Dear Launi-
I didn’t think I’d be writing you this soon. After all, I wasn’t due until Feb 8th. Our last class was on the 15th, and our little girl was born on the 18th!! exactly 3 weeks early!! huge surprise to us. I was expecting to go late and have a really long first labor. Neither of those happened.
when I went to bed the night before, I joked with Matt, “what if I go into labor tonight and our carseat hasn’t come yet?” he told me I shouldn’t say things like that. Well, at 1am I woke up in a flood. I told Matt “either my water just broke, or I wet the bed” and he responded that he hoped it was the second. It wasn’t. I wasn’t quite sure what to do, so I climbed in the shower, since I was leaking all over, and Matt called the midwife on call. my surges were about 5 minutes apart. I had no signs of labor until my water broke, so I wasn’t sure what I was feeling. in the shower, I practiced my breathing and staying relaxed, which was hard because I was so excited.
after I got out of the shower, I sat and listened to the rainbow relaxation while matt packed the bag for the hospital. i told him that i wanted to stay home for as long as possible, because i didn’t want to sit at the hospital for 18 hours, where it would be harder for me to relax. we decided to go to the hospital in between 5-6am, because the midwife told us we probably shouldn’t stay home for too long since my water had already broken. at about 3am, the surges got really, really strong. I had a hard time convincing myself that they weren’t painful, and reminding myself to breathe. Good thing Matt was there! I was just fine in between surges, it was just during that I thought I would never make it through. Then they would pass and i would think “this is fine, I can totally do this”
finally at about 4am, I told Matt that we had to get to the hospital now, my surges were getting close, and I kinda wanted something to take the edge off. When we got to the hospital, we asked for the natural birthing room, and they said it was closed because the floors had just been waxed. Oh well! When they checked me the first time I was 7cm!! The nurse assisting Abby (the midwife) in the birth was great, everytime I had a surge, she would push on my knees, like you did in class and it helped so much!! it’s a secret I’ll have to remember with my next births. I also did get a little something to help me out, they told me it would only last for about an hour, but it helped relieve some pressure, but I could still feel through the surges. They also had to give me oxygen, because I was getting close to hyperventilating–oops! Matt worked harder to remind me to breathe at that point. Although the oxygen felt good, and actually helped me relax a bit
Within 1/2 hour to an hour of arriving at the hospital I felt I had to push. They checked me and I was ready to go! Abby had just shown up about 10 minutes before, so it was perfect timing. The first push, the nurse told me to hold my breath and push with all my might. I did it once, and then told her that I can’t push that way (I was already tired enough!) but thankfully, abby was completely ok with me breathing the baby down. So I did. it took about an hour, but it felt so much better than that first push did.
Katryn Llewellyn Bockholt was born at 6:01:18sec on Friday January 18th at Timpanogos hospital. She weighed 6lbs 8oz, and was 19in. Has lots of dark hair on the back of her head, not so much on the front. She’s such a content little girl, and believe it or not (most people don’t) she doesn’t cry. Every once in a while, we get one wail (about 3 secs worth) but that’s it! i think a lot of it has to do with the hypnobirthing, and not being pushed out of me.
Thanks for teaching us!! We’re exciting to use it more fully with our next baby
-Krystal, Matt, and Katryn Bockholt
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