It fascinates me that some women are able to completely block out their labor experience. I remember every single second like it was my favorite movie I have seen dozens of times. Which by the way, is When Harry Met Sally but that’s a discussion for a different post entirely. In the moment, it truly felt like I was in the main character in a movie. It was terrifying, life changing, beautiful, exciting, and fun in the way that brutal horror films are fun. The adrenaline was pumping, the oxytocin was coursing hard through my veins. And it all ended with my beautiful son arriving to the world and greeting me sweetly immediately with the best cuddle of my entire life.

A part of labor that I was not prepared for is transitional labor. It is that stage where you are almost ready to push. It is so painful and scary that some women have been known to start to pack their bags and leave the hospital, in denial about the inevitability of the baby’s delivery. Many women will repeat how they cannot go forward, they cannot do it, etc. It’s so unbelieveably painful. Like your entire body is experiencing an earthquake you won’t survive.

I straight up saw the light. The only thing I could compare it to is a bad acid trip. I felt in my soul that I was about to leave this life. I started softly sobbing and asked my husband to come hold my hand. He stepped off of his support person bed and came to me. I told him I was dying and I needed him to take good care of our son. When I said that I felt myself starting to go. For a brief moment I fully convinced myself those would be my last words. It was sad but oddly a relief to say it out loud, especially because it illicited this response from my husband.

“You aren’t going to die, Chelsea. You’re in a hospital. There’s a whole staff here whose entire job is to make sure you make it out of this alive.”

This snapped me back into reality, and in moments the OB came in and said joyously, “Okay let’s push. It’s time to have a baby!” I started pushing like it was an athletic feat. The whole room was full of people cheering me on and helping me get through it. “You’re so close!” “I see his head!” “You’re doing so good mama!” “We are going to see him so soon!” “Keep going!”

I pushed for 2 hours straight. I pooped on the table twice. I threw up 3 times. Despite all of this, I did apologize for how my face looked, which my husband found hilarious because he said my facial expression looked like the roasted kid meme.

And that is how every single person in the entire world has come to exist. We all passed through, whether through a vaginal delivery or c section – and it’s very likely that for a moment, the mother felt the earth shake within herself.