Jakub Andrew Sadecki
August 17, 2006
4:57 am (as stated by Lovely Lew)
10 lbs 10 oz
21.5 inches

A note to a friend 9-5-06: “All is well here. Just settling into life with a baby - it's not easy - takes more time than I ever thought - hence I am just now having a chance to email you. And baby Andrew is sleeping on my lap - I'm trying to type quietly. :)

It was pretty tough at first because we were in the hospital for a week with the baby in the NICU. They wouldn't admit me to that hospital (because I didn't have a c-section...), so Jake and I were sleeping on couches and wherever they could put us because I wouldn't leave Andrew. They treated him for pneumonia - he had difficulty breathing, but they never found any infection (it's my opinion that he was fine from the beginning, just needed a little more time to breathe and be on his momma...). It was a wild start, but we're happy to be home and getting into our own routine here now!

A brief synopsis: For days we thought it'd never happen - Jake and I became very impatient. Then, I started having regular contractions at 6pm the evening of the 16th, they progressed rapidly for such a big baby, and we were at the hospital by midnight with contractions 3-5 minutes apart. I started pushing around 3am and he was born at 5am. So the whole labor was very short as labors go - 12 hours!

He is a big baby, but I have to say that no matter the size, you just do it, and during the labor I never once thought about how big he was - I just made it through each contraction one at a time and hoped that each one would be the last, and then finally it was, and the boy came out! Jake was by my side the entire time - he cried a lot, but still held my hand and encouraged me along the way - I would've been lost without him there. And my mom and sister too - encouraging and telling me what to do. I held Annie's hand on my left, and Jake's on my right. (Much later, Jake said he thinks I sprained his thumb!)”

My story:

Friday August 11 was my last day of work. What a great day that was! Everyone wished me well, and I wobbled myself to my car (they let me go an hour early) around 5pm. My momma had driven up from WV and was awaiting my arrival when I got home. When I saw her, I melted – my heart was filled, my security satiated – in other words, with her there, all was right in my world. We could have the baby now – after 39.5 weeks of anticipation – the moment had finally arrived that my momma had made it before the birth of my son. Now, the only question was – “will she still be here when he’s born?” Although my heart told me the answer was certainly yes, my fear remained.

The next day, Saturday the 12th, Annie, Paul and KyaLily arrived! I was on top of my world with my Mom and sister here with me – all felt right and ready – now it was up to the baby inside of me. Although I knew that birth is one of the most timeless events in life – meaning that it can not be predicted whatsoever – I still thought “surely he’ll come today or tomorrow because that would be best and leave the most time with my family.” Well, today and tomorrow came and went and still notta. I felt like a ticking bomb – everyone cautiously waiting and looking at me and watching and hoping to catch some sign of labor. By everyone, I mean everyone except my mom and sister – oh, they were watching me for signs for sure, but they were so relaxed and if they mentioned the timing at all it was to assure me that no matter when he came, that would be the right time – whether they were still here or not. Others, however, including myself, added to the anticipation every day – I started to feel pressured. And my emotional state of pregnancy alone was enough to keep me on edge, I thought that I might take castor oil to get things moving – I’d decided long ago that I would if it seemed like nothing was happening. I let Tuesday pass with nothing.

One thing that amazed me was that the contractions were just that – a contracting uterus – and didn’t cause any pain for a long time. I hadn’t prepared myself for that exactly. You see, for days my uterus contracted and I didn’t realize, until mom explained to me, that these were real – I kept saying they’re not “real” because they didn’t hurt. Well, after understanding and being able to define the presence of the contractions, I was better able to accept that my body was doing its job in preparing me – fortunately, nature intended for this first stage of labor (the prodromal stage) to be a pain-free process.

Then, after much contemplation and evaluating the pros and cons, on Wednesday morning I woke up sure that I was ready to take the castor oil and hope for it to get the labor started. I took a little at noon, then mom suggested another dose a couple hours later – I took a little and decided that was the last. I already sort of felt that something was going to happen – without the added enhancement of the castor oil.

