Josiah's Birth Story
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He’s here!
Josiah Lee Williams was born on Friday, June 21, 2019 at 8:39 PM. He weighed 7 lbs, 8oz and was 20.5 inches long. If you follow us on social media, then you already knew all that as we (okay, mainly just me) have been blowing up all social media platforms with pictures and videos of him since he was born.
His birth story was nothing like I had imagined or planned. [Disclaimer: I plan to share it ALL. The good, the bad, the unforgettable. You’ve been warned.] And I think I’ve put off writing it out because perhaps it has been haunting me in a way. I mean, when you drive past the hospital you labored and delivered at and you start to get emotional 4 days postpartum, something may be up. And I don’t mean the happy emotional. . .
Induction
In my last post (38 Weeks Bumpdate) I shared how I was going to be induced. My doctor scheduled me to be induced right at 39 weeks due to baby’s projected size and my PUPPs worsening. Calvin and I had an appointment with our doctor that morning before we were scheduled to check into the hospital that evening at 8 pm. So we went home, I finished getting the house ready for our baby’s arrival, we loaded up our hospital bags and diaper bag in the car, stopped at Chuy’s for dinner, and drove to the hospital.
I was excited as I’ll get out. Calvin was too. We knew we’d be entering that hospital as a family of two and leaving as a family of three. We were besides ourselves. Honestly, nerves hadn’t kicked in. I was just on cloud 9 about it all.
We checked in and were guided to our room where our nurse, Danielle, met us and I signed some paperwork. Following that, Danielle handed me my gown and socks and explained how the night would go.
[Let me pause here to preface - I had never been admitted to a hospital. No gown. No IV. No room. No hospital food. Nada. Mom says I have, when I was 3, to get tubes in my ears. Do I remember said hospital experience? Of course not. So this truly was for me my first experience being admitted to a hospital. I will forever remember all of this. And not just because it was the experience that brought our son into the world.]
Hence the photos up above. I felt so weird in that gown and in those socks. It was all so new to me. I even felt weird getting situated in the bed. I’ve visited many people in the hospital before, but never have I had to be the one in the bed.
Danielle informed me of my doctors orders, who wouldn’t be there until early the next morning. My doctor ordered for me to start with Cytotec, a pill inserted vaginally to help thin out my cervix. I also forgot to mention that when arriving to the hospital I was 1 cm dilated and about 90% effaced.If I needed more Cytotec to get my cervix at 100% effaced, Danielle would return throughout the night to check me and give me more. To any mamas to be… when I say “they checked me”, that means they put a glove on, go up your vagina and check your cervix. Which is the same method to getting that pill inside me to thin out my cervix. Since 8 pm that evening, I was being monitored (for contractions) and baby Williams was being monitored. We could hear his heartbeat the entire time. It was a sweet soundtrack to the night.
When Danielle first checked me before inserting my first dose of Cytotec, she actually stimulated my first contraction! I had many Braxton hicks and often wondered, “could this be what a contraction feels like”. NOPE. A contraction definitely felt different. That one would obviously be the first of many.
MY plan was to go through labor and deliver without medication as long as I could bare it. When contractions started and continued throughout the night, I would breathe through them and await the next. At this point they were only mild contractions. Regardless, it was a sleepless night due to nerves, my nurse coming in to check me, Cytotec doses, and bathroom trips of course.
Labor
The next morning, Danielle began the Poticin as my doctor had ordered. This was my first time to have an IV in. Going to the bathroom sure was an adventure as I had to wheel over my IV bags with me. Right after the Poticin kicked in, the contractions got stronger. All night and into the morning I had Calvin keep my Labor and Delivery playlist playing on the Echo Dot we packed in my hospital bag. Worship music played the entire time in the background. As contractions got stronger and more frequent, hearing the lyrics to these songs after the talking died down was what I needed.
My first nurse switched out with the next and the laboring continued. I was inhaling all the ice chips they could give me because I was SO THIRSTY. We were nearing lunch time and I was both hungry and thirsty. I asked if I could labor on a medicine ball and walk around the room some, not just get up to go to the bathroom. My nurse allowed it and brought me a medicine ball.
At this point Calvin’s parents had gotten to the hospital, as had my mom. My doctor would soon arrive to check me and if needed, break my water. I was dilated 5 cm at this point. Contractions were pretty strong. For some reason, when my doctor checked me this time, it was brutal. It had brought on another contraction and I was in pain. This was about 10 AM or so and she asked me if I wanted to consider getting the epidural because she would be back in an hour to break my water and contractions would only get stronger and more frequent following that. Calvin and I discussed it after she left and we agreed I’d take the epidural.
I’m going to get straight to the point here, I (neither Calvin or our parents) were happy with my anesthesiologist and the way this epidural went down. I was traumatized. Sounds dramatic, I know, but y’all I was pricked over and over again. He’d ask what I was feeling, I’d tell him, then he’d say, “oh, that’s not right, let me try again”. It was painful. It was nerve wrecking. And finally it was over and I laid back down as I began to feel both my legs go numb.
