Behind the Scenes of a Homebirth

My midwives wrote that baby boy made "quite a dramatic entrance into his mother's arms this afternoon!"  Jane, one of my doulas with Claire, responded, "Yay Eileen!!!!  Sounds like I wouldn't have made it to this birth either! xoxo"  I found it so funny, and perfectly said given how speedy everything was at the end.

When we decided to transfer to the hospital all the midwives packed up their supplies.  They scrambled to get everything back out before the baby arrived.  As such they didn't even get chux pads underneath me so there was a huge pool of blood on the floor (so glad for wood floors) and Rich talks about how it was splashing all over Beth.  He likes to make it sounds so humorous.

Near the end of my labor I remember thinking, I never warned my next-door neighbor (who shares a bedroom wall with us) that I was in labor.  My midwife assured me not to worry, that she'd figure it out.  She must have been out of the house, she told me she didn't know I had the baby until she heard crying a few days later.

When I was laboring in the bathroom, I heard a knock at the door.  It was the Elder's Quorum President from church stopping by to talk to Rich.  The midwives answered the door and in an flurry of activity (packing to go to the hospital) they told him, "Now's not a good time", and shut the door.  I'm pretty sure he heard me in transition labor.  But, people should know not to just stop by when an overdue couple is absent from church.  :)

Things happened so fast that Claire ended up being there, like we originally wanted.  Ketsy held her at my bedroom doorway, but stepped away at one point when Claire started to whimper.  She brought her back in as soon as baby was born.  Claire later said, "I didn't want to see it", which I felt bad about.  It wasn't the quiet, calm birth that I had envisioned.  Poor traumatized girl.  She has since talked about when I pushed baby brother out and she makes grunting sounds, which we had taught her about while I was pregnant.  She also talks about pushing her baby doll out and she lifts her shirt to nurse her baby doll.  I do hope to empower her throughout her life on the subject of birth.

In the end I was disappointed at the midwife when she said, "I know you are a tough cookie and you've done this [un-medicated birth] before, but I don't know if you can do this."  It was exactly what I was thinking at the time, so I readily believed her.  In hindsight, I was in transition emotionally while my body was catching up.  But, it was a bummer to hear my midwife's doubt in me.  I'm glad Rich and Eva were still rooting for me, even though they didn't oppose her out loud.  And I did appreciate that the midwife kept following her gut to check my dilation before trying to transfer - I would have had a baby in the car then.  At a follow-up appointment, wondering why there was no resting during the pushing stage, I asked my midwife, "were you in a hurry to get him out?"  She said, yes, since baby was expected to be so big and his chest was especially large, she was worried about shoulder dystocia.  In fact, he was so big that we later learned he broke his clavicle during the birth, which is one result of shoulder dystocia, though he never got stuck.  He didn't seem to complain about his clavicle, but we noticed he was only moving one arm from the elbow while the other arm he flailed the whole thing.  Poor little guy.  He healed up just fine though.  I broke my clavicle when I was born too.  Big babies.

This was such a hard birth that I felt particularly bad for Eva and Ketsy who were both pregnant and due to have their babies soon.  I had hoped I didn't scare them by being a "wild woman".  But, they both assured me that they both came away from it inspired and empowered.  I remember one of the student midwives telling me as she left that I was "amazing - a birthing goddess".

After the birth I was in a state of shock and while Rich held him I kept having to remind myself, "Eileen, you just had a baby.  Look at your baby."  Even though he was so sweet and perfect, it just took me a long time to gather myself.  Rich declared in complete awe, "Don't ever say you can't do anything, ever again."  I have felt some trauma from this birth and over a year later I can still cry about it.  I just can't believe I was in that much pain - it was very scary.  For a long time afterward I thought we might only have 2 kids, ever.  But, it helps to remind myself that I was in labor for 37 hours, and it was only the last 45 minutes that were unbearable.  Yet, even that part, I got through it.  And, yes, I do want more children, someday, somehow.