Round two of this story starts in the early am hours of April 1st. My first thought on my contractions starting was I cannot have this baby on April Fools day and second thought was Dr. Terryberry is out of town until the second, I have to wait until tomorrow.

I told Jeremy what was going on and he started timing contractions. They were always between 3-5 mins apart but only lasting 20-30 seconds. I figured it was still too early. Once my contractions got to a constant every 3 mins we finally headed to my parents house just in case (we live about an hour away from the hospital…my parents are less than 10 mins from the hospital). Finally after staying at my parents house for a few hours and saying if I go they will only send me home I agreed to go to the hospital.

Around 8:00pm I was admitted for observation. I had to pee in a cup and put on a gown. The nurse checked me and I had only dilated to a 3. She hooked me up to 2 monitors. I also found out I was dehydrated. They kept bringing me juice to drink. After being there a little over an hour the nurse checked me again..still just a 3. She then called the Doctor on call. He said being a first time mom I had a good 12-14 hours more before I would deliver. I was sent home. I knew I would be. The nurse said she didn’t feel right letting me go. She loaded me up with juice and told me to work on breathing and focusing and I would need it when It was time to push.

We went back to my parents house to get our little dog. They tried to get us to stay with them just in case. I was hard headed and just wanted to take a hot bath in my tub (the hospital told me I could) and sleep in my bed. We got home around 11pm. I took my bath and decided to sleep on the couch in the living room. I couldn’t get comfortable in bed and my little dog was so worried about me he keep pacing and kissing me. Jeremy had to work the next day so I told him to go on to bed I would be fine. It had to be around 11:55pm when he left me on the couch to go to bed.

Here’s where the fun begins… The contractions were still just 3 mins apart and I really do not believe they were getting stronger. I was a little mad my hot bath hadn’t seemed to help the back pain. I would dose off to sleep between the contractions. I was getting about a 3 min nap between each contraction. Finally after suffering through these “not labor yet” contractions I decided maybe I needed to empty my bladder. I was also thinking “if this isn’t labor and it only going to get worst… Elizabeth will be our only child”.

Once I got to the guest bathroom I never left. I can remember the back labor being so painful I would dig my fingers in my back and massage it during the contraction and then lean over on the sink and take my little nap. I’m not really sure how long I did this, I just know there was one point I woke up the contractions had stopped and I felt the urge to push. I remembered reading pushing too early was a bad thing so I tried to fight the urge to push. My body took over and I had to push.

I remember looking down and my belly had dropped almost like it wasn’t there anymore. I pushed a few more times and realized this has got to be it. I stood up to go get Jeremy and that is when i noticed the bulge between my legs. The head was not out yet but it was time for this baby to come. I knew I had to get Jeremy. I made it to the door of the bathroom when I felt the urge to push again. I started to back up to the toilet knowing I would probably pass out like before. I was standing when I pushed. It was then my water broke and out comes Elizabeth. It all happened so fast. One push a gush of water and there I was holding Elizabeth. By the grace of God I caught her, threw my legs together, and sat on the toilet.

I flip her over, the first thing I notice is she looks just like her daddy. Then I calmly call down the hall “Jeremy….the baby is here”. I hear him get up. He tells me later he thought I meant I needed him to take me back to the hospital. He turns the corner and there is Elizabeth sitting in my lap wide eyed.

Jeremy then calls 911. They ask him all these questions and walk him through tying off the cord (which he did with a spare pair of hot pink shoe laces). The EMT’s were there in less than 15 mins. I had delivered the placenta while waiting for them. The EMT’s cut her cord, put her in a little blanket bag and we were off to the hospital. I got to hold her and nurse her the whole way there. I was soooo exhausted…excited..yet relaxed and calm. Jeremy followed behind with our bags and dog.

Once I got to the hospital, I saw the nurse from earlier. She told me when they got the call that a female from the beach that was 39 weeks along had delivered her baby at home she knew it was me but was hoped it wasn’t because they had sent us home.

Elizabeth was born April 2, 2007. She weighed 7lbs 1.5ounces. She was 19 inches long. The approximate time of birth is 2:30am.We weren’t sure of the exact time of birth, but judging by the time of the 911 phone call was made (2:38am) they guesstimated that time of birth had to be around 2:30am.