Right after the epidural, came the catheter. Another weird first time experience. All of these experiences began to weigh on me. Yet more was to quickly come.
My doctor was back within the hour to break my water. Once again, up she went, this time with a long stick called an amniotic hook. After she broke my water, I felt a big gush of warm fluid coming down. It was interesting. After that, I continued to labor with my nurse and doctor alternating in checking me. The contractions sure did get stronger. I felt a lot of pressure, not so much pain.
It had to be well into the afternoon when the doctor told me the baby was sunny side up! Sunny side up means the baby’s face is facing my abdomen and not my back. The best position for a baby to be delivered is head down, facing the mother’s back, chin tucked in. Our baby was head down, facing my abdomen with his chin up off his chest. Problem.
She suggested I alternate laying on my left and right side to help turn the baby before I reached a full 10 cm dilated and it was time to push. So, my nurse flipped me from one side to the next as I continued to contract. By this time, my nurses could see I was tired and all I was experiencing was a lot for me. I was overwhelmed. Though I had been laboring for over 12 hours now, everything felt like it was happening so fast and decisions were made and executed before I could have a breather from the last decision we had to make. Calvin spoke to the nurses about how I felt and asked for me to have a moment to try and rest. From then on, things didn’t seem as crazy, nor as fast.
The next time my nurse came to check me I told her I was feeling the contractions get stronger and I was in pain. She reassured me that with the epidural I should only feel pressure, not much pain. However, I began to feel pain in my sciatic nerve. I had pushed the button they gave me with the epidural to push when I needed more medicine, however, after a few minutes I would feel the pain again.
This had to probably be the hardest part. I know now that it was the epidural wearing off because it wasn’t done correctly, but at the moment all I knew to do was continue on with the pain. Both my mom and Calvin’s mom were in the room with me and every time a contraction would come, mom would feed me ice chips, Calvin would hold my hand and encourage me to breathe, while his mom rubbed down my right side/leg to help alleviate the sciatic pain.
The doctor told me the baby was probably right on my nerve and we continued alternating what side I was laying on in order to help the baby turn.
Hours past with little no change other than being dilated more. It was finally around evening time when my doctor told me I was at a 10 and I would start pushing but on my right side. With every push they would hope to reach in and help turn the baby as I laid on my right side. In walked in the lead nurse and Danielle, the first nurse I had the night before and they began coaching me on how I would be pushing. I had to have pushed for nearly half an hour when they told me they would position me on my back now to push the baby out. I had given it all I had to push on my side in order for them to go in and turn the baby. But the baby was still not facing my back and had his chin up.
I continued to push, now on my back and with my legs up on the leg holders. I wish I could tell you the pain went away but it didn’t. We even had the anesthesiologist come and give me a boost of the epidural. I pushed for over an hour. The contractions were almost one right after the other and I felt it all. My legs began to cramp and I begged for a break. I was exhausted. With each contraction, I gave three pushes. The baby was not coming.
My doctor called to check my vitals. Just seconds laters I heard the lead nurse say, temperature is 103. My doctor looked up at me and said, “Crystal, I’m calling it. You need to have an emergency c-section. If this baby was not positioned the way it is, you would have had this baby out within the first three pushes. But this baby will not come out the way it is positioned and will lead to stress of the baby. We can’t keep going this way.”
Having a vaginal birth in mind, I was nervous about needing a c-section. But after being told I also had a 103 fever and the epidural had completely worn off and being completely exhausted, I knew a c-section was what was best for baby and I.
C-Section
After my doctor called for an emergency c-section, we had another woman step into the room to talk us through our options before the operation took place. Mind you I am 100% STILL CONTRACTING, in active labor, my sciatic nerve throbbing, AND I WAS FEEL EVERYTHING. I wish I was exaggerating, but you can ask Calvin, my mom or his mom, this woman was talking sooooo slow.
First option was a spinal tap, to which after catching my breath in between contractions, I immediately said no. I didn’t want the anesthesiologist, or anyone else for that matter, anywhere near my back again. Absolutely not.
So finally she moved on to the second option, general anesthesia. I’d be unconscious during the entire c-section and Calvin would not be allowed in.
Calvin looked at me and I up at him, still contracting, he encouraged me and reminded me of how far I had come along and that he was proud of me. He recommended I be put under general anesthesia because he knew just how exhausted I was and how my back and sciatic nerve was bothering me. I agreed with him and we told the woman we would go with option 2.
Immediately, I remember my mom and Calvin’s mom being asked to leave the room and having numerous nurses surround me as they began prepping me for the operation. I was so exhausted that all I remember is hearing the lead nurse repeating to Calvin how he wouldn’t be allowed inside the operating room but could wait outside and would be brought in when the baby was born. Before I knew it, I was all prepped and being wheeled off to the OR. It’s all fuzzy from there. I don’t know if it was the exhaustion mixed in with the fever, but all I recall was entering a bright, well lit up room and a man standing over my head speaking to me as he placed the oxygen mask over my mouth. Few seconds after that, I was out.
