Throughout high school I dated the same guy in a pretty toxic relationship. I became pregnant at eighteen during my first semester of college. I had a pretty easy pregnancy but my boyfriend and I broke up for a few months during the pregnancy. We got back together weeks before I gave birth which was one of the hardest, most life changing moments I’ve ever had. I went to the doctor on my due date September 23rd 2011. I was 3 centimeters dilated so they told me to go to the hospital. I got there around 10 am that morning. I knew I wanted to try doing this naturally. I didn’t want a lot of medication and I wanted to listen to my body. Well they had other plans. I was essentially forced into Pitocin after 11 hours of no progression in dilation. I told them I didn’t want it and they put it in my IV anyway. After that they told me they had to do the epidural again I told them no. They said it’s time to do it before I get more dilated. Again essentially standing there peer pressuring me into getting it. They asked if I would be okay with a student performing my epidural and I said no, I have scoliosis and nerve damage and would not feel comfortable with that. Later found out they let the student do it anyway and now I have more nerve damage and consistently had in my spine for months after. I finally progressed to 4 centimeters. My sons heart rate dropped so low that it seems as if every nurse on the floor rushed into the room to flush out the Pitocin that I had initially declined. *insert major eye roll* Things calmed down for a while but there was still no progression in labor. Every time I was checked they said disappointingly said I was still at 4 centimeters. After 37 hours I finally progressed to 5 centimeters. At this point they gave me morphine, still not sure why they did and my memory gets foggy here because of that. Fast forward to 40 hours of labor later and it’s finally time to start pushing! I pushed for FOUR HOURS. His head was stuck in my pelvis and we tried everything we could to get him out. He was finally crowning and the doctor said it’s going to have to be a c section. I was TERRIFIED. I immediately had a panic attack, started crying and just broke down inside. They said it was an emergency at this point and we had to get him out. So off we went to the OR. My boyfriend wasn’t allowed in until after I was prepped. So there I was, 19, tired after two days of labor, alone, scared and vulnerable. They finally let my boyfriend in and I finally felt a moments peace and fell asleep during the surgery. They woke me up second before my son emerged earth side. At 12:49 am Sunday, September 25th 2011, Elijah Liam was born. His cry was the sweetest sound I had ever heard and I saw him for about three seconds before they took him and my boyfriend out of the room. Once again there I was alone. I cried until I got to see him again. As I lied there being put back together, my family was outside holding my son whom I hadn’t even gotten to look in the eye, let alone hold. If you had put him in a line up with five other babies, I wouldn’t have been able to pick him out because of how quickly they had taken him from me. Finally, four hours after he was born, I was able to hold my son. I was in so much pain, I couldn’t smile without it hurting. But as I sat there in the bed holding this beautiful boy, it’s as if time stood still and it was just me and him. I had been holding him for the first time for about ten minutes before it was interrupted by a nurse telling me I had to walk the halls of the hospital to speed up my recovery. I refused and she said they were taking him to the nursery so I could start recovery. I told her I wasn’t ready and she basically told me I didn’t have a choice. I cried, I was angry, I was never validated, heard or considered. Thank god, my sister was a nurse at this hospital and came to my rescue. She came in and told the nurse she would handle it for a while. She helped me to the bathroom for the first time since delivering while my boyfriend held our son. She and another nurse had to help support me while walking to the bathroom. It took nearly twenty minutes just to get me to the toilet. The amount of pain was indescribable. It took nearly another fifteen minutes to get back into bed. A few hours later it was time to walk the halls. I couldn’t do it. I made it about fifteen steps from my room and broke down crying in pain. I was screaming, and telling them I couldn’t do it. They wheeled me back to my room and gave me pain medicine. I couldn’t stand up straight, walk normally or take care of my son for days. The pain was so severe. My postpartum depression was even more severe. I left the hospital feeling so worthless, so little, so unnecessary. It wasn’t until my son was about two months old before I even started to bond with him because the depression consumed me so deeply and the pain lingered for weeks. I couldn’t breast feed beyond a couple of weeks because my milk supply was not nearly enough and my milk dried up so quickly. But once my mind recovered and I was in a healthy place, that boy was my everything. He still is almost ten years later. Having him was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. I was a struggling teenager, a bad seed, not going in the right direction. Because of my son, I graduated college, am graduating grad school in a month and have strived to be hard working, driven and go for my dreams so I can give him the best life possible. His birth experience lit a fire inside me to be an advocate for women’s health, maternal medicine and maternal care. He gave me that passion and gave me so much strength. Becoming a mother at such a young age is life changing, and man did it change mine for the better.
hotmess motherhood 