Bringing Brooks Heinevetter into this world
I wanted to sit down and write this birth story while it was still fresh in my mind. Yet here I am, almost 2 weeks PP and details are already fuzzy. Labor and delivery didn’t scare me until the third trimester. But the “scared feeling” would always wash away when I thought about holding that sweet boy in my arms for the first time.
Anyone that has followed along with my pregnancy journey on social media knows that by 32-33 weeks, I was feeling pretty miserable. I wasn’t sleeping, the back pain was unbearable, and mentally- pregnancy had taken a toll on me. I never wanted to come across as ungrateful or complaining too much but pregnancy is HARD. And women are freaking super heroes. I started to joke with my friends that I was hoping Brooks would come early. I started to prep all the “old wives tales” to get him to show up a little quicker. I was eating a few dates, drinking raspberry leaf tea, bouncing on the pregnancy ball. I was planning to go full force into those old wives tales once I’d hit 37/38 weeks so I’d be full term. I think Brooks knew his mama was ready for him to come early but he didn’t get the memo that my version of early was NOT at 35 weeks.
It all started on Saturday 2/12. I woke up that morning and told Robert that I felt better than I had in weeks. No back pain, tons of energy, a full nights rest. Incredible. I was determined to nest a little bit further that day. We went to Costco for house basics. I packed Brooks’ hospital bag. I even recorded some TikToks about nesting and what I was packing for baby. We spent some time in the backyard with Rocky and at one point I looked at Robert and said, “I think Brooks just kicked my bladder and I peed a little bit.” I laughed it off like any other weird pregnancy symptom. We ended our Saturday by going to the movies. That’s right, our final date night was spent watching Jackass in the theater. I kind of feel like this is very fitting for Robert and I LOL. When we got home from the movies, we spent some time in the basement relaxing and then went up to bed. It was about 11:30 at this point.
Our Snoo (bassinet) had been delivered the day prior. Again, if you follow along on socials, you know that we received a snoo a few weeks prior and when we opened the box, it was empty. So we finally received the snoo and decided since it was up in our room and we weren’t super tired yet, we’d unbox it and get it set up. IRONIC.
Robert finished setting up the snoo and I downloaded the app. Looking at that little bassinet next to the bed made me giddy and I turned out the light planning to dream of little baby Brooks all night. 10 minutes later, I got up to pee. A regular occurrence for me at this point (I was probably waking up to pee 8 times a night). I went to the bathroom, emptied my bladder, then climbed back into bed. The minute I got comfy, I felt warm water down my legs. My immediate thought was “oh my god did I just pee myself again?!” I stood up thinking I’d need to clean up the mess of pee in my bed, but before I knew it, another gush of liquid down my legs. I realized that this wasn’t pee, I had just emptied my bladder. I walked over to the bathroom and was dripping. I thought about every possibility as to what this mysterious substance leaking out of me could have been before waking Robert up. Robert was about to drift into a deep sleep. I got him up and said “hey babe, I think my water might have just broken.” We both didn’t really believe it. I was only 35 weeks and 4 days pregnant, we still had weeks to finish our baby courses and mentally prepare ourselves for all this. We called the on call midwife from my OBs office and told her what happened, she said we needed to go to the hospital. At this point, I wasn’t feeling any contractions. I actually felt perfectly fine minus the anxiety shakes. We quickly gathered our things… Robert hadn’t packed a hospital bag at this point so he threw some clothes together. We also hadn’t installed the car seats yet so he ran into the garage and quickly installed that. We grabbed my bags (they’d been packed for weeks), the nurses baskets, and a few other random items then we hit the road.
By the time we checked into the hospital, it was 1 am. They said they were going to do a swab to see if it was amniotic fluid that I was leaking. The swab came back 100% positive for amniotic fluid so the nurse told me I’d be having a baby within 24 hours. We got officially admitted. They hooked me up to IVs, talked me through some pain management options, and Robert went back to the car to get all our things because we were officially there for the long haul.
I think the scariest part in all of this was the fact that I was so early. The nurses warned me that I shouldn’t be surprised if the baby came out really small (little did they know, he was estimated to be 87th percentile during me 32 week scan) or if he needed to be taken to the NICU. This was hard to hear as a first time mom but I pushed all negative thoughts away. I knew I needed to be strong and prep my body to deliver a healthy baby.
I was dilated 1 cm when I arrived at the hospital. Since my water broke on its own, they didn’t want to check my cervix too often since it could cause bacterial infections. My first contractions started to happen around 1:30-2 am. So it took about 90 minutes after the gush of fluid to even feel a contraction. Contractions SUCK. I knew they’d be painful but it felt like the worst period cramp you’ve ever had, times ten. And its constant pain for about 90 seconds and then total relief. It was wild. They gave me some pain supplements until around 4:30 am when I asked for the epidural. At this point, I was only 3 cm dilated. So I’d progressed, but knew I had quite some time left.
