Billie’s C-Section

“When I found out I had to have a c-section because Riley was breech, I bawled my eyes out. Literal sobs. I think my husband was worried I was going to put myself into labor right then and there. (Pregnancy hormones y’all!) But no matter the amount of crazy pregnancy hormones that ran through me, my feelings were still very real.
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I felt hurt, scared, worried, disappointed and like a complete failure of a woman. I felt like my body had failed me because I wouldn’t give birth naturally like a “real woman”. I was scared and worried about what the procedure would be like and especially the recovery. I was sad because I was so drugged up from the procedure that I don’t even remember when Riley was born. I just remember small bits and pieces. The tugging and pulling as my body was splayed across a table with multiple doctors and nurses seeing my vulnerable naked body. The puking and stabbing pain in my back as the medication started to wear off DURING the c-section. The utter fear when I didn’t hear Riley’s cries, and I couldn’t see my baby or hold her as I was in and out, only to later learn she didn’t breath for nearly 2 minutes. And then I laid there and cried while they stitched me up all while listening to the doctors chat away about life to one another as if they were just having lunch together, while Holden and Riley waited for me in the other room. I still hadn’t held my baby yet.
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I thought the tough part was over, but I was wrong. I had never felt such pain before in my life. I couldn’t lay down, I couldn’t stand up without assistance, I wasn’t allowed to eat and I even had to deal with postpartum contractions and tremors. On top of recovery, mamas gotta deal with insane postpartum hormones. Let me tell you. My mom walked in the room and said hi to me and I cried and I couldn’t tell you why.
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You guys, I’ve never felt so vulnerable in my entire life. I remember the 3rd night in the hospital in the middle of the night I cried while breastfeeding because no one prepared me for how bad my nipples would hurt, or how insane I felt for crying over little things. I had never felt so broken mentally and physically than I did that night.

April is c-section awareness month. No blog, birthing class or book will ever prepare you for your personal c-section journey. Everyone’s birth, recovery and postpartum road will look vastly different. I’m not telling you my birth story to freak you out or turn you off about having children, because like I said, it’s different for everyone. I’m sharing it because I want to bring light to what c-sections (and birth in general) can do to a person. It’s so freaking hard, and postpartum doesn’t get easier! But with more education and giving mothers their options, I believe there could be more successful vaginal deliveries. I personally am hopeful for a VBAC in the future.
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However at the end of the day, I’d do it all over again just to have my baby girl.”

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