An Incredibly Gentle Birth

First Baby
2008 Memorial Hospital, Mary Mumford Haley, CNM East Bay Health Care

We have our little girl! Is there anything better in the world than this? Our story isn't nearly as adventurous as L and C's, but it went wonderfully.
On Thursday morning, at 4am, I woke up to go to the bathroom, noticed a birthshow (I never turn the light on at night, but for some reason I did), and then realized my contractions were feeling pretty regular. I got really happy and couldn't go back to sleep, so I plugged into my ipod and listened to birth affirmations a I watch the clock. 8 minutes apart. G noticed that something was happening and I told him to rest up, that this was it. Around 6 he asked me how long my contractions had been 5 minutes apart, but I'd been listening to the rainbow relaxation and hadn't noticed. At that point I got up to take a shower. By the end of my shower the contractions were 2-3 minutes apart, so I woke G up again and said it seemed to be happening rather quickly. He tried to call the midwife, but her office had forgotten to turn the answering service on...so we tried to go on-line to find the hospital number to see if they had Mary's number...but the internet wouldn't work...finally we found Memorial's number in a folder and they gave us her cell number and Mary told us she'd meet us at her office to check me out.

We got to Mary's office at about 8 and I was fully effaced and 5 cm. She said to take a couple hours to get to the hospital and she'd see us there. As we got back in the car I was getting a little surprised at the power of the contractions (that internal force is unbelievable). So I said, let's just go to the hospital now. It took 45 minutes to get from East Providence to Pawtucket. At one point I said "Rush hour on 9-11, huh kid? Well, OK." By the time I got to the labor room it was 9:30 and I was fully dilated. There was no time for that IV I was supposed to get, so no IV (after all that work to not be IVed I ended up being Strep B positive and since I'm allergic to penicillin they needed to get 8 hours of another drug into me before E was born. Seeing as how people usually aren't fully dilated for 8 hours, they decided to skip it. E's bloodwork came back negative for Strep B).

There were lots of people in the room, trying to get me admitted to the hospital between contractions, asking a million questions. I think they were still asking admin questions as E was crowning. Shortly before the midwife arrived, I flipped over to hold on to the back of the bed (such good advice on that one Allison. The room was so small and there was a midwife, 2 residents, a nurse and that admin person and G and I. Luckily they all caught on to the hypnobirthing thing pretty quickly and I was mainly aware of G (who's face I needed against mine. he was a superstar reminding me to breath just a little deeper on each breath, the couple surges when his face wasn't right there were the only one's that felt like they just might overwhelm me). As I felt E getting closer, I kept asking myself, "Is this pain? No, no this is definitely more pressure than I ever thought my body could produce, but it's not pain". I reached down and felt her head 6 or 7 surges before she came out. At the very end, I held my breath and pushed once and that was the only time I felt pain (and it's possibly the reason I had to get a couple stitches). I can't even think about regretting that though because the calmness of the entire event, and the incredible moment when they passed her through my legs and into my arms was just priceless. She stayed awake for a few hours taking it all in, breastfeeding, and charming the heck out of G and I. She was born at 10:39 weighing 7lbs 3oz, with curly brown hair and eyebrows.

I'll attach a couple pictures, one taken right after she was born and another taken today.

It is very clear to me that the tools we learned in class were the key to navigating the surprising force of the birthing body, and it is clear that the gift of a gentle birth cannot be beat. E is so calm and easy and patient with our new-parent-fumbles (like how long it takes us to feed her little body into a long sleeve onesie). She's just amazing. We haven't put her down yet:)

So, Allison, we thank you. E thanks you. What a gift ...

~b, g, and e