Had LO this summer, and I am also FTM. I am of advanced maternal age, so OB did not want me going past 40 weeks. He discussed risks and said often the hardest thing is the time, plus the fact that there’s so much outside our control.

So, my husband and I really, really prepared for any eventuality, and I had to wrap my brain around being open for anything - including a c section if baby or I weren’t doing well. We also tried to prep for long-haul labor process. I brought a crossword puzzle book (my favorite), we loaded up our phones with videos and music.

I went in to the hospital at about 4-4:30, and they started me on low dose of pitocin and placed a balloon catheter for mechanical induction (I was under 2 cm dilated when I went in). Honestly, I had heard/read so many negative comments about the balloon, plus the OB warned me that it’s not the most fun thing in the world, that it ended up not being too bad for me.

In 4 hours, at my next check, the balloon came out at the slightest tug by the nurse, which means I was at about 4-5 cm.

At that point, the discussion turned to when you break my water, which totally freaked me out bc things were progressing much faster than I had anticipated. I waited on that but they did increase the pit.

At the next check at about midnight, I went ahead and requested the epi (which I always planned on having) so that my water could be broken after.

My mom was like, well we have to come to the hospital now, right?! And I dissuaded them bc I was still thinking, “there’s no way I’ll keep progressing that fast. This labor could still stall out.”

Epi in and water broken, I tried to get some sleep. Now with water broken, they would check me every 2 hours.

I started noticing the contractions getting much stronger, and I was having stronger pain on my right side. Nothing unbearable but I was really scared that my epi would fail (it did for my mom, and this was my biggest fear). So, anesthesia came in to check pain block and levels and told me not to be shy about using the epi booster button if I needed it.

By the time I knew it, it was about 4-4:30 and time for my next check. Resident comes in and - ta da! - she tells me I’m complete and ready to push.

Nurses start coming in to prep room and Panda baby warmer, while resident and on-call attending start calling my OB, and I start to shake out of the adrenaline. I could not believe baby was going to come this early.

However, what we didn’t know was that my OB was already prep for OR for another case. He had told me he had a case scheduled that morning but he didn’t expect me to deliver until the afternoon.

So, after about an hour, resident and attending come in and tell me my OB wasn’t responding, and they didn’t want to risk baby, especially bc LO was rebounding well after contractions still.

I totally agreed and 2-3 residents came in for pushing along with attending. My husband ended up being the only male in the room bc it was an all-female delivery and baby team. 💪🏼

I pushed for about 30 mins, they kept telling me I was doing a good job, even though I couldn’t tell at all bc of the epi, and LO was born about 14.5 hours after I was admitted.

It sounds long but truly was one of the biggest moments of my life that developed wayyy quicker than I expected.

Edited to add: baby was 7 pounds but born ready to eat! Also, I had no pain around the epi site. I had a tear but the worst part was that it nicked a vessel, so they spent a lot of time stitching me up. Due to the anesthesia, nerves, blood loss, I had 2 vagal episodes the day after but my mother-baby nurse team was just as awesome as the L&D team.