Zoe Frances Voosen's Birth Story by Maureen
Born Saturday, September 13th.
8 lbs 1.5 oz, 20.75" tall.

On Friday, September 12, our due date, on the way out to a celebratory 'date night' at Mandola's, my water broke, conveniently in the parking lot just as we were getting out of the car. We hopped back in, me sitting on a sheet normally reserved to keep our car clean of dog hair, missing our last meal as a couple, but looking forward (and quite giddy) to the adventure on its way. Phoned my folks who had to cancel their flight reservation they had made just a half hour ago to come out on Tuesday, to fly into Austin arriving at 2pm Saturday, with strict orders not to have their first grandbaby before then.

After some last minute packing at home (we were anticipating having early labor to do some of that!) and stuffing our face with leftover pizza (with jalapenos - not the best 'last meal'), we headed to NAMC, birthing ball in hand and no contractions in sight.

We checked in, and were surprised to find a very not-busy L&D despite the low pressure due to Hurrican Ike. We settled in, and started napping to await contractions. Around 2am they started, and I was able to work through them fairly well, though I have to say I went through several of those hospital 'barf bags' - it seems my stomach was refusing to keep anything down, even ice chips. On to an anti-nausea in an IV, which was quite welcome. Sometime that morning (I had by then lost track of time, but perhaps 8 or 9am) I asked to have my progress checked, and was quite surprised to find out that we had made it all the way to 100%, 9.5cm, and +1 without any anesthesia. I felt completely empowered, like I could do anything. Kyle had been such a great guide offering up many different positions and pain coping techniques. My midwife had brought in her rice cooker with a heated sock, which came in quite handy, and I have to say lavender scented washcloths are pretty awesome.

My midwife gave me the go ahead then to push when I felt the urge, which I started to soon after. After three hours of pushing, with every position known to man tried out, and still no progress on the station, we had a conference with the midwife. Given that there had been no progress made, the midwife suggested going for an epidural, and a small dose of pitocin to perhaps encourage some stronger contractions to help in pushing this hold-out out. We agreed that it was time to try something else, and shortly thereafter (I have to say that while I now very much appreciate anesthesiologists, this one didn't necessarily have the best bedside manner) we waited an hour for the pit to kick in, and pushed for another 1/2 hour or so. Everything remained unchanged, and I was slowly losing steam, as were my contractions, which were coming further and further apart. The midwife called in the OB on call. She was great, which I very much appreciated. Given all of the progress we had made beforehand, she had me push for another 1/2 hour or so, originally encouraged by the strength of the pushes still in me. However, our little one remained at +1, sunny-side up, with an identifiable cone head and one ear, though not much else able to be identified. We all decided a Cesarean delivery was best at this point, and proceeded along this course.

At this point I have to say that I am so thankful for our Conscious Birthing classes. We felt we had gone through the labor so far that we had wanted, and were quite comfortable with the epidural and Cesarean at this point. We were able to accept this as our birth, and all of the L&D staff were so supportive of what we had already gone through.

After all of this work, it seems that our little one had had enough - while she did take her first breath on her own, she needed resuscitation and was well taken care of by the NICU team. She was originally to be kept in the NICU for a day, to receive IV fluids and be kept for observation, but after only an hour she was already screaming and rooting around (so I'm told) quite dramatically looking for the breast, so we were able to come together as a family shortly after the birth. After receiving the report from the OB, it turns out that the sunny-side up nature had created a retraction ring/Bandl ring in my uterus, which was preventing a vaginal birth.

It was a long stay in the hospital, and I have to say that Cesareans are interesting things to recover from (which is of course ongoing), but we are happy to now be home with our girl. Zoe is doing well, and turning into quite the chub!

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