It all
started with a dirty rug. One Saturday afternoon when I was 39 weeks pregnant,
Chris and I decided to haul both of our large area rugs out to the backyard to
give them a much needed cleaning. When we lifted one, we noticed the mold
growing underneath it, which immediately triggered an allergic response, but
the job had to be done. The next day, while searching for lunch for my daughter
Addalyn, a rogue orange also covered in mold dropped from the top shelf of the
pantry onto my shirt, sending a cloud of mold spores into my face. That was all it took. For the next week, I
was miserable with one coughing fit after another. Bronchitis is difficult
enough to deal with on its own, let alone at very full-term pregnancy. By
Friday, I was begging for assistance with child care and my prenatal care
provider came to my rescue so that I could rest. Saturday evening, I had
several strong contractions which picked up again on Sunday morning, only to
come to a frustrating halt mid-afternoon, chalked up to an irritated uterus
from all the coughing I’d been doing.
Even
though that Friday, May 24 was my 40ish-week guess-date, neither I nor my
husband or care provider thought we would be having a baby that week. After
all, Addalyn had been born a full three weeks beyond her guess-date, and at her
newborn exam she really did have all the indicators of being a 43 week baby. So
I definitely expected to cook this one a little longer than 40 weeks and 3
days. I didn’t really consider the fact that my coughing fits might trigger
labor. In fact, when the contractions stopped on Sunday afternoon, I sent Tracie
(my care provider) a text around 3pm telling her to please go and visit her
kids in Texas (about a 3 hour drive), because it was her birthday weekend and I
didn’t feel like anything was going to happen. In fact, my words were, “There
is no baby in my immediate future. Please go!” As it turned out, I was wrong.
Really wrong. Because unbeknownst to me, in about 18 hours I would be welcoming
my baby girl earthside.
The
contractions started getting heavy when I went to bed on Sunday night. We went
to bed around 10pm and when I wasn’t asleep an hour later due to the repeated
discomfort, I decided to fiddle with my phone and find a contraction timer app,
because I couldn’t really tell yet whether these contractions were any
different than the prodromal ones I’d been having all weekend. Over the next few hours, they got closer and
longer and stronger and by 2am, I texted my birth attendant that I was 99% sure
I was in labor, and that I was going to take a warm bath and try to relax. She
immediately sent a text back that she was on her way and leaving her daughter’s
house, which is almost 3 hours away from my house. I sent her a screen shot of my contraction
timer, which only proved to make her foot a little heavier on the gas pedal
knowing that I’d been in labor now for three hours, and this was the first I’d
mentioned it to her. (Hey, it’s serious
business to wake someone up at 2am! I wanted to make sure it was the real deal
and not just our fourth very convincing false alarm in the space of a week!)
So I took a bath. Poured in my
Epsom salts and a few drops of my favorite lavender essential oil, and I tried
to relax. It worked to a point, but it didn’t do anything to lessen the intensity
of the contractions. About 10 minutes into my bath, I realized I hadn’t washed
my hair in a few days (in typical mom fashion, especially since I had been
sick) and somehow decided that was a point of concern, so I washed my hair so
that my birth support team wouldn’t think I was a slimy greasy slob. (Because
that is what close friends focus on when they come to your birth…NOT!! Well, I felt better anyway!). I stayed in the
tub about 45 minutes. Got out and dried off between blowing through contractions,
got dressed around a couple waves that nearly dropped me to the floor, and
texted back “Yep, there is DEFINITELY a baby on the way!”
At that point (around 3am), I
decided to let Chris know that it was go time. I had left him sleeping because
I needed the quiet just to focus on myself and my baby until I was sure. I walked back into the bedroom to hear him
jokingly ask “Are ya gonna live?” I told
him I was definitely in labor and he was out of bed in two seconds.
The next hour or so are a blur in my
memory as I went back and forth between the bed, the couch, my birth ball,
walking and rocking and trying to labor as quietly as possible so I wouldn’t
wake Addy. I told Chris I was fine on my
own for the time being, and asked him to work on filling the birth pool. Tracie
arrived shortly before 4:30, having handily made that three-hour drive in a
mere two hours and fifteen minutes. (She says she wasn’t speeding!) I think I was laying down when she arrived,
but as with my first labor, I soon realized that the bed was not my happy place
and for a moment, I empathized with moms everywhere who are forced to labor on
their back in a bed attached to IV bags and monitors for a doctor’s
convenience, and in that moment I was so grateful that I had the freedom to own
my birth. I was so glad Tracie was there
and felt like I could relax. I said
through my entire pregnancy that I was perfectly comfortable with having an
unattended, unassisted family birth, and that was true – but I REALLY
appreciate having a motherly figure for support while I am laboring, and
especially someone who had taken care of me during my pregnancy.