Tami

My DH (Jason) got up to go to the bathroom a few minutes later and when he came back I told him that I thought I might have had an “accident” but that now I was having some weird cramping. He asked if it was my water and I told him I didn’t know, that it wasn’t like what I would have expected my water breaking to have been. I thought it was supposed to be like a flooding gush, but that I was now having the cramps.

I was losing my mucus plug the day before so I was kind of worried that this might be labor. We took the Bradley method and learned that sometimes you will have false labor and being that my due date wasn’t until july 21st, I thought that maybe this is what was going on. So, following the Bradley guide I got up around 6 am and took a shower to try and see if they would stop. Also, I wasn’t full term for 4 more days and the midwives told us at our last appointment that we could only delver at the birth center with them once we had reached full term which was still 4 days away, so i needed these contractions to stop.

Anyway, I got in the shower and had Jason start timing the contractions on contractionmaster.com (great site by the way!). I stayed in the shower for about an hour but the contractions kept coming. I still wasn’t sure if they were real or not because they didn’t seem to be getting any worse, pain wise and they seemed kind of sporadic but close together.

When I got out of the shower I checked the timing that he had recorded and they all seemed to be lasting about 30-60 seconds and were all between 1 1/2 – 2 min apart. Well, we had learned that when contractions start they should be short contractions but about 10 minutes apart, which mine obviously were not. It was only 7am so we really didn’t want to call the midwives yet, because we didn’t want to be those people who show up 5 times to have their baby and actually be having false labor, so I drank a lot of water and started walking around, all the while talking and going about doing things normally. But, I decided if they were still coming at the same rate by 8am I would call them.

Jason ran to his mom’s to get the lawn mower, because we had gotten a notice from the city saying we needed to mow or we may be fined, so he ran and got that and was back a little before 8am. He came in to see how I was doing and I told him I was still having contractions at the same rate as before and still not very strong.

We then decided I should call the midwife on call and tell her about the contractions I was having, that they didn’t seem to be very strong but were really close together. She said that since I wasn’t quite full term that I should go to the hospital near the birth center and if it was real labor that they would need to give me meds to stop them. I then reminded her that we lived an hour away and that I really wasn’t sure if it was just false contractions or not and that I had been trying to walk them off but I didn’t want to be speeding things up if they were real. She said “Oh yeah, I forgot you were that far away” and she suggested that since it didn’t sound like I was really having a problem with the contractions that maybe that was what was going on, so to stop walking and get in the tub, drink lots of water, take a double dose of  calcium-magnesium and call her back in an hour to let her know how things were going.

So Jason ran and got the pills she said to get and I got in the tub. I took the double dose while Jason called our moms and my sister to tell them what was going on but not to worry, that we thought they might just be false and that we were trying to get them to stop and then he went out and started on the lawn.

I stayed in the tub for about an hour and a half until I was so uncomfortable I had to get out. I figured it was because it is a small tub so I wasn’t even actually able to get my big belly under the water unless I turned on my side which in turn made my hips hurt, so I got out and called her back. She asked how far the contractions were apart and I told her I didn’t know because I was in the tub and Jason was mowing the yard. She asked if they were growing in intensity but I told her that I didn’t think they were, that I was just really uncomfortable being in the tub because it was so small.

I then told her that I had lost my mucus plug the night before and that I wasn’t sure if some of my water had broken that morning, because I forgot to tell her earlier. She then said that she was finishing up a home birth and that she wanted me to go ahead and come into the birth center so she could check to see if I was leaking fluid and to see if I was dilating or not. We agreed to meet there at 11:30 because we needed to get ourselves together and it takes an hour to get there.

I went and got Jason out of the yard and told him to take a shower while I got dressed and put all our stuff into a bigger bag and got a few more things together. He took a quick shower and started helping to get things together, but was concerned because the lawn wasn’t finished and we didn’t want to get fined so he started asking about what we needed to do to get a hold of the city to let them know that I might be in labor and that we wouldn’t be getting the lawn done.

Well, about that time the contractions really started getting bad, like almost instantly. one minute I was handling them fine then the next was really slamming and I had to stop and brace myself for it and I couldn’t even talk.

I got a few more like that while he was getting a little frantic about getting things out to the car and worrying about the yard not getting mowed, and he kept asking me were the phone number was for the city. I finally lost it and told him to “f*** the lawn” we needed to go and to leave a note!!! He ended up finding the number and calling before we left, at which the city guy said yes, don’t worry about the lawn get to the hospital!

