2010.....the year of the final BABY!

I only haphazardly blogged through 2010.  The year saw many changes:

• pregnancy
• fear of Down's Syndrome in our unborn child
• the fearful decision to undergo amnio 
• seeing our baby's little penis and knowing that we would have a son
• the joy and relief at discovering that our son had no genetic disorders
• the decision to embrace natural childbirth and leave my trusted OB at 30 weeks pregnant
• doing self-hypnosis via the Hypnobabies homestudy course (if you know what a skeptic I am, you will know what a huge leap of *gasp* faith that was!)
• carrying a large baby past 41 weeks without any desire for induction
• going into natural labor for the first and last time the same day the USA won a match at the World Cup
• giving birth without any medical interventions!!!!
• welcoming our beautiful son, William Christopher, into the world
• my husband losing his job
• my daughter potty-training without any threats or coercion at 3 years old
• my wonderful 5-month maternity leave with the greatest long-term sub on earth (thank you, Michelle!)
• my return to teaching and the homeroom from hell
• the realization that I may get pink-slipped
• the need for my husband to abandon his role as a stay-at-home dad and look for work
• my struggles and triumphs as a working mother and intuitive parenting practitioner/advocate

That's it in a nutshell.  Stay tuned for my resolutions and plans for 2011.....

I Did It: The birth of baby Liam

On Wednesday 6/23, I woke up feeling nothing, but by about 9:00am, I had some very light bloody show and some stronger contractions. I was also extremely hungry all day. My doula left for vacation that morning and I was planning to meet her backup (Bria) at a café at 10:00 am. Everyone freaked out about me driving to the meeting, so I called Bria and explained. She agreed to come over to our house and we had a great meeting. I actually liked her more than my original doula. After discussing my symptoms, we agreed that I would probably go into labor sometime in the next 24 hours.

My contractions continued throughout the day. We took Zoe for a walk to the park and then I went for a chiropractic adjustment, listened to my Hypnobabies, and had an acupuncture treatment (Chris drove me to both). I was getting a little discouraged because things were not really picking up. Chris and Zoe went to his parents’ hotel for dinner and I got some quiet time at home alone. I made myself a big salad with avocado and grilled chicken then got to bouncing on the birthing ball.

After putting Zoe down for bed at 8:00, Chris and I watched a movie and by 9:30 my contractions began to intensify. They still weren’t too bad and were irregular, coming anywhere from 10—20 minutes apart. At 11:30, I went to bed and tried to fall asleep, but the contractions were slowly becoming more intense and I knew there was no way I was getting to sleep. I got back up and tried to distract myself by watching tv. By midnight, I was having to really breathe anesthesia into my lower pelvic area and repeat to myself “my face, my hands, and my pelvic floor are completely relaxed.” I was getting pretty excited and confident that I would soon have my baby. I used an online contraction timer for about 45 minutes and realized they were lasting 1-2 minutes and coming every 3-5 minutes. At 1:00 am, I woke up Chris and told him it was time to call his parents and get ready to go to the hospital. I called the midwife and doula and within 30 minutes we were loading up the car.

The 15 minute car ride was very uncomfortable—sitting was bad. By the time we got to the hospital, my contractions were about every 2 minutes. The concourse from the parking garage to the hospital was locked for the night, so we had to walk around the entire building to the emergency entrance. I kept having to stop for contractions and it took forever to get inside. I checked in at maternity around 2:00 am. There was another mom at about the same point in the birthing process as I was who had the same midwife. Becky (the on-call MW) asked me if it would be okay for her student nurse-midwife to be with me instead and I said okay. She was great. She checked me and I was only at 3 cm. My contractions also began to slow, she had me get up and walk the halls to get things going again. We did that for awhile and then I wanted to go back to the room. They had me get onto the bed and lean over the back, which was elevated. That was a pretty good position for me, but in time, things began to stall out again (just not progressing) so I got on my hands and knees on the floor holding onto the back of the rocking chair. I was checked again and had gone to a 4. Then I moved to the birthing ball, then standing and holding onto the side of the bed. I was checked again about an hour later and was at a 6-7. That was my final cervical check. They got the tub filled up for me and I sat in there for about 25 minutes. As much as I thought I would love the tub, it was not as comfortable for me. It was too slippery and I did not like the weightlessness. I was beginning to hit the “transformation” stage while in the tub and was getting very vocal with every contraction. It took some time for me to get out of the tub and get back to my room even through it was just a few doors down the same hall.

