Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

Monday, April 12th, 2:00 pm

“2:08 pm Started pushing. ‘I’m scared’.” This was the last note my mom wrote down for me in the labor notebook. And I was scared, I was terrified. Sarah had to assure me many times that my bottom half was not going to split in two because that is what it felt like. There was so much happening down there that I could no longer distinguish between any of my “private parts” and it all felt like one giant hole that a baby couldn’t possibly fit out of. Sarah told me to hold my breath and push into that feeling I was having in my bottom. I would hold my breath and push through the pain for as long as I could, take another quick breath and do it again, and try to do that 3 or 4 times in a row if possible. Then it would all be too much and I would take a break. I’ve heard of Hypnobabies women who use a technique called “breathing the baby down.” I confess I have absolutely no idea what they are talking about when they use this term as it felt like there was no way this baby was coming out without me pushing with everything I had.

Before writing this story out I watched the video my mom had recorded with our video camera and wrote down some of the things that were said while I was pushing. Sarah: “You get scared and pull the baby back up.” Me: “Oh no! No! No!”

Me: “It hurts, it hurts so bad.”

Me: “No one tell me the gender, okay?”

Me: “I don’t feel contractions anymore.” Once I started pushing my contractions stopped. Confusing because Sarah kept telling me to go ahead and push when the next contraction came, but I was too tired to keep telling her I wasn’t having them anymore. So I just pretended. No, maybe pretended isn’t the right word, I just decided to act like they were coming and say things like “Okay, it’s time” or “Let’s go”, when I felt ready to push again. Sarah was wonderful, never telling me I had to do anything. As my midwife, she was my guide on a journey which I was unsure how to complete on my own. It was the perfect combination of listening to my body and having someone there figuratively holding my hand to usher me through the experience.

Me: “Ow! Ow! Ow! It burns. It burns so bad.” Sarah kept telling me to push past the burning feeling. She had me reach down and touch the baby’s head but instead of being delighted and amazed as I had imagine I would be, I acted like it was no big deal and went back to saying how badly it burned. Everyone was repeating over and over, “You’re doing so good. So good.” Kelli can be heard on the video saying “Wow Jenna!”. Those words of encouragement, even as repetitious as they were, were exactly what I needed to hear.

Me: “Maybe now I’ll just keep the baby in there.”

Me: “How close am I?”

I had Kelli videotape and photograph everything (as in, vagina and crowning and all), telling her I would just throw away what footage and photos I didn’t want, and even though it’s a bit strange to get such a raw view of your own lady parts, the ability to see your own baby’s head crowing is a pretty amazing experience. The bones in the skull shift around in order to fit through the birth canal, and as the head emerges it appears to be almost triangular in shape. I remember reaching down to feel what was going on down there during my pushing and being a bit freaked out at how irregular it felt. Now worries though as this is exactly what was supposed to happen and it all rounded out quite nicely in the end. At one point I took a break and got a drink of water with a head literally halfway out of my nether regions. That had to be about as uncomfortable for baby as it was for me. No wonder they cry after they are born, they’re just so relieved to be out of that tight, dark tunnel they just emerged from!

That Husband: “You’re doing so good. You’re the best honey.” Have I gushed enough about how supportive, calm, and sweet TH was throughout my labor? I surely could not have done it without him. Over and over he repeated in my ear how amazing I was, how he was so proud of me, how good I was doing. I needed him right then more than I ever have before and he didn’t let me down for a single second. Laboring together in this way, bringing our baby into the world in such an intimate and private environment, brought us closer together than I previously could have imagined possible. To describe him as my rock doesn’t really do his efforts justice. I love him so much.

Me: “Am I going to tear?” With baby’s head halfway out, I began buzzing my lips between pushing rounds to try to relax my body and let my nether regions stretch as much as I could stand. Sarah encouraged me in both my pushing and my breaks and supported my perineum throughout. When baby’s head was out all the way, with shoulders and body still inside, she instructed me to take a longer break than normal to give my body a chance to prepare for that last big push.

Me: “What do I do now?” Sarah told me to wait for the next contraction, which I of course didn’t do since I couldn’t feel them anymore, and I decided I felt ready to go ahead and finish the task. It took me 40 minutes to get the head out, and only one minute to finish off the rest of the body. I didn’t tear with the head, but did experience some tearing when the shoulders emerged. I ended up with “skid marks” on the labia on either side of my vagina and a superficial tear on my perineum. Though I had hoped to avoid any tearing at all (now that I’ve been through this I have a hard time believing this actually happens!) I’m very happy with how Sarah supported me throughout my labor and that I didn’t end up requiring any stitches.

Monday, April 12th, 2:41 pm

One last round of 3-4 pushes and baby was out! As soon as the body emerged fully Sarah quickly unwound the cord from around his neck and told me to reach forward and grab my baby up out of the water. I grabbed hold of the slippery little body and pulled up, glancing down quickly to see if I had just pushed out a boy or a girl. I announced to the room that it was a boy! I couldn’t believe it. All of these months I had suspected I was carrying a girl, though I never felt certain either way. I think because I am a girl, and a firstborn, part of me thought I would have a girl as well, because that is what seemed right to me. Now that I had a boy though, I couldn’t imagine things being any other way. He sat so quietly on my chest, working hard to fill his lungs with air for the first time. I wasn’t nervous that he wasn’t crying right away, I knew it would come soon enough, and within a few seconds a sweet little “waahhhhh” sound was heard.

But wait, was it really a boy? I got nervous that I had said the wrong gender so I held him back from my chest and took another peek. Yep, I saw the goods hanging down and told everyone that I had been correct in my early pronouncement. I saw back against my husband and breathed a sigh of relief. It was over, the pressure was gone, baby was doing great, and we were now a family of three.

