kellycrull.com - expat life in Spain

My wife April and I are American, and our daughter Alleke was born in Spain. We often get asked questions about April’s pregnancy, the hospital where April was born, whether it is possible to have a natural birth in Spain, and in general what April’s experience was like giving birth in Spain.

So, I asked April if she would be willing to tell her birth story here on kellycrull.com, which you’ll find below. Also, if you are interested in knowing more about having a baby in Spain, visit my newest blog called Spain Dad, a baby blog.

On October 2, we had our regular prenatal classes that evening. After doing our normal stretches and meditation, Carmen, the midwife told me and the other woman who was at 38 weeks that it was time to practice pushing. Knowing that our baby girl was due in two days, I figured it was a good idea. After class, we talked with Carmen rehearsing all the things we needed to do if I went into labour. She mentioned to Kelly that she was going to be on-duty in the hospital on Tuesday night and Thursday morning, so if we wanted her to be there, try to plan accordingly.

For the past few nights, we had been taking long walks, which was our habit during the pregnancy. That night we decided to take an extra long walk, knowing that it could help induce labor. We left the classes and walked about 15 minutes to a bookstore to get a baby book for Alleke. Then we walked out from Plaza Fadrell to the edge of town, past the concert hall, nearly to the basilica, and then back again, down the tree-lined boulevard. Once we got home, we had been walking for nearly two hours. Since it was a little past midnight, we decided to go to bed.

Around 2 am or so, I woke up with a lot of pain in my hip sockets. I kept shifting around, trying to fall back asleep, or trying to stretch what felt like really tight muscles. I slept off and on, getting up to go to the bathroom, or just feeling like I was in pain. For awhile I laid there trying to time how far apart the pain was. Now and again the last few weeks I had restless nights thinking I was in labour when I obviously hadn’t been, so I thought this might be the same. About 7 am I finally woke up Kelly (whether intentionally or from being so restless I don’t know) and explained what had been going on. He asked if I was in labour, and I honestly couldn’t tell him, but said we probably should be ready, because I was consistently having pain in my hips.

After eating some breakfast, I made some heating packs out of old socks and rice and popped them in the microwave. When I laid these on my hips, it helped the pain go away and I could sleep more. I took a nap and Kelly worked in the office for the morning. We had decided a few days before that before the baby was born, we really wanted to go to one of our favorite restaurants for a last menú del día. When I woke up from my nap, the pain in my hips had subsided some, so I decided we should go to the restaurant. We headed out and walked past the four or five restaurants in our neighborhood that we liked. Either we didn’t like what was on the menu or the restaurant was full, so after getting really frustrated, we eventually returned home. We sat at home for a little while trying to decide what to do and I finally said “I can’t just stay here and concentrate on how I’m feeling. It’ll be better if we just go.” So around 4 we headed out again and went to the closest restaurant which had space at that point because it was later.

Once the food came, including a heavy paella, I realized that this probably was not such a good idea. I was still getting the pain in my hips off and on, and when it was strong, there was nothing I could do but shift in my chair and grit my teeth. Getting to the comfort of my own home seemed like a much better idea. Besides, I wasn’t much of a conversation partner.

On our way home, even though we were only a block away, I had to stop and push against a light pole during a contractions (which I had finally started to label the stretching pain in my hips). While we were stopped, Kim called to talk to Kelly, and he told her the baby would probably be coming any day, but didn’t say that I was actually in labor. We got home around 5.30. I finished packing what I could of our hospital bag and changed into my pajamas. I went to sit on the couch, with my heating pads, and read Chronicles of Narnia for awhile. The whole day Kelly kept asking me what I wanted him to do and finally I said that I just wanted him near me, even though I didn’t need any help yet. So he sat on the other couch working on a web design. While I was reading, stretching, breathing, imagining my cervix opening, etc. I tried to time the contractions. They weren’t coming consistently, but did seem to be about every 7 to 10 minutes. I eventually decided to try to take another nap with the rice socks helping for the pain.

I woke up a little before 7. I was still groggy, but I remember Kelly saying something about a plug-in he had found for the new website he was working on. That’s when I screamed, heard a loud pop, stood up, and ran to the bathroom. Kelly followed yelling, “What happened, what happened.” I sat on the toilet saying, “I don’t know, I don’t know, I think my water broke.” It wasn’t as much water as I was expecting, though, and I felt like my entire insides were emptying out and the pain had jumped off the scale.