Later, from 6 to 7 pm I decided to write down every time I felt a contraction because it felt that they were occurring more frequently, and I didn’t yet want to alert anyone too excitedly – so I noted the contractions – and told Annie and mom. They were coming about 7 to 10 minutes apart from 6 to 7 pm. So, now that there was rhythm and consistency, I felt better knowing that my intuition was letting me know that the baby would be born very soon – certainly within 24 hours.

Around 9 pm, I was lying in bed with mom and Annie and we decided to call the midwife before going to sleep to let her know that we’re in labor. So, I called the phone service and they had Anne Fine (one of the 6 midwifes from Midwifery Care of Holyoke, who was the on-call midwife that evening). We spoke and I told her that we’d already discussed that I’d come to the hospital when I felt that I would no longer want to get in the car and travel for 50 minutes to the hospital – that, as we all had decided, would be the determining factor. We established that tonight we’d rest, and probably by morning have to go to the hospital. None of us expected the labor to progress so rapidly.

An hour later, after returning from the bathroom after experiencing perhaps the third bowel movement of the evening – thanks to the trusty castor oil doing its job of cleaning me out and apparently helping stimulate the uterus at the same time, I laid in bed. I then watched the clock as I felt more intense contractions – ones that were significantly different than the previous ones. It’s hard to explain (partly because my body seems to encourage my mind to forget these things – as I am convinced is part of the reproduction mechanism that encourages mothers to continue to have children), but they didn’t really hurt, they just were now consuming all of my concentration – during the contractions prior to this I could still think of other things and do other things, but these I could not.. As I watched the clock – I realized these were coming every few minutes – like 3 to 5 minutes. Mom had just gone to bed, as did Paul and Annie. Jake was in the shower.

I let this go for about 15 minutes or so. Then, realized I must call mom and let her see what was happening – I needed confirmation outside of my own body that this was really happening, and help deciding what to do next. I yelled for her, and instantly she came (I felt very young again in that moment). She watched and counted for about 15 more minutes. I told her when they started and stopped (they only lasted for less than a minute – very short, but still close together). Then, she asked the ultimate question: “how do you feel about riding in a car right now?” By this time, Jake was in bed lying next to me. My response: “I really don’t like the idea of spending the next 12 hours in labor at the hospital, but I really hate the idea of riding in a car right now.” Jake said “that’s it, let’s go!” And off we were – everyone bustling to get dressed. Annie, Paul and Kya had just gone to bed too, so they got up and moving while Jake loaded the car with the bags that I had packed a couple months prior.

The ride to the hospital was an adventure in and of itself. Jake drove; I was shotgun, and mom in back. He ran every stop light with excitement, and on the highway he drove about 90 mph. I kept glancing over and asking him to keep it below 80, that there’s no reason to fly. I was having contractions between 3 to 5 minutes a part at this point, but I knew we still had plenty of time to get to the hospital. I think he had envisioned this drive many times prior to the day, and anticipated being “allowed” to drive fast because of having the excuse that his wife was in labor – and also I think that he believed that this would be his most important job, so he took it very seriously. In between a contraction, I called the midwife – well I called the phone service and she, Anne Fine, called me back. I told her we were on our way to the hospital – didn’t make it ‘til morning. She said she’d call ahead to let them know and she’d meet me there.

When we got there, there was some confusion about where to go – the main entrance was closed because of the late hour, so we had to go through the emergency entrance. Jake dropped me and mom off and went to find parking. Mom and I went in and they noticed what was happening right away and some man lead us to the elevators and up to the birth center.

Things progressed rapidly. I kept my clothes on for the time being. The contractions gradually became more intense, but in between I had nothing but relaxed feelings to carry me through to the next bit of intensity. And I recall that the contractions were still relatively short in duration, although close together. When I peed, which was way too often for my liking, they were much more intense, and on the toilet they always came, I couldn’t slip in a pee between contractions, I guess they liked when I sat on the commode. When Anne got there, she examined me to discover that I was 6 cm dilated – so this was about 12 am.