If I wasn’t having such strong contractions, it was really quite comical to see my DH so frantic about getting everything to the car, and then he starts running around talking about “We need towels!! We need more towels!!”

We finally got out to the car and realized that we needed gas!! So, we stopped and got enough to get us there and then got on the highway.  At this point my poor DH is really stressing out and is hauling to get us to the birth center as fast as possible, but go figure that everyone and their brother decided to be on the highway at the same time I decide to go into labor. So, Jason puts on his emergency lights, is going like 95-100 MPH and is flashing his lights, honking the horn and trying to wave all these “fools” out of the way!

A little back info, we had planned that we would have fruit and cheese and crackers to eat when we went into labor, but being that we were 3 weeks till our due date we didn’t have any of it on hand, and neither of us had eaten anything before we left. He then remembers that we don’t have any of the food I wanted so he gets on the phone and calls his mom and tells (yells to) her that she needs to go get fruit!! “MOM!!!! I NEED FRUIT!!! I NEED FRUIT, YOU NEED TO GO GET FRUIT AND CHEESE AND CRACKERS AND MEAT!! WE HAVEN’T EATEN ANYTHING AND SHE IS IN LABOR!!!! BRING IT TO THE BIRTH CENTER!!!”  But, she doesn’t even know where the birth center is, so he then tries to tell (yell) directions to her.

He is so sweet, here we thought we would have this romantic labor and delivery, and he would feed me fruit and give me ice chips, so he was still going to do anything in his power to make my “labor day” dream come true.  Well, he finally gets off the phone with her and is flying down the road, when up ahead we see a state trooper pull out in front of us with his lights on!! “OH GOD!!!” he frets “WE ARE GONNA GET PULLED OVER!!”  but the trooper pulls over some one else, so he flies by them at near 100 MPH.

At this point my contractions are reallllllly bad and I am feeling a lot of pressure and it feels like my body is pushing and I can’t stop it!!! And we are still 30 minutes away!!!  I really started getting worried.  Luckily, he was going so fast that the 30 minutes turned into closer to 20 minutes and we finally are about 4 miles from our exit.

Well, he is steadily “moving” people out of our way when we come up behind a city police officer! Well, cop or no cop, he needed to get the hell out of our way and there was no way around him, so at this point emergency lights flashing, he flashes his lights non-stop, starts honking his horn like a mad man and we are BOTH waving at the cop to get out of the way!! BUT THE FOOL WON”T BUDGE!!!!  Then finally there is a break in the traffic and we are like 1 1/2 miles from out exit, so we go shooting around him and cross all 3 lanes to get to our exit lane, but of course the cop puts on his lights and PULLS US OVER!!!

Jason tore off the road and stopped so fast the cop probably almost hit us, he jumps out of the car and yells “OH NO, YOU GOTTA LET US GO!! MY WIFE’S IN LABOR AND SHE IS FIXING TO HAVE THIS KID RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW!!! THIS IS OUR EXIT, WE GOTTA GET TO THE BIRTH CENTER!!!!” The cop then walks up to the car while Jason is getting back in and as soon as he sticks his head in the door I feel a gush of water “OH GOD, NOW MY WATER JUST BROKE” I yell.

(I must interject, get some depends for the “big day” they really do the trick) The cops jaw drops and all he can do is stutter, ” Ah, ok, go on, just be careful, don’t hurt anyone!”  We take off!  We run the red lights between the exit and the birth center and get there at about 11:25am.

Jason jumps out of the car and rushes around to help me out and helps me to the front door, at this point I know the baby is coming, it felt like he was half way down my birth canal. we get over to the door and Jason reaches out to open it, and it is LOCKED!!!!  “OH MY GOD, IT’S LOCKED!! WHERE IS SHE, I THOUGHT SHE WAS GONNA MEET US HERE!!!” he yells and his face just drops as his heart about stops, we are going to have this baby on the side walk!

Just then a little old janitor lady comes to the inside of the door and tells us “they are closed”. He says to her “no, you gotta let us in, my wife is having this baby NOW!! Hope (my midwife) is supposed to be meeting us here please let us in!!” But she can’t get the door unlocked so she tells us to come to the next door, which is a pediatrician office that is attached to the birth center.

