Labor & Delivery, Part I

I was more than ready to give birth, so Andrew and I set about being proactive in instigating labor.  We were doubly motivated:  not only were we (mentally) through with the whole pregnancy thing and waiting, but the new year was looming.  If we wanted to be able to claim our little bundle of joy on our taxes, we were going to have to get crackin'!

My due date arrived, and Andrew took off work for the December holidays and a pre-babymoon spent at home.  I finally stopped going to work as well after having astonished my coworkers that I was still working up until my expected launch time.

...And my due date went past.  We knew it was most common for a first pregnancy to go 10 days past due, but that was cutting things awfully close as I was due on December 20.

So, tired as I was, and in pain and discomfort as I was, we started walking as often as possible.  In all, I had gained 50lbs with my pregnancy, and my joints and feet were really unhappy about that.

I started to worry about whether or not I would survive childbirth.  Odds are much better these days than in bygone times, when women had some ridiculous death rate in childbirth of around 25% or so.  (Feel free to check that statistic; it's unverified by me as of yet.)  Just in case something tragic occurred, I wanted Jackson to know his Mommy and to have something that was just for him from me.

Thus, I wrote "A Letter to my Unborn Son."  Rereading it now, it was terribly written, to be honest, so I won't reproduce it here except for the closing:

"Thank you for making me a mother.  And thank you, in advance, for doing your chores as you were told and for respecting your parents, as I'm sure you will, or you'll be grounded until you're 40, young man."

Well, that didn't instigate labor.  Then Andrew, my darling Quality Engineer husband, had a great idea:  He pointed out that goals are best achieved when they are written down and made specific.

So, I wrote down my goals, which mainly stated that I hoped to have a safe labor and delivery, that Jackson would be born healthy, and that I would pretty please start having contractions as soon as possible.  As in now.

That was at 9 days past due.  This kid was going to owe me late fees!

On the 10th day past my due date, we did more walking.  And more walking.  And more walking.  We then tried spicy food.  It seemed less crazy than the old "drive down a bumpy road" idea.  Our cajun food was annoyingly bland but sent us rushing home to fight for the bathroom.

Still not in labor, we tried the often suggested approach by many of the informed people in our cadre of medical prenatal caregivers:  sex.

There are scientific reasons for which sex is suggested as a method of inducing labor.  But when one partner is shaped like an inverted camel, humping becomes less fun and more like solving a Rubik's Cube.

The science:  The cervix is the enemy that must be conquered.  Jackson showed some prescience in utero because any time I said the word cervix, he would find some way to hit it painfully as a way to indicate to me that he knew what it was:  the way out.  In order for the gestated little squirt to achieve escape velocity, the cervix has to soften and stretch open.  Conveniently, human male semen has some ingredients, known as prostaglandins, that facilitate this ripening process.  The same sort of chemical mechanism is used in artificially stimulating labor, only it's way less fun that way and greatly increases the pain of labor.  Sex would be simpler and gentler.

So, what the heck, right?  Well, we did our part and managed to enjoy each other--which we did not get a chance to do again for another 6 weeks afterward.

But still no labor.  My sister called and woke us from our post-coital snooze to nag me about hatching her nephew.  "Hurry it up, already!"

Tired and ready to give in to defeat for the day, Andrew and I ventured out into the world to rent some movies and buy some Publix deli sandwiches.  (Something about Publix deli...there were almost always swell-bellied pre-mamas hanging around there.)

Watching the old movie, Blown Away, with Jeff Bridges and Tommy Lee Jones, I ate my turkey sandwich and felt surprised that Andrew had never seen the film before.

Then I felt something that wasn't surprise.  This was not a Braxton Hicks contraction, ohhhhh no, sir.  This was the real deal.  I was finally in labor!

And the cause?  Maybe it was just time at long last, or maybe it was just a 24 hour delay from my goal writing, but Andrew likes to say that all we needed to instigate labor was a dose of Tommy Lee Jones!