The rest of our time at home is still a blur to me now, but I know that at some point Kelly called our landlords, Damien and Encarna. They were the ones who were supposed to take us to the hospital and Kelly had called them earlier to let them know that today would probably be the day. He told them they didn’t have to come yet, but would probably need to soon. Kelly ran to get the stopwatch while I stayed on the toilet. He came back to time the contractions, but the stopwatch didn’t work. Eventually we realized that the contractions were on top of each other, and we should just get to the hospital as soon as possible. Kelly called Damien and Encarna back, and they said they were already on their way, only five minutes from our apartment. Kelly told me to try to change my clothes while he ran around like a madman trying to get all the last minute things packed. During a few contractions during this time I had him push my hips together according to a hold I had looked up online a few days earlier thinking that my contractions would probably be in my hips. I walked slowly to the bedroom and sat on the bed trying to pull clothes on over my pajamas and deal with the painful contractions through fast breathing, because the pain was past the slow breathing part. Finally Kelly came in and said we were ready. We needed to take the elevator down to the street. Suddenly, the thought of walking across the square in front of our apartment building in labor seemed really embarrassing, and I was very glad we had not decided to get a taxi to the hospital instead.

Damien and Encarna helped me into the front seat of their car, and I probably had at least two contractions on the way to the hospital, doing all the fast breathing through my mouth and nose that I had never been able to accomplish during prenatal classes, but suddenly found very useful. I do know that having contractions in the leather BMW of your landlord is not a terribly comfortable place to be. Damien realized how close I was, so he put on his flashers, proceeded to drive like James Bond through red lights, and pulled up to the emergency entrance of the hospital. I remember having this really surreal clarity. Although I was totally focused on breathing, pain control, and imagining the baby coming, I also found it slightly humorous and somewhat alarming the way Damien was driving, I may have talked with him in Spanish, and I remember listening to the song that was on the radio.

That momentary calm broke the moment we arrived at the hospital. Encarna raced in to get a wheelchair and started barking instructions to the staff. A male nurse came out and helped me into a wheelchair and rolled me up to the third floor hospital room with Kelly by my side and Encarna close behind as Damien explained what was going on and moved his car. Once in the hospital room, the nurses tried to calm Encarna down and get information from me and have me change into a gown while Kelly was briefly stopped to fill out forms. Remember that during this whole time I was basically doing all I could to deal with the contractions that were now coming about thirty seconds apart, and all I wanted was to have Kelly push on my hips again to help me. During each contraction I would sit Indian style and push down on my knees while I was breathing rapidly through my mouth and nose. The nurses left us alone for awhile (I don’t remember how long), and Kelly could help me again. Soon they came back and we could still hear Encarna in the hall telling them to get the doctor and midwife here now! One of the nurses told me she was going to check how dilated I was. When she finished, she walked over to the phone, picked it up, and yelled, “We need to get down to the delivery room - she’s a 10!”

The next thing I knew another nurse came and loaded up my bed for transfer. We rolled down the hallway, and he tried to make small talk with us as I moaned and made loud noises through each contraction (I think the noises I had been making since my water broke were what scared Kelly the most). By now I definitely felt like pushing, but realized it wasn’t the time. Off the elevator, Kelly was pulled aside to put scrubs on, and a midwife walked up and grabbed my hand. She was in process of asking me if it was my first baby when she glanced up and yelled, “Oh, April!”. It was Carmen, our midwife from prenatal classes. I’m not sure who was more happy that she was on duty - me or her.

Once we got to the delivery room (in the basement) the nurse and Carmen helped me off the bed onto the delivery table which was very narrow and didn’t have anywhere for me to put my arms. Carmen kept talking me through the contractions and chiding me for not coming to the hospital earlier, but I could tell she was also happy I was getting the natural birth I had wanted. Because I had arrived so late, there wasn’t time to hook me up to the IV or the fetal monitor. Carmen helped me get my legs in the stirrups and started massaging my perineal. Kelly was back by my side, and I started asking if I could push. Carmen said the doctor wasn’t here yet, but if I felt like I needed to, I could start. Then our doctor came running in, breathless, also asking why we waited so long to come it. She had run all the way from home to get here and almost missed it.