We get into the building and there just happens to be a pediatrician there. Usually there wouldn’t be anyone there, but she just happened to be holding a seminar there that day. So me, Jason, the ped, and the janitor make our way down to the waiting room of the birth center and the rest of the center is across the hall locked up tight! I grab the phone and call Hope. She anwers all pleasant and calm “hey, hows it going?”  I’m frantic, “Hope!! where are you?!?!?!  You gotta get here, he’s coming, HE’S COMING RIGHT NOW!!!!!!” She’s taken a back.  “What??? you weren’t urgent on the phone the last time i talked to you, what happened??? I’m almost there, I’ll call Sharon, she is right around the corner!! We will be right there!!”

At this point the ped (Dr. Cerone) and Jason help to get my bottoms off as dr Cerone instructs the janitor to get plastic bags, paper towels and gloves! And she states that she has delivered children before so she will deliver ours if she needs to. They get me to the floor as they are laying out the bags and paper and the dr is getting her gloves on.

Just then Sharon (the head midwife) comes through the door, bare foot and half dressed. “What happened? You aren’t supposed to be having him yet.” She smiles and asks dr Cerone if she has checked me yet, but she hadn’t. So Sharon grabs some gloves as Hope runs in, and she checks and says “oh yeah, i feel his head, he is right there, we need to get you to the birth bed. when your next contraction subsides let us know we need to move you. its not going to go away completely, so just when you feel it ease up some let us know.”

It eases a bit so they (Jason and Sharon) help carry me to the birth bed. Jason climbs into the bed next to me and I’m on my side pushing and about to rip his pocket off. I push a couple times like that and they say to get onto my back so I can push better, so they roll me to my back. I get one leg and Jason’s neck and Jason gets my other leg. Jason looks around and says “Oh my god, I can see his head! I can see his head, he has hair!!”

I pushed again and Jason can see him coming out and is so excited “You’re almost there, our little guy is almost here and he has so much hair!” They tell me to reach down and I feel my babies head and he does have a full head of hair! I pushed 3 more times and his head came out, then his little body!

They placed our baby on my chest and it was the most wonderful, shocking thing ever! It was so surreal, I couldn’t even believe that I had woke up only 6 hours prior and all of a sudden now I’m holding our baby!!

Jaxon Creed was born at 11:56 am and was 6lb 13oz and was 19 inches, he is so precious and perfect, with a full head of hair like I had when I was born. He has my lips and daddy’s nose and both of ours green eyes.

“Well, i didn’t see that coming.” Sharon said smiling once it was all over. Well, needless to say, there was no time to fill the tub to have the water birth we had wanted but we still couldn’t have had a better birth.

They checked his heart and lungs and wiped him off a little bit before they left us to bond together for about an hour. Kristin (the lactation consultant) then came in and asked if he had nursed yet and she helped me to feed him a little and showed me how to express some colostrum into a spoon to feed him if need be, while Jason held him.

About that time Jason’s mom called and said that she was about to leave her house to bring the fruit he demanded, but he told her that it was to late that the baby was born and she got to hear him cry. He said not to worry about it, that we would see her tomorrow. We then called my mom and sister so they could hear our boy and my mom was making her way up to my sister’s house. I then took a shower while Jason got some daddy bonding time and then he went and got us some food while Kristen again helped me to get him nursing. We stayed at the center till about 4 pm.

Because Jaxon wasn’t full term and so technically I was supposed to deliver at a hospital (but being that he was coming out there was no time to transfer me), they wanted us to stay in town for the night so they could keep watch on his vitals, so we went to a hotel to stay the night. you should have seen the looks on the peoples faces at the hotel when we got there. we showed him off to the man behind the counter, and on the way to our room there was a couple in the hall who asked “Oh, what a cute baby! How old is he? 1-2 weeks?” They were shocked when we told them, “No, he’s 4 hours old!”

We had a wonderful first night,in our king sized bed, both of us taking turns to watch him while the other slept and I spoon fed him throughout the night and took his temp and counted his breaths, which were all right where they needed to be. Hope came in the morning to make sure everything was going good and to check him over then we headed home with our new baby.

Alicia

I went from planning on making supper around 4:00, to sending hubby out to get McDonalds and my sister around 4:20, to them arriving home an hour later and 10 minutes after that hubby calling for my sister to come and catch while he was on the phone with 911.  The midwives were about 20 minutes out, but there was no way to know that I was going to go that fast.