Someone mentioned the tub, and knew that I had said before I wanted to labor in the tub as much as possible – I love water. Well, the idea didn’t seem quite as appealing to me, but despite this, I knew that I had wanted the water on me, and I decided to give it a try. I thought they’d bring the tub to my room. But some time later the nurses came in to tell me the tub was ready, let’s go. I said “where are we going?” We had to walk all the way down the hall to the far room; I guess that’s where they do the tub… The walk there seemed like the longest of my life to this point – and it remains very vivid in my mind. I had 3 contractions on the way, each of which was incredibly intense. And each time I found Jake and leaned on him with my arms around his neck – that part at least was comforting. Finally, we made it to the tub room – which by the way did not feel very inviting for some reason. Jake left (probably to go smoke) and I was there with mom, Annie, and a nurse. Annie and mom stayed by my side for the duration. I recall then that the nurse/s was saying that I made labor look so easy – I couldn’t believe they could say that! I had adopted a method of breathing in which I stopped the let-out of each deep breath by using my tongue – so it sounded like “tata tata ta ta ta” – I started doing this soon after I realized that I could make myself very dizzy by letting out such a deep breathe too quickly. Then, after the tata seemed monotonous I began using “lala” sounds – so it sort of seemed like a song, I suppose. Maybe that’s why she said I made it seem easy. But during the contractions – each one more intense than the previous one – I just followed my bodily instincts – part of me wanted to scream out loud and cry for help (which I did a few times), but I knew that would absorb more energy than I could afford to lose.

Shortly after getting in the tub, I was uncomfortable, and felt that the water made me more nervous than relaxed. I just felt that the contractions were quite close to being at “that point” and so I asked to get out. Well, I had to wait while the water drained enough to open the doors of the tub, so I had a few more contractions – I remember trying to slip around in the tub a bit, hoping the water would ease the tension, but it didn’t – I kept crying to Annie, somehow I needed her to know and acknowledge that she knew that these ones were really strong – she did.

So, out of the tub and somewhat dry, we headed back to the room; Jake had come back to the tub room. I remembered the walk to the tub room, and prayed that the walk back would not yield such difficulty for me. It didn’t. It seemed much quicker and I don’t even think I had one contraction – I walked very fast, Jake was by my side and I think I told him I had to hurry because I didn’t want to have another contraction in the hallway.

Back in the room, I think I peed again – hating every minute of that. Then, went straight to the bed – where I had been before, on my side, with my pillows, including my mushy that reminded me of home and comfort. I remembered being comfortable in the bed, and I didn’t waste any time getting back into it before another contraction could happen. In fact, I recall having a few contractions leaning over the bed – I had done that before going to the tub too, and knew that that helped ease the tension. Back in bed, Jake was on my right, Annie soon on my left, and mom was back and forth, but soon to be stationed beside of Jake for the rest of the labor.

At this point I was in or past transition – I know because I remembered Anne saying I was in transition when I was in the tub. This was good to know, because I remembered that transition was supposedly the “worst” part of labor and the longest – and I was there already, and it wasn’t that bad. Soon I believe I had an urge to push – or maybe I just felt a pressure and definitely got scared because either I pushed or it just happened, but my waters broke – they broke vigorously, not how I’d imagined them breaking, i.e. slowly leaking out over a period of time. Instead, it was a huge gush – like someone had cracked a fish tank, and the pressure caused the water to just gush out. I was scared, it felt very awkward, and I imagined it was everywhere and I was just laying in it. I know that I screamed when it happened, and I heard Anne say it was okay, that my waters had broke. Jake was holding my hand (I was still on my side) and I knew it was okay.

Contractions at this point were overwhelming – and my “easy sounding” music I had made earlier I believe had now dissipated. I began to yell during the contractions. Then they started to tell me I could push if I felt the urge. Strangely enough, I did feel the urge, but for a contraction or two, I don’t think I did because I guess I couldn’t believe I was at that stage, and somehow I thought I needed someone to tell me it was “time” to push – strange. So, then I began to push with every contraction. I have to say there was a time during the first stage of pushing in which I don’t feel my mind was quite there. My body was just going through the motions of labor, while my mind tried to drift away. It wasn’t long though that I realized my mind had to stay and do this because my body couldn’t do it alone.