Calvin said it wasn’t even 15 minutes later when they came out to get him so he could meet our baby. The lead nurse asked him, “do you still not know the gender of your baby”. He said no.
“Well, come on in and find out,” she told him, as she led him to me.
She warned him not to glance my way when he walked into the room, which of course, he did anyhow but quickly regretted it and continued to look straight ahead. They were putting everything back in at that moment, he would later tell me.
Calvin saw our son for the first time as nurses did what was necessary following birth. He said one of the first things he noticed was how Josiah had red marks that looked like bruises all across his forehead and a small cut by one of his eyebrows. Turns out the baby’s head kept hitting my pelvic bone with each push.
Not long after meeting Josiah, Calvin went out to update our family and friends on how everything went. And to officially give the long-awaited gender reveal!
meeting josiah
Josiah was born at 8:39 PM and I didn’t wake up from the anesthesia until about 10:30 PM, No one really knows how one will respond to general anesthesia and as for me, according to Calvin, I woke up slightly confused and with a big gasp. He mentioned I’d wake up, ask a question, and pass out again. I did this a number of times, some I do recall. I woke up one time and remember hearing a baby crying softly. I asked “is that my. baby”? After hearing yes, I was out again. Then I woke back up and noticed Calvin sitting next to a bassinet and I asked again if that was our baby, he replied yes.
Is it a boy or a girl?” I continued the conversation.
With a huge smile on his face, Calvin replied, “Meet Josiah Lee Williams.”
I then asked the second question I had been wondering for months,
”Is it both a cleft lip and a cleft palate?”
Calvin nodded his head and said, “yes.”
My nurse Danielle then addressed me and told me they needed me to stay awake long enough so I could meet and hold my baby. So then I began asking her a million questions in order to keep talking and to stay awake. Poor Danielle. I asked her everything. She so Kindly answered all my questions. She was a great nurse who helped me start this entire process and got to help me finish it off as the baby’s nurse handed me my son and we met for the first time. (Danielle is pictured above.)
Holding Josiah in my arms made it all worth it. I forgot almost instantly everything prior to that moment. All that mattered was him. He was beautiful. He was perfect. He was here and he was ours. The emotion I felt in that moment I can’t fully describe.
Josiah’s nurse was standing beside Danielle and after allowing me to have that moment with Josiah, he told me it was time to feed. At 20 weeks we were told it looked like Josiah would be born with a cleft lip and palate. Since then we had been educating ourselves on the birth defect and learned that most babies with a cleft can not nurse. However, Josiah latched on immediately and he nursed during the rest of our hospital stay. It was an answered prayer in the midst of a crazy 24+ hour period. A sweet moment and unforgettable experience. I was over the moon about it.
And finally, at midnight, they wheeled us into our postpartum room where we would stay for another three days as I recovered from the c-section.
“You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy. A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world.”
I have two final things to say about Josiah’s birth story:
#1 This is not a complaint.
I know many women who wish they could have their own children but can’t. Moms who delivered still borns. Moms that had extremely difficult experiences. I’m not complaining, I don’t take for grated the opportunity I have had to concieve, grow, and birth a child. This isn’t to rant or blame or complain, it’s to share every honest detail (that sometimes others leave out) in hopes that it helps other expecting mamas to know what to possibly expect!
#2 This is not a comparison.
I think everyone’s labor and delivery story is beautiful because of the very truth of that verse quoted above. No matter how easy, how difficult, how exciting, how overwhelming… at the end of it all, a mother forgets the anguish as she holds her newborn. This isn’t to debate which is better, induction or natural, vaginal or c-section, drugs or no drugs. You get my point. Josiah is here. And no matter what I experienced, I wouldn’t change it one bit because this is our story to share.
post-partum
Y’all I could write an entire separate blog post on postpartum life and I just may. Our first night at home with Josiah was rough. But since then we’ve had family and friends help a ton. It takes a village.
I also knew that upon leaving the hospital I personally would have a lot to process pertaining to my experience. It was a lot to all at once. And while I know each birth story is different and as I mentioned, there's no need to compare one to the other, I know that what I experienced was hard. So for the first couple of days PP, I was incredibly emotional and exhausted. I knew it was important for me to cry out to God, pour out my heart to him along with all the heaviness and weariness I felt. And to be 100% honest, writing this out to share with you all has been a healing process as well. I’ve met God here at this lap top, with this blog post up, typing through the tears, stopping from time to time to pray and hear from Him. This wasn’t what I had planned or dreamed up in my mind. But it is exactly what happened and how my son came into this world. I would do it all over again to have him here. All moms will tell you, as I do now, it was all worth it!
So, there you have it! That’s our story. Our story of how I labored and delivered Josiah into the world. If you have questions, you know you can always ask. Y’all know I’m an open book!
Thanks for reading,
Crystal
