The Birth Story: Ryan's Viewpoint

I woke up to Marilyn telling me that she had been having contractions since midnight. We started timing contractions and getting packed up for the hospital.

We had prepared and hoped dearly for a natural birth for the baby, for Marilyn's recovery and also for the phenomenal experience of natural birth. Sadly, minutes after reaching the hospital we learned Hannah was totally feet down. But better a cesarean than losing the loves of my life! That far along they do not try to turn the baby since there is too much danger of the cord prolapsing (entering the birth canal before the baby). We had an appointment to try and turn the baby just the next day too! Our doctor was called and he scheduled a cesarean as soon as possible. The hospital was swift about it, that's for sure!

I was told I could watch the operation so long as I did not faint. So, I split my attention between comforting the anesthetized Marilyn and watching the birth operation over the screen. Our relaxation training really paid off, despite the fact that we had a c-section.

The Surgery

Supposedly an average cesarean incision is only 6 inches long (I just measured, Marilyn's is 6 3/4). But it looked a lot larger, especially when pulled into a rough circle by clamps so the doctors had space. Our doctor talked me through the operation and gave lots of advice to the assisting doctor. The shop talk was interesting, apparently common mistakes include cutting too low and pulling the baby out through an incision in the vagina, not the uterus, or cutting open the bladder on the way in (yikes). Pretty soon Marilyn's stomach looked like little more than a pool of blood and iodine.

I spent a lot of my time with Marilyn reassuring, deeply breathing and telling her how things were going (without bloody details). As Marilyn mentioned, she doesn't remember the anesthetist rather ironically telling her she'd forget a lot of what was happening.

Soon, the doctor told me they were going to pull little Hannah out. Her feet came easily and the doctor gripped them in the standard two-fingers-and-a-thumb diaper change position. Her body also came easily, along with a truly thin umbilical cord. Hannah's hands were over her head and the doctor spent some time fishing them out with two fingers. The trouble started when the uterus began post-birth contractions, right on little baby's head and neck! I watched for probably a minute and a half as the doctors twisted, tugged and wrestled with the headless body of my baby emerging from Marilyn's massive wound. The situation was tense, but the doctors stayed calm and efficient. Hannah was dripping with blood and deep purple when they briefly showed her to me before sending her to be cleaned.

Half the time of the surgery was sewing things back together. Did you know they actually take the uterus from the body and lay it on the woman's stomach to sew it up? Tellingly, Marilyn struggled to keep herself aware against the medicine until she was told the baby was fine. After that she immediately slipped into relaxation and wanted me to sing her lullabies. The last thing she remembers is hearing Hannah cry from the other room. I spent quite a bit of the surgery singing to her and stroking her hair.

Post Birth

Hannah's first Apgar score was critically low, a 1 of 10. This means:

Appearance: Totally blue: 0
Pulse: Over 100, faint: 1
Grimace: Unresponsive: 0
Activity: No movement: 0
Respiration: None: 0



The uterus clamping down on her head ("it felt just like a vice" the doctors said over and over) really traumatized our little one. But her 5 minute score had improved to an 8. She spent about 4-5 hours in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) on a breathing machine.

Even in the NICU, she was just beautiful. Although she looked a lot better once the breathing machine was out!


(I bet you are glad for some pictures after the wall of text about the surgery!)

Marilyn was very sad about not seeing the baby for that many hours. I assumed they would show her the baby before taking her to the NICU, and the NICU also said they'd get us the baby in an hour. I wish I had been more proactive about getting the baby shown to Marilyn, but she got to us eventually and we spent a lovely time together in the hospital.