Sylvia's birth story

Four weeks ago today, we welcomed Sylvia Dawn into the world! I got a lot out of reading other people's birth stories as we prepared for Sylvia to arrive, and so I'm sharing ours in the hope that someone else will benefit from it in some way, whether they're preparing for a birth themselves or are just curious about our experience.

Sylvia's due date of Monday, July 17 came and went without much fanfare. I had an appointment with Kavita, my midwife, that day, and she checked my cervix and reported that I was one centimeter dilated (out of the standard ten centimeters that one's cervix must usually dilate before one can push a baby out). It's apparently common for the cervix to dilate a centimeter or three during late pregnancy before labor actually starts, so it didn't mean much that mine had begun dilating. Still, Alex found it very exciting that Kavita was able to poke a finger in and feel the top of the baby's head through the amniotic sac ("You're the first person to touch our baby!"¹). I couldn't tell that my cervix had begun to dilate (and I couldn't feel anything unusual or painful during Kavita's exam), but I was happy that my body seemed to be preparing for labor and birth.

My parents arrived in town two days later, on Wednesday the 19th, but they didn't come to visit us yet. Their plan had been to come see us a day or so after I gave birth, and they wanted to leave us some space until then. They got an Airbnb in the next town over and found tourist activities to occupy their time. I was on leave from work, and I puttered around the house, cooking, cleaning, and organizing things. A friend had asked me a few weeks previously if I had been "nesting" yet, and I hadn't been sure what that meant. "You mean, like, buying stuff for the baby?", I had asked. "No," she'd replied, "I mean, like, organizing the spice rack." The week starting with Sylvia's due date turned out to be when the "nesting" thing finally kicked in. I did not organize the spice rack, but I did construct, bake, and freeze two pans of enchiladas. I like to cook, but cooking and freezing food in advance is not typical behavior for me!²

On Friday the 21st, I lost my mucus plug, the small glob of mucus that fills the cervical opening during pregnancy. I had never imagined that I would be excited about a glob of yellowish mucus in my underwear, but I was pleased to have another sign that my cervix was beginning to open. I excitedly texted my mom, who said, "Are you sure your water didn't break?" (Yes, I was sure.) Like me, my parents were eager for things to move along, and by now they were running out of tourist things to do. My dad finally announced that it was ridiculous that they'd been in town for several days and not seen me yet, and that they were coming over the next day, which was Saturday.

On Saturday, we all went out for a nice brunch together, and then we spent the afternoon at home, where I gave my parents a tour of all the many baby accoutrements that we'd been given by friends and relatives.³ At some point in the afternoon, I noticed that I seemed to be having some watery discharge. I called Kavita, worried that it might be a slow leak of amniotic fluid. She told me that she'd come over around 8:30 the next morning and check on me. Eventually, my parents headed back to their Airbnb, and some time later, Alex and I went to bed.

Around two-thirty in the morning, I started to feel what were...well...I thought they might be contractions, but I wasn't entirely sure. How is a first-time birth-giver supposed to know what a contraction feels like, anyway? I knew from the childbirth class that Alex and I had taken that during early labor, contractions would last less than a minute and would be between about seven and twenty minutes apart, and that this stage of labor could last for a long time, possibly days. But, although I was sure I was feeling a sort of discomfort that was new to me, I couldn't put my finger on how long the contractions were, nor how far apart they were. I got out of bed and googled for things like "can't tell when contractions start and stop", to not much avail. I downloaded a contraction timer app and tried using it, but that wasn't particularly helpful, either. Eventually, I decided to call Kavita to let her know what was going on, although I didn't think there was an urgent need for her to come over yet. She told me that she would come over at some point, but that instead of coming at 8:30 a.m. as she had said previously, she wouldn't plan on any particular time and would instead wait for another phone call from me. At that point, I think I went back to bed and tried to sleep, with mixed success.

Around seven in the morning, I still couldn't tell when the contractions were starting or stopping or how long