I stood on the side of the bed again, then spent a lot of time on the birthing ball. Things were picking up and I could feel Liam descending into my pelvis. It was pretty intense, but I still felt in control. Finally, the pressure in my bottom let me know it would not be long before I needed to push. I said I wanted to try kneeling on the bed holding onto the back again for pushing. Things continued to intensify. The pressure of Liam turning from posterior to anterior while in the birth canal was difficult to handle. I was getting scared about pushing and began to feel really sick. This was shift change time for the on-call midwives and my favorite one, Patti, was there. She was the one who did my initial intake appt when I transferred to the practice. She was very calm and supportive. I said I was scared and she said that was okay, but that my body was made to do this and it will do it. She kept her finger on my third eye chakra to help get my consciousness out of my pelvis. I guess it worked to a certain extent because I was really able to let go and relax between waves. She offered to break my water and I said no. About 5 minutes later, my water broke on its own and I felt a great deal of relief.

The relief was short-lived, however, because with the bag of waters out of the way, Liam was ready to come out. It was at this point that I began to feel true “pain.” I was thinking how stupid I was for not getting an epidural at that moment. I knew I would survive it, but it sucked. I began vomiting (really dry-heaving) and I guess it took my attention away from the pelvic pressure. I think Liam may have still been turning. Finally, it was time to push and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I wanted it over fast and gave a good hard push (despite Patti telling me to slow down) along with a blood-curdling scream—out came his head. Then my body decided to take a break. Patti told me I had to push again right away. I said I needed to take a break and she said, “you can’t; the baby needs to come out right now.” I knew something must be going on with him so I pushed without a contraction to help me out. I had to push hard but I was able to get his shoulders and body out with just one or two more pushes. What a relief to have him out!

They told me to reach down and grab him and it was hard to do because he was so slippery. I also had to turn around to sit down. I knew I tore and needed to get stitched up. Once I was holding him, I could tell why they needed me to push him out so quickly—he was blue and not crying. His initial Apgar was 6. We tried rubbing him all over, but still no change so they took him over to the baby table and gave him some oxygen which required cutting the cord a little sooner than planned. While he we getting oxygenated, I delivered the placenta and reminded the nurse that I was going to take it home. She asked if I was going to have it encapsulated and I was hesitant to answer. She said---it’s okay, my friend is a homebirth midwife and she does encapsulation.

Liam was returned to me quickly and he looked pink and was crying. I held him skin to skin and he found his own way to the breast and latched himself on. I couldn’t believe how big he looked compared to how Zoe looked at birth. While I nursed him, Patti stitched me up. I had a 2nd degree tear from pushing his head out in one hard push. I kept saying, “I can’t believe I did it.”

Patience and a return to the SAHD

I am now 41 weeks pregnant (in other words, a week overdue).  I have employed every possible natural labor inducing technique: Evening Primrose Oil, Black Cohosh, acupuncture, chiropractic adjustments.  And there has been a little bit of progress toward expelling this child from the womb.  The anxiety over giving birth naturally in the hospital is gone.  I have zero fears at this point.  One way or another the baby will be born within the next 9 days (by induction on July 1 or 2 if necessary).

Now for a return to my SAHD post from many months ago.  It seems that our decision was made for us when my husband became yet another casualty of the recession.  Fortunately, I still have my job (for now) and probably will at least make it through the next round of budget cuts and teacher layoffs.  With unemployment and no childcare payments, we will be able to maintain our lives as usual.  We are very fortunate and realize that many families do not have it so easy when a lay-off occurs.

