at that point the contractions were still about 7-9 minutes apart and a minute long. I figured I should tell Mitch he should stay home that day. I wasn’t 100% convinced I was in labor (I kind of just figured it was early labor that would last a long time) at this point, but I knew if I was having these contractions I wouldn’t be able to take care of the boys very easily. Mitch ended up taking our dog to our friend’s house around 8am, just to get that task done, and then took the boys to the gym for a couple hours while I hung out at home.I spent the morning doing laundry, finishing getting the boy’s bags packed for our friend’s house and showered and washed my hair, then when Mitch came home I told him we should definitely get the boys to our friend’s houses. We were going to wait to take them until after they napped, but around noon I had this feeling I just needed them out of the house, and I think it was because I knew I needed to focus. It was all very surreal, but it was like my body knew when and how things needed to go that day.  

The contractions pretty much stayed around 7-9 minutes apart until I started really timing again around 2 after we dropped the boys off.

First, we took Remy to his house (they were each at separate houses so we didn’t bombard one friend with both), and on the way there I had a couple contractions and realized I know why people don’t like having contractions in cars! At this point the contractions were about 7 minutes a part and a minute long. We took Jack next and I remember I had a contraction outside Mitch’s truck, then brought Jack in and said bye, then had another one before I got back into the truck, and about 2 more on the way home. When we got home I was really relieved to have the boy’s and June safe with friends and felt like I could finally concentrate fully on the contractions. As labor progressed over the next couple hours I kept getting in and out of the shower to help with the contractions. Contractions are hard to explain, and the best way to describe mine were that they were very intense period cramps, very low in my abdomen and in my low back. I have no idea if this is how other’s feel, but this is how they were for me. I LOVED the freedom of laboring at home, mainly so I could keep getting in and out of the shower to help with the pain. If I would have been at the hospital during this part of labor, I would have 100% been hooked up to monitors and not able to move around the way I wanted, so I tried to stay home.

At around 4pm, my contractions still didn’t seem super regular to me (granted, Mitch kept “forgetting” to time them when I would be in the shower, so may not have been super accurate). Looking at the contraction app, it looks like around 4:30 pm the contractions went from being consistently 7-8 mins apart to about 5 minutes apart and a minute long. Around this time I had been texting my doula keeping her in the loop, and she told me to call her and talk to her during a contraction so she could try and gauge where I was and when I should head to the hospital. I was trying not to go too early, because my ultimate fear would be to get there and be turned away, or have to labor in the hospital for a long time. I was really trying to avoid interventions since I wanted to successfully have this VBAC. When I talked to her I was definitely in a lot of pain, but apparently it didn’t come across this way since I could talk to her, and she told me it seemed like I could wait it out a little longer. I also kept thinking “this surely gets worse, I need to suck it up”. So, I think I got back in the shower for a while, while Mitch watched Game of Thrones and forgot to time my contractions ;), and then from this point on I pretty much needed him with me during contractions to apply pressure to my lower back since that’s where most the pain was. Contractions are SO weird because I was completely fine and calm in between contractions and could carry on a normal conversation with anyone, but as soon as one would start building, I had to be completely silent and hunched over with my hands on the counter, our bed or our dresser to get through the contraction. Around 6pm my contractions had definitely started getting more intense and closer together – about every 4 minutes and some jumped down into the 3’s. I remember around this time I told Mitch I was so tired and needed to take a nap, but as soon as I laid down, I had a terrible contraction and told Mitch there was no way I could sleep and we might as well go to the hospital because I was pretty sure I wanted some pain meds so I could take a nap. 

