Wednesday's Child is Full of Grace

I guess my body started laboring on Tuesday 3/18 but the early labor was so much like my prodromal labor had been for the past 5 weeks that I was unable to distinguish it for a loooong time. We went out to the midwife’s for my 39 week visit. Jim drove because it’s a 45 minute trip and I was unable to handle driving for that long. As it turned out I was immediately and intensely uncomfortable in the car. Everything looked/sounded good so we headed home. While at the midwife’s the uncomfortable crampy feeling had gone away only to return as soon as I got back into the car. We ran some errands on the way home but I was so uncomfortable and tired that I was getting crankier and crankier. By the time we got home I only had about an hour to rest before leaving to pick up the coop order. I was still uncomfortable but no longer felt crampy. I dozed and then left for our coop. By the time I got home Daniel woke up and I was back on mommy-duty. I had a sore throat and was still really tired and cranky so we did the least we could do until it was time for dinner. And then I fed D cereal and myself frozen soup, leaving J to fend for himself. While I was eating I realized that my uncomfortable feeling was beginning to settle into a pattern of contractions. This had in fact happened almost every night for a week so there was little spectacular in this observation. I amused myself by practicing thinking through them, saying, “surrender and open” whenever I would notice one coming. J put D to bed and we caught up on an episode of Lost. For kicks, I timed contractions during the episode. They were still irregular landing anywhere from 6-10 minutes apart and only about 30 seconds to 1 minute long at most. I figured I’d wake up still pregnant same as the last 5 days! Only I was never able to get real sleep. The contractions kept me at a doze and made me wake up every hour to pee.

By 1:30, I was beginning to think that maybe it would be easier to get up to pee if I was sleeping on the couch (our bed is pretty high off the ground for 9 months pregnant!). I got up and took my pillows with me, leaving J the bed. I tried several different positions, dozing on the couch only to wake up again at 2:30 to pee. Only this time there was a little streak of red when I wiped. The midwife had specified that she wanted me to call, even in the middle of the night, for ANY red or pink mucous. I’m glad she specified this because I was looking for bloody show not a little itty bitty streak! I was obedient and called but told her I was going to try and go back to sleep. I tried but falied. I got up around 3:00 and took a hot shower. I was having to focus on the contractions when they came, moving into them, squatting, swaying,etc. But they were still short and still coming irregularly, from 3-8 minutes apart. I was sure that I was in early labor now, but still thought I was very far from giving birth. After about an hour of laboring on my own, I realized I was thinking about getting in the pool every time I had a contraction. So I reluctantly woke J up and asked him to inflate and fill the pool. I was still fine between contractions, chipper and in complete denial that the train had left the station (as J put it!). So I puttered and moved through the contractions when they came. When the pool was full, around 5:00, we called the midwife back. I was still worried I would stall out if there was too much fuss about me (which is why I wasn’t sure about getting into the pool or waking J or calling the midwife). But I figured, she could evaluate the situation on her own and decide to come or not. She asked J how I was doing and when he told her I was moaning a lot she said, “Not what a midwife wants to hear!” and booked it on over!

J and I labored with me in the pool for a while. I was able to stay really focused on the contractions, keeping my voice low and thinking about opening up. I was saying a lot of “ohhhhhh” which in my head was “open”. The contractions were still short and not too intense. Around 6, D showed signs of waking up so we called my mom to come over. The midwife arrived a little after that in a rush (poor lady!).

I was pretty serious about labor at this point and the rustle and lights around me were really annoying. But I was able to keep my focus. I really needed a birth partner at this point to hang onto during contractions and help me stay low. I kept thinking, “I’m gonna get SO BIG” which amused me but also helped me stay in the contraction. J or the midwife would hold my hands when one would come so I could squeeze and moan. The birth energy was really picking up at this point. I could tell a contraction was coming because my legs would start shaking and then I’d feel the contraction. Like it would start at my knees and travel up and through me. J kept reminding me to let it “roll over me” which I would change in my head to “roll through me.” I was also puking every few contractions, which I did with D as well. But this time it didn’t feel wrong it just felt like more of the same birth energy ripping (or rippling depending on the moment) through my body.

Mom arrived just as D woke up. She played with him, fed him and brought him in to see me in the pool as he was able to deal with it. He did super well, not getting freaked out (except for a little when I went into transition and when Grace was crowning). He kept telling Mom that I was making cow noises! I was.

At one point the contractions started coming harder and closer and I began to think I was headed for transition. But I also really needed to pee and thought maybe if I could just pee things wouldn’t feel so intense. So J and the midwife helped me onto the toilet. I sat, peed and jumped straight up again as peeing pushed me over the edge into transition. Three hard contractions came one on top of the other. I was mostly able to vocalize through them and hang on to J (or maybe it was the midwife… I really couldn’t tell ya!). All I could think of was getting back into the pool as fast as I could. One more contraction in the bathroom and I went straight back into the pool. Things at this point were pretty intense and the timeline gets a little hazy. I was having a hard time dealing with some of these contractions. I could feel Grace moving down pretty quickly and I could feel myself opening up. I would describe her descent as a fist pushing down inside of me and the cervix opening up as being torn apart, but strangely less painful than all of that but no other language describes the power of those sensations. The midwife asked if she could check me and found me just about ready to push. She also saw a small little lip and aksed that I wait to push. Since I didn’t feel the urge at all yet (and had a two hour transitioin with D) I didn’t really believe that we were so close to the end. A couple of contractions later and my waters broke. It was such a forceful feeling that my first thought was the baby had punched me from the inside. But immediately I felt a desperate need to push. In fact, I felt my body pushing in spite of me. The midwife had seen meconium in the water and wanted me to deliver on the bed. She and J helped me out of the pool and onto the bed as wuickly as possible. I know I walked and they ushered but it really feels like they carried me we moved so quickly.

I landed on the bed in a kneeling position and J sprawled across from the other side to give me some moral support. Grace was crowning at this point and the midwife asked J if he wanted to help catch. He got up and walked around but I was suddenly seized by an unbearable need to bear down hard and realized I had nothing to grab onto to help me do that. So I somehow managed to tell J I needed him back with me. He again landed in a really awkward position but I was able to hang my arms around his neck and bear down. And I bellowed and pushed and bellowed and pushed! And we hit the ring of fire with some serious force! Wow! And it got worse! Then the midwife told me to take it easy. So I breathed, moaned and shouted but didn’t push, though my body wouldn’t stop, I just didn’t help it along at all. Another big, long amazingly painful powerful push and the most glorious feeling of pop and slither! I was done! She was out. The midwife passed Grace to me through my legs and I knelt and held her while the cord pulsed its last. “Is she still a girl?” I asked “What color is her hair?” J asked. And then she started to cry and look around a little and cry some more.

D and Mom came into the room at this point to seek out the source of the new noise! D was pretty excited and climbed onto the bed to peek at the little baby. Grace (still nameless) nursed within the first half hour, maybe at about 15 minutes while Jim called family to greet them with the news of the new baby. They all wanted details we couldn’t give them yet like, weight, height and name! We were still a little stunned at the speed of the whole thing! It was 7:55 am when Grace Elinor arrived, weighting 8lb 14 oz and measuring 20 1/2 inches long. It was around 9:30 when we were able to tell them all those details.

I am on cloud 9 with this birth. It was powerful and fast but I was able to stay present the entire time. I was able to surrender to the force of my body without panicking and without feeling a loss of control. This was exactly the birth I had hoped for and imagined.