AwkwardlyHugged
Greenlighter
- Joined
- Jun 29, 2016
- Messages
- 2
[WARNING: This has an actual birth in it, guys. If you?€™re squeamish, look away now.]
The first time I had a baby, it was pretty much textbook. It wasn?€™t a long birth compared to many (an evening at home having contractions, hospital around midnight, baby by 6am), but it was quite a lot of pain and a lot of waiting. Then I got an epidural which was excellent. An hour of pushing and just being so ready for it to be over?€? and then out comes a baby. Yay!
I expected my second birth to be similar - rock up to the hospital, have an epidural, push - done. I felt more prepared and was really relaxed about it all. I was kind of looking forward to having a bit more knowledge on what to expect the second time around, and getting to appreciate the moment more.
On the night of my second birth, I?€™d been feeling rubbish all day. My hips hurt and I had trouble walking to my car after a lunch date. I had light contractions all afternoon and asked my hubby to pick up our daughter from daycare, rather than leave the house again.
My water broke in the night, and when we phoned the hospital, they said to come in. I was having contractions in the car. We dropped off my daughter with her nan and we checked into the hospital. Hubby and I and went back to sleep for a few hours.
As I tried to sleep the contractions got stronger and closer together, but still manageable. But then quite suddenly, one contraction took a really big bite and I woke hubby up and got him to call the nurse. In the few minutes it took to buzz the nurse and have her arrive with a wheelchair, my contractions took off. I was in agony and felt like I was having the baby RIGHT NOW.
I remember being wheeled down the hall and waves of pain just hitting me over and over. I wanted to ask the nurse to stop so I could stop being jostled and do something (anything) to relieve the pain, but she was rushing now, just saying ?€œ... hang on, we?€™re nearly there?€ (the birthing suite).
I got to the suite and in the few hours we?€™d been resting, I?€™d gone from 2cm to 8cm dilated. The nurse offered me the ?€˜gas and air?€™ machine.
I didn?€™t really use gas the first time I had a baby: in fact, I don?€™t remember having any at all. I started having a few breaths from the machine. My husband asked me if I wanted an epidural. The answer was yes, except I said to him ?€œ... I?€™m not getting an epidural - there?€™s a baby coming out?€. And there was. I could feel her head right down low in my pelvis.
The nurses at this point are properly scrambling. They?€™re saying ?€œ... Hangon - don?€™t push?€. I?€™ve realised I?€™m definitely not getting any of the ?€˜good stuff?€™ pain relief this time. There is a baby and she is on the way.
I?€™ve not used gas before so I?€™ve communicated to Hubby to ask the nurse if I need to keep taking ?€˜hits?€™ from the mask synchronized with these waves of contractions, or whether I can just breathe from it constantly.
I think it came out ?€œ... will I die if I suck on this??€
Hubby translates beautifully and the nurse laughs ?€œ... No - you go crazy on it love?€.
And so I put the mask over my mouth and don?€™t stop breathing the gas. And things go completely and terribly and wonderfully mental.
My physical body is convulsing in massive waves. But my mind is gone. I?€™m no longer an actual person. I am completely engulfed in the process of birthing. I feel like a cow who is going to push her baby out while mooing with joy and it is sensational. I am powerful. I am life. And I am going to bellow this baby into the world because it is the most important thing I?€™ve ever done.
?€œOkay - she's going?€
The nurses are still moving fast trying to get everything ready as I?€™ve been in the birthing room literally minutes and I have caught them a bit by surprise.
One of the midwives leans into my face and whispers to me "... this is the way to do it".
In my far away place, I think that she's referring to euphoria of knowing the secret to the beginning and end of life. That I was leaning in and becoming one with vibrations of existence, while literally bringing new life into this world. Happy I was going to birth this baby like I was Mother Nature herself - raw and real and without fear. And that somehow she knew that I was experiencing all of these things.
(On reflection, I think she probably just meant birthing really fast and getting it over with!)
I feel something release inside me and the baby moves forward. She?€™s ready to come out and her head is pushing low and ready. I?€™m hit with another massive wave of contractions. One on top of the other. I?€™m blind with pain. But then it stops. I've had my baby!
Nope. Another wave of contractions and a feeling I remember from my first birth - bone dragging on bone. Enormous resistance. I haven't pushed out the head fully yet.
More contractions hit and oh my god I just want this THING out of me. Maybe I can pull it out. The midwives are protecting my poor baby's head from my groping fingers. I've gone completely mad with pain.
?€œIf you want it out, you're going to have to push it out.?€
Oh sweet relief! Why didn't you JUST SAY SO. And I push and her head moves through and the awful, full feeling is gone. Her wibbly wobbly body and legs follow like wet spaghetti.
