Birth Story

My water broke around 8:15pm on Friday, October 10th. I had just sat down to watch TV ("Real Time with Bill Maher," our usual Friday night show) in the living room with Dan when I felt a little gush. I jumped up right away and ran to the bathroom where I experienced a great big gush so I knew it was time. We had everything packed for weeks:

...and it was all in the car ready to go however we weren’t in a big rush or panic – we were really mellow about it now that I think back. My mom on the other hand, was freaking out…she was so excited that she nearly jumped out of her skin. Dan took a quick shower and we took the 45 minute commute to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

On the way, I called my doctor’s office to let them know I’m coming in and they had the doctor on call return my call about a minute after I hung up with them. I’ve known from the beginning that I was in a medical group so my specific OB/GYN may not be the one delivering the baby so over the many months of doctor’s visits, I made a point to see every doctor at the practice. It turns out my doctor was not on call that night. The doc on call (Dr. Timothy Tsui) called into the hospital to let them know I was coming – I was already pre-registered so everything moved pretty quickly once I got there.

I had been feeling cramps for about two days prior but not in any regular pattern. For this reason, and even though my water broke already, they put me in a smaller room to monitor me instead of a proper labor & delivery (L&D) room. After about an hour of answering questions, changing into a gown, getting the monitors on my belly and starting antibiotics (I was Group B Strep positive so I needed to receive antibiotics) – the nurse finally checked how far along I was and since I was 3.5cm, they moved me to a L&D room.

Here's the L&D Room, if you listen to the background noise, you can hear Sean Patrick's heartbeat from the monitor (it's fast!):

My contractions still felt like normal period cramps so I decided to sleep as much as possible. Before we went to sleep, the nurse brought Dan & I the most delicious cherry icy treats…they were so good! Here's me, pretty relaxed before I fell asleep:

The nurse at L&D informed me that the doctor ordered to start pitocin around 3:00am if my contractions did not get more regular. My mom paced the hospital the entire time, she couldn’t sleep. Dan & I slept until then, here's Dan on his sofa/bed:


The nurse checked me again at 3am and I was 5cm at this point but with irregular contractions so they started the pitocin. I got an epidural around 3:30am since the contractions definitely got much more intense after the pitocin started. About 15 minutes later, like magic, I couldn’t feel anything. The nurse came back in to put in my catheter. Since I wasn't really familiar with catheters, I asked her if I could be able to feel anything and she said, “Well, you’re pee-ing now…can you feel it?” as she held up the little collection bag. So it turns out I couldn’t feel it, we all laughed and I went back to sleep until around 6:30am just prior to the nurses’ shift change at 7am.


My new L&D nurse was darling Filipino lady and a 30-year L&D RN which made me feel really good about having her around, she checked in on me around 7:45am. She estimated that I would be giving birth around noon or 1pm however I had not been checked since 3am so when she checked me, she freaked out and told us that I was fully dilated and the baby was at +2 station…the baby was coming in 10 minutes! Dan and I were barely awake but we tried to collect ourselves quickly. We decided beforehand that Dan would be the only one in the delivery room with me so my mom stood outside the door (even though the nurses told her to go to the waiting room, she wouldn’t budge).

The nurse called the doctor on call who was 20 minutes away. By this time, the doctor on call had changed to a different doctor (still not my OB/GYN, Dr. Taz Varkey – rats!). There was a resident in the room but the nurse told the doctor to do whatever she needed to get there. In the meantime, she quickly prepared the room and got me in position. She turned down my epidural but it was too close to the time to push and I couldn’t feel anything when it was time to push. The doctor, Dr. Sushma Bhadauria, walked in just in time for me to start pushing (the nurse would have started me otherwise).

The doctors and nurse had to tell me when to push because I could not feel a thing – I also didn’t know what I was pushing so they told me to push like I was pushing out a big poop (nice although completely accurate in terms of what it feels like). Well it worked because six contractions later (about 20 minutes), the baby was out. At the last contraction, I could feel pressure releasing and I knew he was coming so I pushed extra hard. I heard the medical team scream at me to stop pushing but it was too late I couldn’t stop – I apparently caused a 2nd degree tear on that last push but it didn’t matter because he was out!

Sean Patrick was born at 8:56am on Oct. 11th. He was 9 lbs, 9 ounces and 21 inches – a big healthy boy. He started crying right away and they put him on my chest at which point I think I was in shock because I couldn’t believe I didn’t feel anything and I had my (huge!) gorgeous baby in my arms. Dan cut the cord and they gave us about 10 minutes together before they took the baby to get weighed (still in the same room) while I got patched up.

Here are some photos taken after the birth on the first day in the hospital:

Mia & Shawn were Sean Patrick's first visitors!