Monday, April 12th, 2:42 pm

While settled against TH’s chest I let my body completely relax. The pressure was gone, and I felt content. Sore, but content. I remember looking over at TH and asking him if we knew the name, if we were sure what it was going to be. We had never decided on any one option, though we did think we had a favorite, but we wanted to wait until we were in the moment to decide if one of them felt suitable. I said the name out loud and we smiled. Everyone asked what the middle name was, and TH announced the name of his own father, and it all felt so right that I had a hard time believing we ever could have considered anything different.

Sarah handed me a towel and we wrapped T1 up, splashing him with water to try to keep him warm. I turned toward my laptop and looked over at my dad and sister for the first time in hours. They had been watching through the entire pushing stage (with the camera carefully positioned so that my lady parts were obstructed from view as that’s not the kind of thing my dad and I are comfortable sharing with each other) and I saw my dad wiping away tears. It was so beautiful to think that my mom, dad, and sister had all been able to be present in some way at the birth of my first child and my parent’s first grandchild.

Monday, April 12th, 2:50 pm

T1 started to shiver, and so I leaned forward to try to immerse him under the water a bit more, which is when Kelli captured one of my favorite shots from the birth. This calm moment really describes why I love water birth so much. Though pushing was difficult, and I admit to a lot of moaning and crying out, T1′s emergence into the world was as gentle as one could hope for a birth to be. He went right to my chest, we let him cry when he was ready, and he stayed connected to me through the umbilical cord for 11 minutes while we let him soak up all the fetal cord blood he could get.

Monday, April 12th, 2:52 pm

The water was cooling down and T1 and I were having a hard time staying warm (I’m sure TH was as well), so Sarah clamped the cord and handed TH the scissors so he could do the honor of cutting. They wrapped T1 up in a dry blanket and handed him to TH (who immediately began stressing about the temperature in the room and asked someone to please turn it up), and Sarah reached down to help me out of the water. Boy did I feel funny. While sitting down I thought I was doing great, but once I tried to get up I realized how exhausted and sore I was. Also, I had a big long umbilical cord hanging down between my legs with a clamp on one end to stop the blood flow! Getting out of the tub and moving around was very awkward and painful. Sarah led me to my side of our bed and propped me up with pillows, and TH brought T1 to me so I could give breastfeeding a go. It took a few tries, but soon he opened up his mouth in just the right way and Sarah quickly shoved him on. He clamped down and I said “Oh wow, this feels so weird.” When baby is latched on and starts sucking the act of pulling the milk out feels very foreign. Not quite painful, just different. He breastfed really great though, and Sarah said he looked like he was getting what he needed, and we were happy that it looked like breastfeeding was going to work out.

After T1 had fed for about 20 minutes I handed him over to my husband and spent a few minutes working to get the placenta out . They had me kneel on the bed with a chux pad underneath me and I told Sarah I didn’t know what to do. Or rather, I didn’t know how I could do it. My nether regions were so raw I couldn’t fathom how I could possibly squeeze a marble out, let alone the placenta, but Sarah told me to stop holding the placenta in and just relax so it would slide out. Once I did that, the umbilical cord and placenta did indeed slide right out, with minimal pain, and I was officially declared no longer pregnant at 3:15 pm (a woman is technically pregnant until the placenta is delivered).

Monday, April 12th, 3:35 pm

From that point on, everything felt like it was moving very quickly, although Sarah was there for over 2 hours wrapping up everything. I was examined and my uterus was pressed on to make sure all was well with me. Sarah brought the placenta and cord in on in the bed and examined them in front of us at my request, as I find both to be interesting and unlike most people I wasn’t grossed out by the sight of them. Turns out that T1 had a true knot in his cord, something that is apparently very rare, occurring in only 1% of pregnancies! His was likely due to an abnormally long umbilical cord. True knots can lead to a 4-fold increase in fetal loss and so I consider myself to be greatly blessed as I type this story out while holding a healthy baby in my arms.

Monday, April 12th, 4:25 pm

They got me up to go to the bathroom, the first of what would be several rather awful experiences on the toilet during the first week after the birth, and then T1 was given his newborn exam. He measured 21 inches long, weighed 8 lbs 4 oz, had a head circumference of 14 inches, and an APGAR score of 8 at 1 minute and 10 at 5 minutes. We declined the vitamin K shot and the eye ointment, and Sarah said he was doing great and looked like a perfectly healthy baby boy. When they asked who wanted to dress him for the first time, I quickly claimed that duty, bundling him up in a special first outfit adorned with a silver bird and the words “sweet baby” that I had purchased a few weeks before.

Monday, April 12th, 5:00 pm

My mom brought in a taco, which I literally inhaled, and when she brought in one for That Husband I greedily ate part of his as well. I ate the rest of my protein bar (the delicious one I raved about earlier) and polished off most of the cinnamon and sugar covered tortilla chips my mom offered. I’m pretty sure if my mom wasn’t there with us we would have starved. TH asked if I wanted to eat cake and open a birthday present right then, but I was too tired and said I wanted to take a nap first. While I slept everyone else worked on getting the house back in order, and That Husband started on the very long task of cleaning out the birth tub (made much longer than it should have been because I didn’t buy the right sized cover).

Monday, April 12th, 10:30 pm

That night my mom, Kelli, TH, and I gathered in our bedroom with T1 in my arms to celebrate his birth day. My mom had iced the cake I made the day before, placed it on the red “You Are Special” plate, and Kelli brought in the flutes and sparkling cider. That Husband sang the birthday song in Polish, and I mumbled along pretending like I knew what I was saying. We laughed and smiled and marveled at how beautiful our new baby was. I looked down at him and thought how exceedingly blessed I was by a loving Father in Heaven. Tired, sore, but intensely happy… I had everything I could ask for.

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