The midwife goes to move my new baby onto my stomach, but there is a problem (I'd find out later the cord was really short). She looks worried as she clamps it and passes over bubs to a nurse. And then something goes wrong. The other end of the cord snaps and vanishes back inside me.
Both midwives try to retrieve it. It is incomprehensible that a whole human hand fits into your vagina, but it does, and they both give recovering the cord several goes. My husband is handed Bubs & I hear the nurses ask him to press the emergency button. He looks calm, but terrified. They are pushing on my poor excruciating, cramping stomach to try and find a solution to the unclamped cord that has now gone completely AWOL. There is blood everywhere - more than you could ever imagine. I start hitting the gas hard.
I enter an infinite reverberation of sound and life. Maybe, when one dies, their last instant just replays forever? Maybe this moment, at the of edge of life and brand new birth, will also be the moment I die?
I?€™m engulfed by a {sound/signal/feeling} from my life. Familiarity in a droplet.
Then it repeats.
Then a second {sound/signal/feeling} from my life plays through.
Then the first again.
Then a third is added. Then the second two again. A loop. A growing loop. It?€™s bliss.
It is everything.
I?€™m no longer on the bed: I?€™m higher than the ceiling and the things happening to my body are no longer relevant. I realise it is all just game - a video game. Life is a video game. Each new cycle is a level up - but it is also some kind of countdown. It will lead me to the end. It feels so familiar, so enticing. It is promising that I don?€™t need to worry. This is what was meant to happen all along.
I?€™m life-looping. I?€™m hearing probably a dozen {sounds/signals/feelings} echos on the loop now - my echos of me. It is my life flashing before my eyes, but it?€™s not played like a film - it?€™s feelings and sounds. But also lessons. The whole point of life is learning these lessons. That?€™s the game. And I?€™m gently aware each time I let this loop play through - and the next echo gets added - that we are getting closer to the end. But with each loop it just gets better. More euphoric. More familiar. Easier. Harder to resist.
Then it changes. Rather than being echos {sounds/signals/feelings} from my life, now the new ones being added to the loop are echos beyond me. They?€™re not me anymore. They?€™re the answers to life and death and love and time. The next steps. They?€™re the echos of *everything*. They are the answers. And they go on forever. And I realise that is the secret. That once you?€™re no longer you - you are beyond you - and you become part of the energy that makes up everything. And it?€™s beautiful. It?€™s forever, timeless. It?€™s infinite.
But then there is a huge jolt in this perfect trip and I realise I?€™m in actual, real mortal danger. There are only a few loops left. We?€™re right on the precipice. I?€™m about to find out things I?€™m not able to know and still be on this level - I?€™ll level up. I can have the answers to life, but if I follow it and go to the next level, I?€™m not coming back. I?€™m going, going, gone. This is my choice. Wherever I am right now, it asks me the question deep into my mind - do you want to keep going?
NO, I don?€™t want to keep going! My husband is back there and he?€™s perfection and he?€™s waiting for me and I want to be with him. No no no no no no no! And I grab the mask off my face, sit semi-upright and shout;
?€œBECAUSE I LOVE HIM?€
And at that moment my head explodes with bright light, absolute euphoria and something like a cross between the music from the ending of an 80?€™s video game and a tremendous round of applause. I realised I?€™ve made the right choice. I was supposed to choose love. That was the ultimate lesson. Boss level complete. I won the game.
I look straight into my husband?€™s eyes and I can see he?€™s scared shitless because he?€™s got a newborn baby in his arms and he?€™s watching a bunch of nurses try to stop the blood pouring out of his wife. (Which they do).
And I hear a midwife off to my left say laughing ?€œ... well, I think SOMEONE'S had enough gas.?€
She takes my gas away. And I?€™m left to work through sober, the hard reality which is a medical emergency during delivery. Which was unmentionably shitty. Suffering was the price to pay for staying, I guess.
It?€™s worth mentioning the entire experience from entering the birth suite to baby in arms, took 25 minutes. The whole thing was life altering, and I got a lovely new baby out of it - but it was over really quickly.
Bubs and I are healthy and happy now. The obstetrician joked having someone shout ?€œI love you?€ at their husband while birthing was not usually the way it happens. And while I feel like a got a lot of answers, I?€™ve definitely been left with more questions. Mostly, did I really have a spiritual, near-death experience, or was it all ?€˜just the gas?€™...