I took a bath after hubby and our son left, and then went and laid down to see how that would feel.  The contractions had been about 10 minutes apart until about 4pm and then went to about 3 minutes but totally manageable just after that.  Once I laid down, I realized that I wasn’t getting back up again.  I didn’t have the phone to call the midwives or hubby, and the contractions started coming one on top of another, about 2 minutes apart and I was having trouble focusing on anything else.  Hubby and my sister and our son arrived and my sister got him into the kitchen for supper.

It wasn’t long after that my water broke, much to my surprise.  We called the midwife back to let her know, and by the time she called back (a couple of contractions later) I felt the urge to push and couldn’t stop it.  So she told hubby to call 911.

My sister came into the bedroom, but poor Little Mister was strapped in his chair in the kitchen.  He could hear me yelling and all, and I could hear him in the kitchen.  “Get me down from here!!!!  Mommy!  Are you okay?!  Get me down!!!”  He was mad.  LOL

So the baby’s head came out, but I forgot how to push properly.  She was stuck for a few minutes until I regained my focus and pushed again.  I got a second degree tear from her shoulders, but at least she came out.  She didn’t breathe right away, but after some vigorous rubbing she started to.  She’d aspirated meconium and had a lot of goo in her respiratory system, but she was okay.  Apgar was roughly 9.

I took the phone and the 911 operator was telling us to clamp the cord, but I didn’t want to yet.  I wanted to wait, so I told her that and that I had to clear the line so that I could be available for the midwives if they called.

The paramedics arrived about 5 minutes after she was born, and the first midwife right after.  The second arrived about 15 minutes later.  All was good, I didn’t need to go to the hospital.  I did have to get a shot of oxitocin for the bleeding, but otherwise I was fine and so was the baby.  She’s now a very happy and healthy toddler.

Mama B

As a hypnotherapist, I had already experienced the power of the mind and how deep states of relaxation and visualisation can enable people to reduce anxieties and remove fear. This made me curious about HypnoBirthing and I decided to take the course.

I found the course enlightening, especially when looking at why fear has become associated to childbirth and how your body and baby work together to enable you to have a calm and relaxed birth. It completely reframed how I viewed labor. By the end of the course I was actually looking forward to my birth day and created my own download to listen to, to help me relax.

We chose to give birth at home and hired a birthing pool for the big day. At 4:30am, a week after my “due date” my surges started and by 5:00am they were strong and regular. My partner and birth companion, Lee started to fill the pool in preparation and we called the midwife. Shortly after, my waters broke and unfortunately, they were not clear. The midwife came round and confirmed that there was meconium in my waters which meant that my baby had opened his bowels and could be in distress. This meant we had to transfer to hospital.

During the journey, I knew I had to maintain my sense of deep relaxation in order to ensure my surges continued. When we got to hospital, Lee took control of everything and I didn’t need to speak with anyone. I knew there were conversations happening and I was glad I could be left to concentrate on my surges and bring my baby closer to birthing.

Because of the circumstances, there was a risk that I would need intervention, however when the midwife checked, I was already 6cm dilated, so we were able to continue with a natural delivery. I breathed my baby down and didn’t really push – instead I took my time and listened to my body and my baby.

Oliver John Turner arrived into the world at 1:20pm with no intervention, no tears and with both me and Lee feeling exhilarated and energised by the whole experience.

As you can see, no course can promise you a ‘perfect’ birth – no one can – but using the right techniques can promise you a much, much more comfortable and relaxed birth than you would have had otherwise and it will enable you to stay calmly in control no matter what circumstances arise.

Juliet
Psychotherapist specialising in enabling calm and gentle births. Creator of The Psychology Of Giving Birth Programme and Orgasmic Birth Hypnosis Download.
http://www.birthdownload.com/

Being 9 days overdue at that point, I was sure this kid was never getting born.  My biggest concern was for the potential complications that sometimes come with being more than 2 weeks overdue.  So, we decided to use a foley catheter to help my cervix along a little.  It’s called a foley catheter “induction”, but the mass majority of the time, it doesn’t induce labor, it simply prepares the body a little, which allows for further interventions to take place if necessary.

