Marshall the Midwife: Chapter 4
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We breathed through contractions for about another 45 minutes. I looked at my phone about every ten to check for service, we were still a ways off before getting enough to make a call. We still had about two and a half hours at our current speed before making it home. Contractions were strong, but Mary was handling them pretty well. At her last appointment she'd been three and a half centimeters pre-dilated and 75% effaced. The book she gave me to read, The Birth Partner, had said that I needed to know that information so I'd asked her to tell me.
I knew active labor contractions were the 4-1-1 rule which meant contractions that were 4 minutes apart, lasting a minute, for at least an hour were active labor contractions. Mary's contractions were currently coming around every two minutes and were lasting a minute to a minute and a half, so I knew we could safely say we were in active labor. Active labor usually meant 5-7 centimeters dilation. Could she really have dilated that much that quickly? She let out a groan and I realized I'd forgotten to start breathing with her. I caught up as quickly as I could.
"Marshall, I don't think I'm going to make it." She said wiping the sweat from her forehead "I can't control this at all, it's just happening, I can feel the baby moving lower and— "
She started breathing again. That contraction came a lot quicker than the others. I breathed with her but as the contraction peaked she started to moan, it was a low animal-like sound that made the hairs on my neck stand up. This was different.
"I CAN'T DO THIS ANYMORE! I CAN'T DO THIS ANYMORE!" She yelled, she was still having a contraction, kind of tossing and turning in her seat.
"Mary, blow, blow the pain away. Come on, keep going! You're doing it right now." I told her. "Hang in there! I need you to hang in there as long as you possibly can."
"I NEED DRUGS, MARSHALL! I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WAS THINKING DOING THIS NATURAL! OH MY GOSH!"
I didn't want to be the one to mention I didn't have any drugs if she wanted them. If they were available I'd use them though, because epidurals and fentenol are known to slow labor down. But there was not going to be any of that anytime soon. I turned on the heater and started blasting it."
"What are you doing?" She said "As if there isn't enough sweat pouring out of me already!"
"I'm heating up the car in case a baby is born in here. Babies lose body heat really fast and I only have one other towel in here. We still have two hours if we're lucky to make it to the hospital."
I didn't know if she heard me or not, because she was having another contraction and wailing through it instead of breathing. I was too overwhelmed to calm her down. She wasn't really focused anymore, it seemed like she was in another world. She stopped wailing for a moment and gasped in a huge breath of air and held it. I tried to look at her out of the corner of my eye. Was she pushing? My question was answered quickly as I heard her puke up all of her funeral food. Realization hit me: This was transition. Transition was the hardest part of labor and usually included throwing up, being shaky and burpy and emotionally overwhelmed by the strongest contractions with no break in between. It usually meant someone was 8-9 centimeters. It was hardest part of labor, but it was the fastest. Once contractions spaced out a bit, she would be completely dilated to 10 centimeters.
There was still a good two hours between us and home at least. She'd be lucky to have the baby in the emergency room parking lot let alone the hospital. But something told me we weren't going to make it.
She ripped her seatbelt off at the next contraction and put her hands under her bottom and was breathing up towards the sky. She was fighting the force of the contractions within her with all she had. It was hard to see her in this much pain, worse than after she'd been shot and she wasn't breathing.
"Mare, listen to me: this is transition. This is the hardest part of labor, but it's the fastest. You're not going to face anything harder than this, just focus on my voice, you can do this, you can do this, you can do this, Mary…. Mary, I love you…You can do this."
…Did I really just say that out loud?
She was blowing so intensly, hopefully she hadn't heard me. A sign showed home to be 80 miles away. 80 miles.
"Baby is moving lower again…Ohhhhhhhhhh! MARSHALL….PRESSURE." She blowed so hard and fast that you'd think the roof would come flying off the car.
I knew one thing right there. We weren't going to make it to the hospital, but I was going to try my best to get as close as I could to make a phone call. There was no way I was going to deliver a baby in this car without direction.
"Ooooooo….Oooooo….Ooooo." She said, tears streaming down her face "Why does it have to happen this way?" She slapped the front of the car hard and burped a few more times. Then, everything was quiet.
"What's going on?" I asked her.
"I don't know…"She said sounding exhausted. "Oh no."
I expected to hear the sounds of another contraction. When I didn't, I looked over at her. "I have to poop." She said.
My hands started to shake a little on the steering wheel. "Mary, you don't need to poop."
"Yes I do," she said beginning to breathe through a slightly less intense contraction.
"No, you don't. You need to push." I said
"Oh," She said, her eyes widening with the realization, "You're right."