My Life as Annie hosts the weekly Time Travel Tuesday and asks us this week about birthing stories.

With my first pregnancy, we had been married four years and had been wanting to get pregnant for about two. We were beginning to wonder if we should go to the doctor and check things out when I finally got pregnant. My first sign was

(click to read the rest) feeling nauseous when we went out of town to visit my folks for Christmas. I had never gotten motion sickness when flying before, but I had to have my little air sickness bag at hand the whole flight, though thankfully I didn’t need to actually use it. We were, of course, very happy, almost giddy, to find out for sure that we were expecting. I didn’t realize how tired and wiped out I would feel at first, and “morning” sickness was distressing to me. I hadn’t dealt with nausea in ages. I finally realized that if I quit fighting against and just went ahead and threw up when I needed to and got it over with, I fared much better.

The whole pregnancy was pretty much by the book. There were no major problems, only some concern about the baby’s size. Ultrasounds weren’t routinely done then, but they sent me for one to make sure I wasn’t hiding a twin in there.

Though excited about and enjoying the pregnancy (except the nausea), I was fearful of childbirth. I remember reading in one of those freebie magazines moms-to-be get about three different birthing stories, and I just went into the restroom and cried and prayed for help. Childbirth classes helped a lot with knowing what to expect and what to do, and the rest was just trusting that God would help when the time came.

About a week before my due date, my labor started around 2:00 in the morning with my water breaking. I was glad that happened first. I thought it would be so discouraging to go to the hospital and be sent back home because of “false labor,” plus my younger brother had been born at home because things had happened too fast to get to the hospital, and I think I had a fear of that happening. I wanted to be at the hospital from the first sign of anything going on.

We made our way to the hospital and got all checked in. Unfortunately at that time they still did enemas routinely. No fun. That resulted in several trips to the bathroom, plus I got nauseated and threw up (I am wondering if something to do with the enema caused that because I didn’t get nauseated with later deliveries). I had a student nurse who took a very long time to check me to see how far dilated I was. So all of that was fairly miserable to me. But things progressed steadily. One thing that helped was something a lady in my childbirth class shared: she said not to lay there thinking, “What if I have to do this all day? I’ll never make it,” but rather to concentrate on just getting through one contraction at a time. That was valuable in labor, but it was also a lesson that has carried through in life — not to worry about all that “what ifs” and wondering how I am going to endure, but just to concentrate on getting through this one moment.

Things were going hot and heavy until finally it was time to push — but for some reason then my contractions petered out instead of being as strong as they needed to be. Pushing took about 3 hours when finally Jeremy was born, weighing 9 lbs. and 7 ounces. Not too long before he made his entrance the doctor gave me a local injection of anesthetic. That was probably a good thing, because I tore all the way down into my rectum. The doctor told me later that when the baby’s shoulders were delivered, he heard a loud pop and was afraid the baby’s collarbone was broken — but it was me tearing. But I didn’t feel anything and really didn’t have any problems afterward. In fact, one kind of funny situation occurred when the nurse set me up for my first “sitz bath,” which was this contraption that set on the toilet and had an iv bag that ran warm salted water through it, which the new mom would sit on, and it promoted healing. She showed me how to set it up for myself the next time. When I did it on my own, I put the whole little paper cup full of salt into the mixture. So the next time I told her I needed more salt, I learned that I was only supposed to have used a little of the salt that was there each time. I don’t know if perhaps the extra-salty water helped it heal even more. In our childbirth class, one of the moms in a filmstrip we saw had trouble afterward and had to sit on a little donut-shaped ring for a long time: I was glad I didn’t have to do that.

Jason came along three years later. That pregnancy was the only one in which I had serious problems, gestational diabetes and pre-eclampsia. Jim said my feet looked like cream puffs with toes. I had to be on bedrest for two weeks, which I really chafed under. I have known of other moms spending weeks or months on bedrest — I don’t know how they do it. I thought that after two weeks I’d be all rested up and then have lots of energy to get things done — but it was just the opposite. I had almost no energy at all when I finally could get up again. I don’t know if it was because of that or the other physical problems, but I just felt miserable through my whole labor. My contractions again petered out toward the end and they had to start pitocen to keep things going. This labor had started out with an occasional contraction that gradually grew into regular ones. They had had to break my water this time. Jason was my smallest baby at 9 lbs. 2 oz., and all the diabetes and other problems resolved right away.

Jesse came along 6 years later, and, again, his was pretty much textbook gestation until the end. He also was very big, but the ultrasound showed just one little boy in there. He was very late, though, and at thirteen days overdue they decided to induce labor. So with each childbirth for me they had to start the pitocen at an earlier stage. I have heard horror stories about induced labor, but I didn’t find it to be a problem or any worse than the others at all. I think with this birth as well as Jason’s I just received a local injection just before birth. Epidurals weren’t really popular or even mentioned, that I can remember, with my first two. It was an option with Jesse, but I didn’t want one. I had known of two people who had had problems with theirs, and I’d rather just have things go along as naturally as possible. Jesse weighed in at 12 lbs. even. Yep, 12 lbs. We had all known he was big, but not that big. I tore a little, but nowhere near as much as I had with the first one. He was born in a women’s hospital where the only children were newborns, and the little newborn diapers didn’t fit him: someone from the hospital had to go out and buy the next size up for him. The little baby blood pressure cuff was too small. But he was healthy as can be. We don’t know why he was so big — my weight gain that pregnancy was the most moderate of the three and I’d had no diabetes this time. I was concerned because in between Jason and Jesse I had had to have half my thyroid gland removed due to a benign (thankfully) nodule, but that didn’t seem to have any effect on the baby. Jesse is now the skinniest of us all, so even though he started out big, he didn’t stay that way.

All three had dark hair when they were born that lightened to blond when they were little boys, then darkened again in their teens. Even though they were all big babies, they were little enough to me. I can’t imagine dealing with a four or six pound baby — I think I really would be afraid of breaking them!

We never lived near family and neither of our mothers were able to come when our babies were born. But thankfully Jim was able to take time off each time, and he is an excellent caretaker. I was so glad that each time we had the opportunity to have him home and get adjusted to the new addition to our family. Each time ladies from church brought food, and sometimes helped with house work or took the other children for a little while.

I am thankful for each one of my children. I had hoped for a little girl along the way, but I wouldn’t trade any of my three guys in!