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I'm a screamer: 0 - 10 cm in 90 minutes
I experience repeated bouts of nausea and diarrhea throughout Sunday March 18. The only food I manage to retain is a brownie hot fudge sundae. Around the time JB decided to go get a pizza and some movies at 8pm, I feel my first real contraction.
Shortly after he gets home, my water breaks at 9:45pm.
My contractions are two minutes apart in the car enroute to the Birth Centre. ("JB, I think we better put a towel on my seat.") We arrive at 10:45pm.
I labour for about an hour at the Birth Centre -- first on the toilet and then on my side on a bed, moaning my way through the contractions. I comment that I couldn't believe I was making so much noise. Jill, my midwife said she'd heard louder...
11:45pm, my blood pressure spikes, and the bambina's drops. I'm dehydrated; Jill hooks me up to an IV. My contractions progress to the third stage of labour, while my cervix remains closed. Jill calls 911.
Paramedics arrive; I don't have the strength to move from the bed to the stretcher, so they lift me with the bedspread.
Ambulance ride to Tucson Medical Centre -- driver's used to pulling into Emerg, the paramedics are yelling directions to him for Labour and Delivery.
Paramedics are timing my contractions and saying things like "whoa." One of them asks me (out of curiosity?) to describe what I'm feeling. "Like my entire stomach is going to explode through my bellybutton [you asshole]."
Midnight, in the delivery room, I start screaming like a banshee during the contractions. It must work; I begin dilating.
Panic sets in: I don't want this to happen, is it too late for drugs? Jill tells me I'm almost there, feeling panicky is normal at this stage. JB tells me to focus on him, and look in his eyes. He lifts my oxygen mask and feeds me Pedialyte pops.
The banshee is replaced by Chewbacca. Chewbacca likes to push. Pushing comes as a relief; the baby coming out doesn't hurt half as much as the contractions did -- I don't feel the "ring of fire" (I recommend lots of prenatal perineal massage with coconut or almond oil) but I do feel Perla slither from me.
It's 1:08am, March 19.
They take her away.
"I want to hold her!"
I tell JB to go with her.
I can see her in the bassinet: she's blue, she isn't moving. Fortunately, I'm oblivious to the fact that she's not responsive -- I think it's just a stupid, typical, corporate healthcare move to whisk her away from me. I don't know it yet but her Apgar score is 1.
Jill distracts me; we need to deliver the placenta. I have a superficial tear and I need a stitch or two.
Perla is resuscitated and her second Apgar is 7.
JB brings her to me; she's so tiny and beautiful and latches on immediately. I think this the best night of my life.
Perla Fiore Kiely, born March 19 2007 in Tucson, Arizona.
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