Things really escalated quickly from here. We got in the car and I was on all fours on the floor of his truck because there was NO way I could sit down at this point, it hurt so bad to lay or sit. When we were about 5 minutes into our 20 minute drive to the hospital Mitch did something I will NEVER forget and asked me if I wanted him to turn into Starbucks to get me an ICED PASSION TEA. I somehow screamed ARE YOU KIDDING and then didn’t really make any noise the rest of the way to the hospital because I was too busy having contractions. Mitch would later tell me that he didn’t realize things were progressing so quickly because I wasn’t yelling at the top of lungs in pain, but really, I just couldn’t say anything because I was having so many contractions. So after that 20 minute torture ride, we got to the front of the hospital and the minute I stepped out of the truck my water broke on everything. Movie theater water break, and I started crying haha I immediately called my doula and handed the phone to Mitch to tell her my water broke, then we somehow made it up to labor and delivery. Looking back, I am pretty sure my contractions were about 2 minutes apart at this point because I had a contraction in the lobby of the hospital, one in the elevator up to L&D, and another at the front desk, and none of these places are a far walk from each other. I was able to tell the L&D nurse my water broke and they got me into triage to check me. This was HORRIBLE because they made me lay on my back (my nightmare with this labor) and attached constricting monitors to my belly. As soon as my doula got there she told them I needed off my back, and I had a couple SUPER intense, shaking, contractions standing on the edge of the bed before the doctor got there to check me (at this point I told my doula I couldn’t do it anymore without meds). I will forever remember the doctor saying “I hope you are at a 5 or 6!” and I remember thinking I REALLY hope so because I am dying. She checked me and said “8 or 9” and then everything went so fast. I was GBS positive, so they were rushing to get me hooked up to the IV to start a round of antibiotics. They wheeled a wheel chair into triage and I remember yelling NO like a crazy person because sitting was awful, but since my water had broken, I apparently had to use it. As soon as I got to the labor and delivery room I had a couple more contractions while they hooked me up to the IV and felt like I had to bear down, so they checked me again and sure enough in that short amount of time since we had arrived at the hospital (about 30 mins) it was time to push. I started pushing at about 9pm and Charlie was born at 9:33pm. Pushing is NO JOKE, people. I got the job done pretty quickly and I am so thankful. I have NO idea how people do that for hours because it was excruciating and I wasn’t expecting that. In fact, a friend of mine had a baby the next night, and told me she pushed for hours and I feel like she’s a super hero. Another friend of mine who has had a couple natural births told me pushing felt better than contractions, but I don’t think I agree. It was so challenging and painful! I just didn’t feel prepared for that part. 

After Charlie was born I had to get stitched up, which was an awful hour long process. I tore internally, and apparently those aren’t the easiest tears to stitch up. Since I didn’t have an epidural I felt a lot of it, but I was just so excited to be done giving birth and to have Charlie earth-side, that I just dealt with it. There is no greater feeling than meeting your new baby and sharing him with your friends and family. I was on cloud nine for about 24 hours straight. 

Before I had Charlie, I didn’t really have any set goals for how my birth would go, other than wanting to achieve a successful VBAC. My doula had mentioned that if (and it’s quite rare) your scar on your uterus from your c-section ruptures, you may not feel it happening if you have an epidural, so this was some motivation of mine to go drug-free, or at least wait as long as possible. Turns out I waited TOO long to get one haha but I wasn’t about to get upset with myself if I ended up wanting pain medication. In fact, I would have loved the epidural for pushing and getting stitches. 

One thing I learned about myself after going through labor and delivery, is that I LOVED laboring at home.  Hospitals are great and serve an awesome purpose, but I think I was able to handle the pain of contractions because I was comfortable and able to be at home. If I needed to get in the shower to ease the pain, no big deal. If I needed to lay down or distract myself with laundry, I could do that. If Mitch and I have a fourth kiddo, I think I would love a birth center for this reason. Still have medical professionals around, but in the comfort of a birth center. 

Introducing Jack and Remy to their new brother was really fun and I will never forget how BIG Jack and Remy looked at the hospital. Overnight, they became big toddlers and not my small babies anymore. The past 10 weeks have been stressful and challenging, but so fun. I love having a family of 5 and can’t wait to see these 3 boys grow up together!