Thanks for listening. x
Tagged by Xorkoth
substancecode_nitrous
substancecode_dissociatives
explevel_inexperienced
exptype_positive
exptype_glowing
exptype_spiritual
roacode_inhaled
The first time I had a baby, it was pretty much textbook. It wasn?€™t a long birth compared to many (an evening at home having contractions, hospital around midnight, baby by 6am), but it was quite a lot of pain and a lot of waiting. Then I got an epidural which was excellent. An hour of pushing and just being so ready for it to be over?€? and then out comes a baby. Yay!
I expected my second birth to be similar - rock up to the hospital, have an epidural, push - done. I felt more prepared and was really relaxed about it all. I was kind of looking forward to having a bit more knowledge on what to expect the second time around, and getting to appreciate the moment more.
On the night of my second birth, I?€™d been feeling rubbish all day. My hips hurt and I had trouble walking to my car after a lunch date. I had light contractions all afternoon and asked my hubby to pick up our daughter from daycare, rather than leave the house again.
My water broke in the night, and when we phoned the hospital, they said to come in. I was having contractions in the car. We dropped off my daughter with her nan and we checked into the hospital. Hubby and I and went back to sleep for a few hours.
As I tried to sleep the contractions got stronger and closer together, but still manageable. But then quite suddenly, one contraction took a really big bite and I woke hubby up and got him to call the nurse. In the few minutes it took to buzz the nurse and have her arrive with a wheelchair, my contractions took off. I was in agony and felt like I was having the baby RIGHT NOW.
I remember being wheeled down the hall and waves of pain just hitting me over and over. I wanted to ask the nurse to stop so I could stop being jostled and do something (anything) to relieve the pain, but she was rushing now, just saying ?€œ... hang on, we?€™re nearly there?€ (the birthing suite).
I got to the suite and in the few hours we?€™d been resting, I?€™d gone from 2cm to 8cm dilated. The nurse offered me the ?€˜gas and air?€™ machine.
I didn?€™t really use gas the first time I had a baby: in fact, I don?€™t remember having any at all. I started having a few breaths from the machine. My husband asked me if I wanted an epidural. The answer was yes, except I said to him ?€œ... I?€™m not getting an epidural - there?€™s a baby coming out?€. And there was. I could feel her head right down low in my pelvis.
The nurses at this point are properly scrambling. They?€™re saying ?€œ... Hangon - don?€™t push?€. I?€™ve realised I?€™m definitely not getting any of the ?€˜good stuff?€™ pain relief this time. There is a baby and she is on the way.
I?€™ve not used gas before so I?€™ve communicated to Hubby to ask the nurse if I need to keep taking ?€˜hits?€™ from the mask synchronized with these waves of contractions, or whether I can just breathe from it constantly.
I think it came out ?€œ... will I die if I suck on this??€
Hubby translates beautifully and the nurse laughs ?€œ... No - you go crazy on it love?€.
And so I put the mask over my mouth and don?€™t stop breathing the gas. And things go completely and terribly and wonderfully mental.
My physical body is convulsing in massive waves. But my mind is gone. I?€™m no longer an actual person. I am completely engulfed in the process of birthing. I feel like a cow who is going to push her baby out while mooing with joy and it is sensational. I am powerful. I am life. And I am going to bellow this baby into the world because it is the most important thing I?€™ve ever done.
?€œOkay - she's going?€
The nurses are still moving fast trying to get everything ready as I?€™ve been in the birthing room literally minutes and I have caught them a bit by surprise.
One of the midwives leans into my face and whispers to me "... this is the way to do it".
In my far away place, I think that she's referring to euphoria of knowing the secret to the beginning and end of life. That I was leaning in and becoming one with vibrations of existence, while literally bringing new life into this world. Happy I was going to birth this baby like I was Mother Nature herself - raw and real and without fear. And that somehow she knew that I was experiencing all of these things.
(On reflection, I think she probably just meant birthing really fast and getting it over with!)
I feel something release inside me and the baby moves forward. She?€™s ready to come out and her head is pushing low and ready. I?€™m hit with another massive wave of contractions. One on top of the other. I?€™m blind with pain. But then it stops. I've had my baby!
Nope. Another wave of contractions and a feeling I remember from my first birth - bone dragging on bone. Enormous resistance. I haven't pushed out the head fully yet.
More contractions hit and oh my god I just want this THING out of me. Maybe I can pull it out. The midwives are protecting my poor baby's head from my groping fingers. I've gone completely mad with pain.
?€œIf you want it out, you're going to have to push it out.?€
Oh sweet relief! Why didn't you JUST SAY SO. And I push and her head moves through and the awful, full feeling is gone. Her wibbly wobbly body and legs follow like wet spaghetti.
