Raley's Birth Story (safe for guys too)

Very early in the morning on May 18, 2000, I awoke to a sharpish pain in my abdomen. Nothing too bad or worrisome unless you add in that I was 9 months pregnant with my first child and my due date was four days away. I remember thinking, “This doesn’t hurt very much, it must not be the REAL thing” but the pain came back every once in a while. Jayme started to call in, but I told him to go on to PT (he was in the Army) since he would be home in about an hour anyway. He went and the look on his face when he came home was a little panicked until he saw that I was fine. I had only had one or two pains while he was gone. We started talking about whether or not we would end up at the hospital that day. We lived about 40 minutes from the hospital we would need to use, so they had told us to come in when the contractions were 5 minutes apart. My mom was flying in that morning and I was hoping nothing more would happen until she was there. Jayme left for work (again at my insistence), but was back about 15 minutes later. When he told his CO (and father of 3) that I might be starting labor, he was promptly sent home again. Jayme left for the airport and again the panicked look (this time from him AND my mom) when he got home with my mom. I was still only having what I considered mild pains very sporadically. We lazed around most of the day and I ate and talked with my mom who I hadn’t seen in person in a couple months (we had flown home to visit in February). That evening, Jayme’s team had a softball game and everyone was very surprised when we showed up! I hadn’t had any pains in a while and it just seemed like something to do to pass the time. I can’t remember who won the game, but I remember feeling relaxed and happy. We went home, watched some TV and went to bed.


Right about the time I closed my eyes, it hit me…now I was thinking, “No…THIS is labor!” I woke Jayme up and we started timing them. 12 minutes, 9 minutes, 7 minutes, 6 minutes, 6 minutes….time to go! My mom had heard me repeatedly going to the bathroom (who knew contractions would make me have to pee?) so she got up and made herself some coffee. She had just gone to sleep after a long day that included a 9 hour flight to a time zone 7 hours ahead of her own! I jumped in the shower, got dressed, left a note on our door that we were hospital bound, and we left around midnight, May 19, 2000.

The drive to the hospital was a harrowing one. With me having major contractions every 5 minutes and it was dark and raining. There was a lot of construction on the autobahn and night-time in Germany the roads are mostly full of semi trucks. We arrived safely at the hospital and managed to find the one elevator in the hospital so I wouldn’t have to climb 3 flights of stairs. We made it to the labor and delivery floor and I started the process of getting checked in. The first thing I had to do was give a urine sample (HATE THOSE) and there was a spider in the toilet. I took 3 flushes to finally get him down! I put on the oh-so-lovely gown, and got strapped with monitors of all sorts, and they decided I really was in labor so they put me a room for delivery.

I’ll spare you the gory details, but there aren’t many anyway. My room was bustling with nurses and technicians and since I was the only patient on the floor, anyone who had nothing better to do seemed to come in and see what was happening. I vaguely remember a doctor coming in once. The main nurse kept touching me and telling me to “Look at your husband, focus on your husband” but what she didn’t get was that I handled the pain best when I shut my eyes and concentrated on breathing. At one point I told Jayme, “If she touches me again, I’m going to kick her.” The hospital didn’t offer epidurals at all and by the time I asked for some IV pain meds I was told that I had progressed too far, but not to worry, I would have that baby any minute now. Three and a half hours later, the staff had a shift change and the new doctor came in. He happened to be the head of Obstetrics for the hospital and after looking at my chart he wondered out loud why no one had figured out why this baby hadn’t come out yet. A quick check of my “situation” revealed that my baby was face up and STUCK! The doctor cleared the room of all unnecessary personnel and ordered an ultrasound machine and I vaguely remember the words, “prep for emergency c-section, but bring me the vacuum and forceps first”.

The vacuum didn’t help but finally, with the help of the forceps, my baby’s head was out. I was told to stop pushing, and my heart sank as I realized the cord was around his neck. I couldn’t believe that I was going to go through all of this and my baby would die. Labor does some crazy things to your brain folks! The doctor removed the cord from his neck and cleared his airway, cut the cord and he was whisked over to the warmer with a crowd of nurses and a neonatologist surrounding him. I was hysterical, crying and saying to Jayme, “I can’t hear him crying, he’s not crying!!” Jayme very quietly said, “You have to shut up!” I did, and then I could hear, very softly, the sound that would make me a mother…my first-born telling the world that he had arrived.

Raley Michael Sims
Born May 19, 2000
8:30 am
7 pounds 6 ounces
21 inches long
US Army Hospital
Heidelberg, Germany