Before labor, I meditated on occasion at bedtime and tried to train myself to envision certain things for labor. For instance, I meditated that labor and breathing was like the flow of the waves and water – breathing in and out just like the tide never stops moving in and out. Well, these visions worked for the first stage of labor, but were forgotten before the tub. Also, I had tried to prepare myself ahead of time to envision the Goddess – during the pushing contractions especially. I had envisioned that birth is solely the work of the Goddess and that my body was merely a tool to allow her to do her magic. Well, this is all nice and happy-go-lucky thinking, but after having birthed my child, I realize that it is the work of the body, of my body and my mind – the Goddess gave me the power to do this when I was born. She may have been watching over me and calling the angels to help me get through it, but her job in the whole occasion was bringing my baby’s spirit to his birth – that’s all. I was on my own with the delivery – for real!

None of this came to mind during the pushing of course. All that I was able to focus on (once I got past the phase of denial) was getting through each contraction. At times, I screamed as hard as I could – this didn’t help, and I knew it didn’t, but somehow it felt good while I was doing it. Well, I soon figured out that the only thing that would help was pushing – but it wasn’t just pushing as one who’s never experienced birth would know. This kind of pushing is like giving up everything physical that you’ve ever known and just letting it go because it doesn’t mean anything now. Like every pain you’ve ever felt, or thought you felt, and going beyond that to a world of pain that is so much more, it’s everything, and I don’t know how else to describe this. So, once I realized that this was where I was, facing the most excruciating thing ever, I accepted that I must push through this, and let it get worse and worse with each contraction – I didn’t want this – I didn’t want to accept it, and it took some time. Most of all it took words from those around me – reminding me to focus focus focus. Focus on that spot – the lowest spot on my bum – and push toward it – and push through the pain. Words reminding me to let it hurt and push even harder as soon as I felt that hurt – damn that was hard. It’s not necessary to say at this point I’m sure, but certainly the hardest thing I’d ever done, and probably will ever do.

So, during these contractions, I held Annie’s hand on my left and Jake’s on my right. I held them hard and pushed them with each push of my womb. Sometimes, during a push, I was reminded (by Anne to my memory) to put all of my energy into the contraction and pushing toward that spot. And so, I’d release the pressure in my arms and legs and head, and let all of my strength go toward that pain. Wow, remembering now, there was such a feeling of accomplishment each time I could make myself do that, because I knew that I made more progress each and every time I could do that rather than letting any bit of energy go toward the hands that I was holding or the legs that were being held for me.

On the complete other end of the spectrum, between each contraction was a time of relaxation – the most relaxed I’d ever known. It was such a relief to be done with that contraction. I didn’t anticipate or fear the next, I simply enjoyed the moment that I had to let my whole entire body relax – and relax it did, I’m sure of it. It was amazing. I’d heard of this, but didn’t fully believe it could be possible, that the body could physically relax after all of that pain. And it certainly helped to have people telling me to relax – once it was over. It was like, “oh yeah, now’s that part where I get to relax.”

So, finally the final pushes came and my baby’s body toppled out of me – for a second he didn’t breathe, but I wasn’t worried – then they laid him on me (for way too short of a time, I’ll add – but that’s a story for another time…). With him on me, the pure exhilaration I felt – which had immediately followed pure relief – was indescribable. ‘Joy’ just doesn’t begin to cut it… Before that moment, he didn’t feel like a person to me (I should say “before that moment, as in the 40 long weeks and 2 days that he was in the womb”) – I believe that his spirit entered the room once he slid onto me (I think it may have even had a bit of hesitation at first [for that, I don’t blame him] – it did take him a second to breathe.) Either way, I was thrilled. My body was spread open for the world to see (and the world, I’ll add, was certainly there to see it – again a story for another time…), but, at that special moment, none of that mattered.

- The pain was over, and the miracle had occurred.