During labor, when my wife’s contractions got strong, the nurses gave her fentanyl to ease the pain, but after about an hour and a half the drug started wearing off and the pain returned. It came back as before and then started to get worse. At this point, Carolyn told the nurses, “I want my epidural!” The epidural could not be administered by the nurses; we needed an anesthesiologist to set it up. On that day and at that hour there was only one anesthesiologist on the Kaiser campus and he was very busy. An hour passed as we waited for him to arrive. We knew that after labor got to a certain point, it would be too late to have an epidural. Carolyn and I both were beginning to wonder if she would get the epidural in time.

After another hour, the anesthesiologist arrived. He cleaned Carolyn’s back and rubbed some orange liquid on it. He numbed her back and then stuck a needle into her spine to set up an IV for the epidural. The anesthesiologist did a great job. He was slow, methodical and precise. He explained everything he was doing as he went through this step by step procedure. The epidural machine was on a continuous feed. Carolyn had a button she could push if she felt pain and wanted to increase the flow. After a little while, she started feeling a lot better.

I was concerned about having an epidural for a couple of reasons. In the past, some women had a become permanently paralyzed by epidurals. Apparently, they are a lot safer now, but I still worried. I heard a recent story about a woman who got an epidural that was placed poorly. She ended up getting temporarily paralyzed. It took her about six months to get back to normal. I knew that medical science had advanced quite a bit in this area, but I was still concerned. Also, I had heard that women who use an epidural are more likely to end up with a cesarean birth. I knew there were several health benefits for both mother and child if she was able to have a regular vaginal birth. Also, cesareans are trouble if you want to have more than three or four kids. You can only have so many cesareans. Epidurals can slow down contractions and make delivery take longer. Despite my reservations, when I saw the pain my wife was going through, I supported her in the decision to get an epidural.