I think my friend Hannah, who had
also been with me during Addy’s birth (even let me chew on HER fingernails
while I was pushing the baby out! See Addy's birth story), arrived somewhere
between 5 and 6 am. All I remember is
that I needed warm water and I know she and Tracie were both there and resting
in the living room when I headed for the shower. I turned on the water about as
hot as I could stand it, got in fully clothed in a tank top and shorts (I
didn’t even care!) and rocked on my hands and knees with the stream of water
hitting the small of my back and stayed there until it started getting cool. In
hindsight, that probably didn’t take long since Chris was busy filling up the
birth pool and also using the water. (He was also checking on me periodically,
but I discovered with this labor that it was good for me to be alone during
this stage with my Lord and my body and my baby.) While I was under the water, I found myself
singing and worshiping my Lord and Creator, praising Him for the miracle of
birth and for the baby I was soon to meet, taking strength in the calm before
the storm of transition into hard labor. I remember telling God that it would
be so cool if my baby were born in the caul (inside the amniotic sac, in other
words, that my water wouldn’t break until she was being born). I remember singing these lyrics:
"In Christ alone, my hope is found ”In Christ alone, my
hope is found.
He is my light, my strength, my song.
This Cornerstone, this solid ground,
Firm through the fiercest draught and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace
Where fears are stilled, when strivings cease.
My Comforter, my All in All,
Here in the love of Christ, I stand.”
He is my light, my strength, my song.
This Cornerstone, this solid ground,
Firm through the fiercest draught and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace
Where fears are stilled, when strivings cease.
My Comforter, my All in All,
Here in the love of Christ, I stand.”
When my hot water ran out, Chris
helped me out of the shower and into dry clothes. I combed my hair (another
definite point of concern during labor – I remembered feeling embarrassed after
having Addy when I looked in the mirror and discovered I looked like a psychopath
with my wet hair that had dried in crazy wild ringlets all over my head!).
Deciding I was ready for some company and support, I opted for my birth ball in
the living room, where I could hang out with Tracie and Hannah. I was quickly learning that laboring with a
posterior baby (her spine against my spine, instead of her back being nestled
in my belly) is not very fun. Tracie improvised a few rebozo techniques with a
bed sheet (a rebozo is a long Mexican scarf that, when handled and moved in a
certain fashion, can provide some relief from discomfort and sometimes help a
baby to turn). That helped a little, but
it did not last long. I had one contraction
right there that almost undid me and that I will probably not forget,
ever! It sent me rolling frantically to
my side and as far forward as I could get, but I was not in any position to try
to brace myself to blow through it like I had been previously. It felt like I was being cut in half and I
think both Tracie and Hannah felt it with me, because something that painful
definitely had to LOOK painful!
Addy woke up around 6:45 after all the noise of that horrendous contraction, followed by the traditional (for me) throwing up just before I hit transition stage. Hannah took over her childcare duties, periodically ducking in the room to take pictures, since she was pulling double duty as my birth photographer also.
I laid on the bed with
Tracie sitting next to me, and she reassured me as I began to shake
uncontrollably. It was that point of
transition where I was hot one moment and FREEZING the next and my body was on
overload and getting ready to do a big job. A few minutes later I sat up on the
bed and cuddled Addy for a few minutes before another wave of contractions hit.
I wanted to get in the pool so badly, but I also didn’t want to move because my
mind was already moving into my dazed “labor zone” and I couldn’t focus on real
life long enough to actually move between contractions. Chris and Tracie talked me into the pool and I
immediately felt so much better – for about ten seconds!
Once I was in the pool, my
body meant business. One hard contraction after another until I broke and
started moaning (and then yelling!) “NOWWW!!
I want my baby NOWWW!!” Tracie squatted at eye level (for a really long
time…serious squatting skills!), locked eye contact, held my hands and helped
me remember to blow and gave me the eye contact, focus, and grounding that I
desperately needed and wanted but couldn’t seem to find on my own. I shifted between kneeling with my arms
draped over the side of the pool, holding onto the side and squatting, laying
back with Chris supporting me with his arms hooked under mine, and rocking on
all fours. All the while, I was
absolutely yelling at my body to give me my baby NOWWW because I wanted to be
DONE with this labor business! I
remember asking myself (and maybe everybody else) why I had been looking
forward to labor and agreeing with ladies everywhere that an epidural sounded
really great right then, although I was really quite grateful that I did not
have that option because I might have given in to temptation. Birthing a
posterior baby is sooo not fun!!