A foley catheter induction is when they place a narrow rubber tube up through the cervix into the very base of the uterus.  Saline is then injected into the tube, which causes it to balloon out above the cervix.  This creates pressure on the cervix, as well as irritates the uterus and causes cramping, both of which dilate the cervix.  It takes between several hours to a day or two to create a 4cm dilation.  Once that happens, the balloon simply falls out.  It didn’t hurt to get done, but I was definitely feeling some pressure down there while leaving the midwife’s office.  This was around 9am.

A little side note.  I did feel like I was cheating just a little for choosing to do any intervention at all, even one as simple as a foley catheter induction.  A huge part of me really wanted this to all happen totally on its own, without any outside assistance.  I suppose I could have gone several days more without any problem.  I figured the foley wouldn’t do much except dilate me anyway.  Little did I know…

By the time I was pulling into the driveway of our house after my appointment, I was feeling some fairly intense cramping on and off.  Over the next hour or two, it was intensifying.  I even tried timing the cramps because I wondered if they were contractions.  There was no distinguishable pattern, so I just attributed it to the foley.  I listened to a hypnobabies cd to try to relax, and I did manage to catch a quick 20 minute nap.  The rest of the time I walked around the house, both to try and ignore the pain and to try to help the dilation move along.  I wanted that catheter out, because that meant the cramping would probably stop.

By about 1pm, the discomfort was significant enough that I decided to call my midwife to make sure it was normal.  I was thinking that if this was just cramping because of the foley, I was in trouble when real labor kicked in.  Lynda, my midwife said it was normal and later told me that she was thinking since I was a first time mom, the pain probably wasn’t as bad as I was saying it was.  Little did she know…

No less than a half hour later, I was walking to the bathroom and felt a pretty significant gush into my sweatpants.  I checked this out and I was most definitely leaking.  A lot.  The problem was, it was a mix of a lot of fluid with a lot of blood.  Blood is never a good thing.  It was pretty obvious my water had broken.  Suddenly, it became clear to me that this baby was coming and soon.  Back on the phone with Lynda immediately, and it was determined that I should head back into her office to get checked out, especially because of the bleeding.  I drove the 2o minute drive, speeding because of the contractions I was feeling and thinking that if a cop tried to pull me over I’d have to try and outrun him.

Brian left work at the same time and met me at Lynda’s office and she checked me out.  This was just after 2pm.  She confirmed that my water had indeed broken and that I was dilated to 7cm and in active labor.  It turned out the bleeding, which quickly subsided, was only from my cervix dilating so much so quickly.  Yes, I had dilated 7cm in 5 hours.  Talk about going from 0 to 60!  Lynda said it was one of the only times she had seen a foley catheter induction actually induce labor.

At this point, a decision needed to be made.  My contractions were about 1 minute long each, and about 2 minutes apart.  Lynda runs a birthing center directly upstairs from her midwife clinic.  So, did we want to risk driving home to birth, which is what we had planned on, or did we want to just head upstairs to the birthing center?  Brian wanted to try to make it home.  I was leaning towards staying.  My main argument was that it only took 5 hours to dilate 7 cm, and usually after your water breaks, things speed up, which means that baby was probably coming sooner than we expected.  Also, the idea of having more contractions in a car did not appeal to me at all.  Plus, I wanted Brian’s undisturbed support from then on out, and didn’t want to have to worry about him setting up a birthing tub and rushing around at home when we got there.  The longer Lynda was with us as we discussed the options, the more she was also leaning towards just going upstairs to the birthing center.

By 2:30 I was in the tub upstairs.  I was relieved to finally be “settled” for the long haul.  It’s crazy how quickly your plans can change.  We had everything planned out for the home birth.  Where the tub would go, what I would wear, which candles we would light, which hypnobabies tracks I would listen to, all the way down to the food I would eat afterward and how I wanted my hair (and I had planned on putting on at least a little mascara).  Everything was out the window.  But, I really was totally okay with the situation.  The one thing that it really threw a kink in was the hypnobabies.  The fact that I couldn’t get into it until way into my labor, plus the change in plans and the rushed nature of everything, plus I didn’t have any of my hypnosis or birthing cd’s to listen to made it quite difficult to utilize the techniques I had learned.  So no, I would say it most definitely was not a pain free childbirth.  It was, in fact, a rather painful childbirth.  But, I will say that when I could really focus and relax, it did help.