The midwife goes to move my new baby onto my stomach, but there is a problem (I'd find out later the cord was really short). She looks worried as she clamps it and passes over bubs to a nurse. And then something goes wrong. The other end of the cord snaps and vanishes back inside me.
Both midwives try to retrieve it. It is incomprehensible that a whole human hand fits into your vagina, but it does, and they both give recovering the cord several goes. My husband is handed Bubs & I hear the nurses ask him to press the emergency button. He looks calm, but terrified. They are pushing on my poor excruciating, cramping stomach to try and find a solution to the unclamped cord that has now gone completely AWOL. There is blood everywhere - more than you could ever imagine. I start hitting the gas hard.
I enter an infinite reverberation of sound and life. Maybe, when one dies, their last instant just replays forever? Maybe this moment, at the of edge of life and brand new birth, will also be the moment I die?
I?€™m engulfed by a {sound/signal/feeling} from my life. Familiarity in a droplet.
Then it repeats.
Then a second {sound/signal/feeling} from my life plays through.
Then the first again.
Then a third is added. Then the second two again. A loop. A growing loop. It?€™s bliss.
It is everything.
I?€™m no longer on the bed: I?€™m higher than the ceiling and the things happening to my body are no longer relevant. I realise it is all just game - a video game. Life is a video game. Each new cycle is a level up - but it is also some kind of countdown. It will lead me to the end. It feels so familiar, so enticing. It is promising that I don?€™t need to worry. This is what was meant to happen all along.
I?€™m life-looping. I?€™m hearing probably a dozen {sounds/signals/feelings} echos on the loop now - my echos of me. It is my life flashing before my eyes, but it?€™s not played like a film - it?€™s feelings and sounds. But also lessons. The whole point of life is learning these lessons. That?€™s the game. And I?€™m gently aware each time I let this loop play through - and the next echo gets added - that we are getting closer to the end. But with each loop it just gets better. More euphoric. More familiar. Easier. Harder to resist.
Then it changes. Rather than being echos {sounds/signals/feelings} from my life, now the new ones being added to the loop are echos beyond me. They?€™re not me anymore. They?€™re the answers to life and death and love and time. The next steps. They?€™re the echos of *everything*. They are the answers. And they go on forever. And I realise that is the secret. That once you?€™re no longer you - you are beyond you - and you become part of the energy that makes up everything. And it?€™s beautiful. It?€™s forever, timeless. It?€™s infinite.
But then there is a huge jolt in this perfect trip and I realise I?€™m in actual, real mortal danger. There are only a few loops left. We?€™re right on the precipice. I?€™m about to find out things I?€™m not able to know and still be on this level - I?€™ll level up. I can have the answers to life, but if I follow it and go to the next level, I?€™m not coming back. I?€™m going, going, gone. This is my choice. Wherever I am right now, it asks me the question deep into my mind - do you want to keep going?
NO, I don?€™t want to keep going! My husband is back there and he?€™s perfection and he?€™s waiting for me and I want to be with him. No no no no no no no! And I grab the mask off my face, sit semi-upright and shout;
?€œBECAUSE I LOVE HIM?€
And at that moment my head explodes with bright light, absolute euphoria and something like a cross between the music from the ending of an 80?€™s video game and a tremendous round of applause. I realised I?€™ve made the right choice. I was supposed to choose love. That was the ultimate lesson. Boss level complete. I won the game.
I look straight into my husband?€™s eyes and I can see he?€™s scared shitless because he?€™s got a newborn baby in his arms and he?€™s watching a bunch of nurses try to stop the blood pouring out of his wife. (Which they do).
And I hear a midwife off to my left say laughing ?€œ... well, I think SOMEONE'S had enough gas.?€
She takes my gas away. And I?€™m left to work through sober, the hard reality which is a medical emergency during delivery. Which was unmentionably shitty. Suffering was the price to pay for staying, I guess.
It?€™s worth mentioning the entire experience from entering the birth suite to baby in arms, took 25 minutes. The whole thing was life altering, and I got a lovely new baby out of it - but it was over really quickly.
Bubs and I are healthy and happy now. The obstetrician joked having someone shout ?€œI love you?€ at their husband while birthing was not usually the way it happens. And while I feel like a got a lot of answers, I?€™ve definitely been left with more questions. Mostly, did I really have a spiritual, near-death experience, or was it all ?€˜just the gas?€™...
Thanks for listening. x
Tagged by Xorkoth
substancecode_nitrous
substancecode_dissociatives
explevel_inexperienced
exptype_positive
exptype_glowing
exptype_spiritual
roacode_inhaled
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