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Hilda's Birth Story — Baby Eva Björt, born January 16, 2008
Eva Björt’s journey into the arms of mama and papa was completed after 8 hours of labour, and some TLC in the hospital nursery. Hilda says she’s a real yoga baby, calm and present!

Yogaspace - Pregnancy Yoga - Birth Stories     I’m so happy to tell you that my baby girl, Eva Björt, arrived into this world on Wednesday, January 16th, at 4.44 in the morning. It was a relatively short labour, lasting about 8 hours from start to finish.

     I got a contraction at just before 8 pm on Tuesday the 15th... another one 10 minutes later… and then... regular contraction every 5 minutes apart... all I kept thinking was... can this possibly be happening this fast. After over an hour of steady contractions, I was pretty sure that this was the real thing, so we called the hospital and they told me to wait until I had had them for 2 hours. Then I called my doctor, who told me to go right away because I had been on the verge of this for a while now... she was right! As soon as I talked to her, the contractions started getting stronger and closer together. As we gathered all the things I had packed for the hospital, they started to come every 3 min, then every 2 in the car on the way (my boyfriend was getting pretty nervous at that point). You’ll be happy to hear that all that yoga breathing was paying off big time and things were still under control.

     We got admitted to the hospital at 11.30. I was starting to be in a lot of pain, the contractions were very close together, lasting over 1-2 min, and I was 2 cm dilated. YAY!!! So into the case room we went and the nurse asked me if I wanted an epidural... ok... I admit, I told her I wasn’t sure I wanted one, so she backed off and waited. About 5 min later, I thought I was dying! Oh my god… it felt like someone had a crowbar in my cervix and was prying it open. JIKES.. it was happening so fast I could literally feel it opening.  The nurse looked me in the eye, and told me that if I couldn’t control the pain better than this (I was kind of panicking at this point... it hurt so much!), I better take the epidural. I was so afraid of the needle... but honestly... the IV hurt much more than the epidural… almost immediately it made everything amazing... I didn’t really feel any pain, just pressure.

     At 3 am, I was already 10 cm dilated. Eva’s heart rate kept dropping way down at every contraction, and they were getting nervous. The lowered the epidural, and we started pushing. It was hard in the beginning, because I didn’t really feel that urge to push... but push I did, over and over, and over and over.. thank god for yoga and kegels and leftover abdominal muscles.

     I finally got her out at 4.44 am. It was the most amazing feeling ever to finally feel her slide out. Then it got a little scary... I didn’t hear her at all... I had pictured this moment like in the movies... a howling baby that got put on your tummy and bliss ever after... not so much. She wasn’t breathing, she was grey blue.. and they rushed her over to the side. I was so scared... she had an APGAR score of only 2 when she came out, but it quickly went to 7 after they suctioned her and revived her a bit.

     She got pink and started whimpering. Thank god! I got her all bundled up for about 30 sec, and then they rushed her to the nursery for oxygenation and observation… my boyfriend went with her.  The nurse came and said Eva was having trouble with her blood oxygenation (ie not breathing that efficiently), and that they were going to put her in an oxygen box.

     I didn’t see her again until about 7.30 in the morning, when they called me to come feed my baby! I was so happy to see her again... she was the most beautiful, fragile, little thing I had ever seen. She was 50 cm and weighed in at 2550 gram (19 inches and 5 pound 9 ounces). The doctors had figured out she was hypoglycemic, so they started her on an IV and I kept feeding her and within a day she was doing so well. She’s a little trooper and feeds like a little shark, attacking my boobs! Eva stayed in the nursery until Thursday night when we got her in our room at the hospital.  We stayed there until Friday night (she was a bit jaundiced and they wanted to keep an eye on it) when we got discharged.

     So now we are home and doing SO WELL. She is so calm, and happy, and content. She’s feeding great, and sleeping all the time. She barely cries, and then only when we are changing her and she’s getting hungry again.

     So... that was my baby story!  Thank you for all the pregnancy yoga. It was a truly great experience to be in your classes and I think it made a lot of difference in my baby’s life... she’s so calm... and I believe that it may be because I am so calm and happy about everything. I can’t wait to start bringing her to mama baby yoga… we’ll give it a couple of weeks, or at, least until my stitches heal (not so pleasant... but so worth the pain!).

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