Made in Reykjavik: Birth and the first week

This morning our beautiful little daughter turned one week old. She celebrated by sleeping last night from midnight to 4am and then again from 5 to 8. Her parents love her dearly and are blissfully happy with their new little family. Now that she is full of milk and sleeping well, there is time to sit and write about how she was born and the wonderful adventures of the first week on earth!

In the hospital after she was born, the midwife asked me how long I had been in labor, and I found it almost an impossible question to answer...I had been having irregular contractions since Monday (March 29th) and they were heavier and heavier since then, so I'd like to think that early labor started then. By Wednesday, I asked our midwife to sweep the membranes (when they separate the bag the baby is swimming in from the walls of the uterus) so we could encourage real active labor to begin. After that, the contractions were more steady and about 10 minutes apart, though I was able to sleep through the night, so they weren't that strong yet.

On Thursday afternoon, contraction were coming more frequently and picking up in intensity. The midwife came to our house to check me in the afternoon, and I was 3cm dilated and about 50% effaced, so real progress was finally starting to take place! I continued to labor into the night, contractions growing more steady and intense all the time. It is weird that they say your sense of time and sequence are disturbed by the hormones produced during labor and delivery, and I definitely found this to be true in my case. I have a hard time remembering what happened when, and during the actual labor itself, it was hard for me to tell how much time had passed. I know that the midwife came to our house at around midnight on Thursday, April 1st. When she arrived, I was about 4cm dilated and she and Tumi got to work setting up the birth pool while I walked around the apartment contracting.

By the time the pool was ready, my contractions were about 3 minutes apart, so I got in right away. While I enjoyed being in the pool, a weird thing happened, and my contractions stopped completely. I was in the pool for about 15 minutes, and had not one contraction the whole time! Birth is a mysterious thing, I suppose, but it was clear from that point on that this baby did not want to come out in the water.

Labor continued once I got out of the pool, but was going pretty slowly. The midwife broke my water when I was 6 cm dilated, but even that did not speed things up very much. Later on, after much intense laboring, the midwife checked once again and I had gone up to 8 cm, but the baby's head was in a strange position. She then checked the heart rate, and noticed that it had slowed significantly. It stayed low for long enough to make us worried, so the decision was made to call an ambulance and finish the birth at the hospital.

Tumi whirled around the apartment and packed our bag for the hospital. Even on such short notice, he grabbed absolutely everything we needed; extra clothes, baby clothes, blankets, food, camera, etc. By the time the ambulance arrived, the baby's heart rate was back to a normal pace, but she had turned in such a way that made the contractions really painful in my back. The ambulance ride was mercifully brief (we live about 5 minutes away from the hospital) although I was really feeling the contractions, and it was overwhelming that the conditions for labor had changed so quickly.

When we got to the hospital, they provided some nitrous oxide, which really helped calm me down (love that stuff!). The midwives decided since the labor was going slowly and was in my back that I would be induced and given an epidural. I was completely happy with that idea, since I know that babies come out whatever way they need too, and it had been so long was ready to be done. After the epidural, Tumi and I slept for about 40 minutes, which was a heavenly break that I am convinced helped me keep up my strength for the pushing phase to come.

After about 4 hours in the hospital, it was time to push. I started pushing at 9am, and little baby girl was born at 9:14. She was crying right away, and they placed her in my arms as soon as she was out. What a beautiful moment! We stayed in the delivery room for about an hour, and then we were moved to a family recovery room. There, Tumi's parents and my mom (who had arrived in Iceland just 2 hours before little one was born) came to visit us and check out their new granddaughter. Once they left, all three of us slept for a long time and left the hospital by about 10pm.

Little baby girl's first week of life has been an amazing adventure. She is a really good sleeper, eater, pooper, and face-maker...what more can you ask for?! Breast feeding has it's ups and downs. I was really surprised by how solid and huge my breasts got when the milk came in, and since their colossal size made it hard for little one to latch on, they have been a bit sore, but are getting better every day. In Icelandic, they call the forgetful, spacey cloud that covers the brain of new mothers 'Milk Fog.' I have noticed since giving birth how hard it is for me to remember things or to have a decent conversation with my friends. While I have found this stupidity difficult to deal with, it is comforting to know that it is temporary and someday I'll have my old brain back (fingers crossed!)