Fast forward an hour, 3:30pm.  My contractions were actually getting a little further apart, but not lessening in intensity.  They were sort of an odd pattern at that point.  I would have one really intense one, and another lighter one almost immediately afterward, then go a few minutes before getting another intense one, starting the pattern over.  Lynda assured me that wasn’t too uncommon and they were still doing their job, despite the pattern.  So, I asked her to check me and she reports that I’m still at a 7.  Not what I was needing to hear.  So much for things accelerating when your water breaks, right?  It was shortly after that point that thoughts of going to a hospital and getting an epidural began running through my head.  How late is too late to ask to be transferred to a hospital?  How late is too late to be able to get an epidural in a hospital?  Heck, even a c-section was looking okay at that point.  Crazy, I know!

I tried some different positions and stuck with it for another hour until 4:30pm, as my contractions were becoming very intense.  I asked to be checked again.  I was terrified that I would still be at a 7.  I needed to feel like I was making progress.  I was an 8 at that point.  Whew!  Getting to a 10 went pretty quickly, and it was about another hour (5:30pm) before I starting feeling the urge to push.

I think it took a little while to get the hang of pushing and where to channel the force, where to relax, etc.  But Janice (the other midwife) assured me again and again after each push that I was making progress.  It sure didn’t feel like it!  But, I so appreciated the encouragement.

Up until this point each heart rate check of the baby had been perfect.  About an hour into pushing, his heart rate was dropping and not coming back up in between contractions.  I was “gently” encouraged to push harder and longer.  I tried a squatting position because I felt it would be more conducive to the downward force, but I couldn’t maintain that position for long in the tub.  His heart rate was down in the 80’s, which is okay as long as it recovers in between contractions, which it wasn’t.  So, Lynda “gently” encouraged me to get out of the tub and try on a birthing stool.

A birthing stool is basically a big cushioned sort of glorified toilet seat.  It mimics the squatting position, without requiring the mom to support herself.  Plus, it gives the midwives easy access to everything.  We quickly moved to the stool and that’s when everything gets blurry.  Seriously.  Closest thing to an out of body experience I can think of.  Except it’s sort of the exact opposite.  You’re so far in your body that you’re completely oblivious to everything else.

At this point, his heart rate was in the 60’s, but he was very close to crowning.  I was totally hyperventilating because of the non-stop vigor of pushing, which is not a good combo with a baby with a low heart rate.  So, they slapped an oxygen mask over my nose and mouth.  I wasn’t even human at this point.  I was one huge screaming push.  With my eyes clenched shut, I could feel them hoist my feet off the floor and brace them against their shoulders.  I could feel Brian against my back.  Everything was happening like I wasn’t even a part of it.  Truly an indescribable, unique experience.  I was close.  I could tell  (mainly because it felt like my hips were going to rip apart).  Not close enough though, because Lynda decided to give me an episiotomy to get him out quicker.  With around 900 births attended, she’s only felt the need to give an episiotomy about 5 times.  I’m one of the lucky ones I guess.  But it worked.  About 30 seconds later, he was out.  6:42pm.

I was still groaning and hyperventilating with eyes squeezed shut as I felt a slimy warm thing get placed on my chest.  I opened my eyes and there he was, facing me.  Crying.  I could feel Brian shake as he cried behind me.  There he was.

I couldn’t talk.  I couldn’t think.  I couldn’t move.  I couldn’t even react.  I just breathed and looked.

His heart rate returned to normal and he pinked right up once he was out.  I did end up tearing through the episiotomy, unfortunately.  After a few minutes I carried him (cord still attached) and was helped to the bed.  I was in the zone, feeling completely out of it, exhausted, and weak.  I hadn’t eaten since that morning.  I had only gotten 3 hours of sleep the night before.  So, I didn’t say much or react as the placenta was delivered, stitches were given, Brian cut the cord, Baby was measured, etc.  My mom showed up after flying in from Denver around 8:30.  By 9:30pm, we were out the door and heading home.  We were allowed to stay until the next morning, but chose not to.

I’m actually glad we were in the birth center and not at home for several reasons.  The birthing stool is probably the main reason.  It was perfect for my situation.

This was definitely not the peaceful, serene, calm homebirth I had envisioned for myself.  But, that doesn’t mean it was any less spiritual, amazing, and life changing.

Jody
Supporter of natural birth and lover of natural birth stories.