I kept asking if I could push, and they finally said yes. My first few pushes were not very good, and I could tell. Carmen said I wasn’t pushing from the right place, I was just using my arms and the top of my stomach, so I tried harder to concentrate and actually push from my diaphragm and to imagine the baby coming out. Someone said, “There is the head,” and Kelly went around to look and was really excited. One more push and she was out. It was 9.12 pm. I remember being surprised that I couldn’t really feel anything, either pain or even her coming out. They held her up so I could see her. I noticed there was very little blood and a lot of white stuff, and she was crying. Carmen and Kelly took her over to the incubator to clean her off and do the first tests. In the meantime the doctor and I worked on pushing out the placenta.

Kelly soon returned with our baby girl in his arms and stood by my side while they started stitching me up. She had so much blond hair! Carmen had asked during the birth if I wanted an episiotemy, because she knew I didn’t, and so I had torn just a little bit. However, the pain from the doctor trying to put in the stitches hurt so bad that I started shaking uncontrollably. Kelly had our baby girl in one hand and was holding my hand and rubbing my head with the other. I knew I needed to relax, because I was too tense and making it hurt more, and Carmen and the doctor kept telling me to relax, but I didn’t have anywhere to put my arms and it hurt so badly. I felt bad that I couldn’t really hold or look at our baby girl. After awhile of trying to get me to relax and trying to stitch, Carmen asked if it was alright if they gave me a local anesthetic to do the stitches. Both Kelly and I yelled “YES!” We didn’t realize they were intentionally not giving me a local anesthetic because I had asked not to receive any pain medicine, and they didn’t realized that by saying I didn’t want any pain medicine, I didn’t mean no anesthetic. After they administered the shot they were able to quickly finish the stitches, and I was put on a bed with our baby in my arms and wheeled up to our room.

In the elevator the nurse made small talk with me about where we were from and how long we had lived in Spain. I was amazed because at that point and for nearly the whole night, I was able to understand and speak Spanish almost perfectly, sometimes better than Kelly even. I felt like that was a huge answer prayer.

Once back in the hospital room and reunited with Kelly, Carmen came to help us begin breastfeeding. It was difficult because I had inverted nipples, but our baby girl had a strong sucking reflex, so we gave it a valiant effort. Damien and Encarna came to offer congratulations and see the baby. We had decided to wait a few days to name her because we were stuck between two names. They stayed to watch our little girl’s first efforts at eating and then left promising to return later.

Eventually we were left to ourselves, and Kelly took over caring for our little girl. I rested for awhile, we made some phone calls to family, sent some text messages, and tried breastfeeding some more. Kelly changed our little girl’s first diaper all by himself and eventually fell asleep with her on the couch only waking me up to help her eat.

Those first days in the hospital were pretty hard. I was extremely anemic and after passing out the first night trying to sit up and feed her, I was literally bed-ridden. Also, breastfeeding turned out to be very difficult because I had inverted nipples and couldn’t sit up to feed her. The midwifes and pediatricians were very helpful, and the nurses were very unhelpful. The days were ok, but the nights were really difficult because we felt completely on our own with a screaming baby. We were scared to let the nurses take her to the nursery because we couldn’t be sure they wouldn’t give her a bottle, and we didn’t want to cause nipple confusion.

The next afternoon Encarna came by to give Kelly a chance to go home and get some things, then lectured us in the way of Spanish hospitals. My first meal had been paella, which I couldn’t touch, and the second was roast chicken, which I lost as soon as I ate it. I hadn’t gotten any water because we hadn’t asked for it. Encarna went and got some water bottles and yogurt and left Kelly with strict instructions to go in the hallway and ask and ask until we got whatever we needed. I requested a vegetarian diet instead, and we were able to move forward as I slowly recovered. Heather came our last day in the hospital to help us our first few days at home. We had stayed at the hospital for four days.

Some friends from our prenatal classes gave birth the day after us. They ended up having 24 hours of labor followed by a c-section, but were rewarded with a beautiful baby boy. He and our baby girl could not have looked more different!

The night before we left the hospital, we decided on a name. The next morning, we proudly carried Alleke Grace out of the hospital door and into her first home in Castellón de la Plana, Spain.