For those of you expecting and wondering about epidurals, they are wonderful. The shot in your back feels like a bee sting, and then you hardly feel the needle going in. They insert a tube into your back so the epidural drip is constant and can be increased throughout your labor if needed. It was crazy not being able to feel my bottom half. The nurses set me up on my side with a peanut ball between my legs. They came in every house to rotate me to my other side.
At 7 am, the nurse came in. She had been monitoring my contractions at the nurses station and the epidural had caused them to slow down. Totally normal for that to happen so they added Pitocin to my drip. I tried to get some more sleep. At around 9 am, the midwife came in (the midwife delivered my baby) and she wanted to check my cervix again. I was expecting to hear that I was dilated to about a 5 or 6 at this point. NOPE! She checked and I was at a 9, 100% effaced. She said baby would be here in around an hour. 20 minutes later, my nurse checked my cervix once more and I was at 10 cm dilated! She told me we’d do some practice pushes and called the midwife back.
We started pushing at 9:45 am. It was calm and quiet for a while. At around 10:10 am, the midwife said the next pushes were the real ones. The nurse picked up the phone and all of a sudden the room was filled with staff, lights turned on, monitors going off. They were ready for baby. I pushed until 10:19 am, when little Brooks Jeffrey made his grand entrance to this world. They put him on my chest for a few minutes before taking him over to the baby station to examine him. The love I immediately felt for this baby was and is indescribable. This little dude who I had bonded with for 35 weeks was all of a sudden here. I couldn’t wait to get to know him.
Unfortunately, with premature babies come different health risks. His lungs looked like they were working a little bit too hard so he needed to be taken to the NICU. This isn’t what I had pictured. I thought you had a baby, he would lay on your chest, you’d have this incredible bonding experience together as a family. Instead, my room went from 10 nurses, full of action, to just me, laying alone, hoping that my baby was okay. Robert was in the NICU with Brooks and sending me updates. I was also going through a bit of a scare in the labor and delivery room. I was bleeding out too much post delivery so the midwife had to be called back to monitor my bleeding. I’ll spare you the details but it was a pretty scary 30 minutes of constant pushing down on my stomach, trying to get all the blood and clots out. I was given medication though, and I felt pretty good afterwards.
Once I was transferred up to the postpartum floor, I was finally allowed to go to the NICU to see my baby boy. I was allowed to hold him, even though he was hooked up to lots of monitors. We were waiting on the doctors to give us the green light that his lungs were looking okay enough to take him back to our room in the postpartum wing. He ended up getting released back to us at 7:45 pm that night.
We’ve had a few more health scares with our little preemie. We just got done treating him for jaundice with some blue light therapy. He is such a strong little boy and we’re truly blessed that it was only a day in the NICU, and that we got to take him home with us 48 hours later.
What I’ve learned about having a baby-
Women’s bodies are truly made for this. It was scary but my body stayed calm and did its job. I’m so damn proud of myself.
Your support person is so critical. My husband was the greatest support during labor and has been the most hands on dad so far. Communication is key. When we learn something new, like how to make sure the diaper is on tight enough, we talk to each other and teach each other. There is no pride here. Raising Brooks with Robert as his dad is the highlight of my life. I know that if Brooks turns out anything like his daddy, we’re going to be very lucky.
Nurses make all the difference. My labor and delivery nurses were incredible, and the postpartum nurses made me feel so confident in my “mom-ing” abilities. I truly looked at those nurses like they were family.
You can’t control anything. A birth plan is awesome but don’t get your heart stuck on things happening one way or the other. I couldn’t control the fact that my water broke so early, or how quickly I dilated. I couldn’t control the fact that Brooks had to be whisked away to NICU immediately. I couldn’t control the fact that I bled too much afterwards. What I could control is how I reacted. It was scary and made me stressed, anxious, angry. But I couldn’t bring those negative feelings into the NICU with me. I had to remain calm. I had to stay optimistic. I had to put my mom hat on right away to show my baby that everything would be okay.
So that’s it. That’s my birth story. I’m a mom now. I don’t know when that will sink in but I plan to continue sharing all the realness on socials. My world revolves around this little guy now. I’m trying to figure out how to balance being Molly the mom with Molly the wife, while not losing my passions and what makes me me. I’ll keep checking in, but i’ll leave you with this. If you’re a mom, I have endless respect for you. I didn’t know my heart could open this much to something until I saw Brooks. I am so proud to be part of this mom community now, and I can’t wait to welcome more mommas to the club.
xoxo, Molly