Every time I questioned my
bent toward completely natural childbirth, my wonderful friend Tracie would ask
me to remind myself why I was doing this: because un-medicated birth was the
very best start in life that I could give to my baby. Even though I was so
under the influence of labor that my speech was slurred, she prompted me to tell
myself again that my body is specifically designed for birth and encouraged me to
visualize what was happening inside as I waited for my body to do its job. My
body was doing the work completely on its own, with little to no voluntary
pushing on my part. I couldn’t have stopped it or slowed it down if I’d wanted
to, and at that point I simultaneously wanted to stop it or speed it up so I
could be done with the hard work and meet the little lady who was doing just as
much work inside as I was doing on the outside.
To this point, Hannah had
been in and out of the room snapping photos and tending to Addy. Tracie called
her in when she felt I was getting close, and she got Addy settled on the bed
to watch her sister be born (along with Lucy who had been laying on the bed the
entire time, and came nose-to-nose with me like a little furry labor coach
while I was draped over the side of the pool).
After an eternity of the
gut-wrenching contractions that, to me, were still feeling kind of
unproductive, I begged for help and Tracie gently suggested that I try standing
and rocking my hips a bit. I did NOT
want to stand up. I whined like a two
year old and said “Nooooo!” But, when I
got up, I suddenly felt the baby begin to drop into the birth canal. That was
the moment of purpose when I snapped out of my la-la-land for a minute and
realized that I knew how to get that baby out, and instead of just trying to
zone it out and survive it, my brain finally buckled down to focus on helping
her out. I didn’t manage to stand up for
long – maybe a minute – before I was back down on one knee, then squatting, and
then kneeling on the other knee. I don’t
remember how many times I changed positions, but I stayed up on my knees and
finally, FINALLY, the baby began crowning. And I don’t mean gently – I mean,
she crowned so fast that I thought she was going to shoot out of me before I
was ready and for a moment I was scared I might tear. I think Tracie is still laughing at the irony
of me immediately changing my tune from “Baby, come out NOWWWW!!” to “WAIT! NO!! NOT YET!! SLOW DOWN!” I reached down and touched that downy soft
head, and then I had just enough time to rock back on one leg and give one good
push as my hips automatically flicked forward and she shot out into my hands.
What a dream come true! I had been determined that I would catch my own baby as
she entered the world and I had done it!
Another answer to prayer was
that she was still wrapped in the caul, although it had broken just as her
shoulders cleared, and Tracie pulled it over her face as I brought her up to my
chest. Oh, what a moment! The sheer joy of pulling my sleeping baby (who could sleep through
all that?!) onto my chest made that whole ordeal worthwhile. She was covered in
vernix so thick and creamy that she looked as if someone had lathered shampoo
all over her and forgot to rinse it off. I could see right away that she looked
like a mini Chris. I was completely
oblivious to Hannah taking pictures and capturing that precious moment of Chris
looking at her over my shoulder while Tracie brought Addy around the other side
of me to see the new baby. A minute or so passed before I even thought to check
gender, because even with my strong instinct of a girl from the beginning of my
pregnancy and an accidental reading of a gender-revealing ultrasound, I had had
so many third-trimester dreams of having a boy that I truly got a surprise when
I discovered I was indeed holding a perfect baby girl.
Jillian Rose arrived
earth-side at 9:08am on Monday, May 27, 2013, which just so happened to be
Memorial Day. She came after
approximately nine hours of labor and 25 minutes of involuntary pushing.
Thanks to Hannah, we were able to determine that I had only been in the
pool for 45 minutes (WHAAAT?!) before Jilli arrived, based on the fact that
Addy had watched “a whole Baby Einstein and half of a Veggie Tales.” It makes
me smile so big that my labor and birth were so unmonitored that no one had any
real clue how long it had actually taken. I think Tracie may have used the
fetoscope once or twice, but there were no Dopplers or vaginal exams or
interventions or interruptions to my body’s process. And Hannah got some
stunning photos of birth and the moments following.
My placenta came very
quickly, within five to ten minutes of birth, and I was ready to get out of the
pool and lay down with my little one.
Soon we were snuggling skin-to-skin in our bed. I think I dozed off for
a little while and when I awoke I still could not believe that I had spent all
night in labor and given birth to this beautiful little baby laying on top of
me, still covered in vernix and trying to nurse. We cut the cord about 2 hours after her birth
and weighed her the next day at 7lbs 8oz.
I had absolutely the best
birth I could have asked for. Completely unhindered and undisturbed and without
fear of anything going wrong. Would I do it again? Absolutely. In the words of
my husband mere moments after I delivered my second child, “Two down, six to
go!”
(For more photos, please send me a message on Facebook to be given access to my private album.)
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