Going Hardcore

It's been quite a while since I've had the time to write here.  My job and my pregnancy have both transformed in the months I've been away from the bloggy world.  This post will be about the pregnancy and my preparations for birth and I'll save the work stuff for another day.

I have never been a fan of modern medicine.  Not that I don't think it saves us from loads of things that would have killed most of us by age 30 in centuries past, but I think often we are over-medicated and over-diagnosed.  The unfortunate reality of living in a capitalist country that offers health care for a profit is certainly a major contributer to the medicalization of otherwise natural processes such as birth and death.  Despite knowing that birth is almost always safe and rarely needs any kind of intervention at all, I was terrified to give birth for the first time. 

I was so ashamed and disappointed that I chose to have my labor induced for financial reasons (long story--save for later), and gave birth in a hospital with an IV, constant monitoring, and an epidural.  It is not at all what I imagined my birthing experience would be like.  Prior to becoming pregnant, I assumed I would give birth at home or in a birthing center in a tub with no medical intervention at all. But once I began trying to get pregnant for the first time nearly 4 years ago, I also became debilitated by fear---fear of pregnancy, birth, weight gain, parenting.  This became all-comsuming anxiety, therefore I chose to eliminate as many fears as possible by getting all the tests, having an OB rather than a midwife, and giving birth in a hospital where any possible emergency could be attended to immediately.  I told myself that if my first birth went smoothly, I would do it differently the second time.

My second positive pregnancy test came in May 2009.  I didn't think about looking for a midwife at first, I automaticallly called to set up an appointment with my OB.  I went in at about 4-5 weeks pregnant and was told it was still probably too early to see anything.  A week later I began cramping badly and bleeding.  I returned to the doctor and she confirmed that there was no fetus there, but a lot of tissue and things were not right.  We tried just waiting for nature to take its course, but it didn't, so I ended up with a D & C  in July.  What followed was more anxiety, weekly doctor's appointments and blood draws until the first week in September.  After five long months, my body was finally back to normal. 

October 6, 2010.  My husband's 35th birthday.  I came home from an after-work baby shower with Zoe and decided that just for fun, I would take my last home pregnancy test.  I certainly did not think I was pregnant, but I figured if on the off-chance I was, it would make a great birthday gift wrapped up next to the others sitting on the dining table.  Three-five minutes later, I saw the "pregnant" appear on my digital test and was definitely surprised.  Zoe was the first to find out.  I was nervous and decided to wait until I reached 7 weeks before heading to the doctor.  Still too afraid to go to a midwife after the long drawn-out miscarriage experience.

Everything was progressing normally.  No problems with me or baby Liam.  My amnio results came back 100% normal, I tested negative for gestational diabetes.  There was no risk for me having a natural, non-hospital birth.  But by this time, I was 27 weeks along.  I found a naturopath/midwife at a birthing center down the street from my house that was willing to take me as a patient, but unfortunately, my insurance would not cover a birth outside of a hospital....so no birthing center.  And no home birth (not that I wanted to give birth in a tiny crowded house full of people and pets). 

Despite these setbacks, I decided to go "hardcore" with this birth---no meds or interventions.  I ordered the Hypnobabies homestudy course, hired a doula, and made a plan to discuss my birth choices with my doctor at my next appointment in April.  I could tell after the appointment that I would not be able to trust that my desires would be honored in their entirety.  I was very disappointed and discouraged.  I had two options: pay out of pocket thousands of dollars to give birth outside of the hospital, or go to the one in-network CNM practice and beg them to take me at 31 weeks. 

The morning after my appointment I sat in the staff room at school and called Providence Maternal Care Clinic.  I learned that all of my birth preferences were standard practice for them and they had one remaining spot for a June birth.  I took it even though I would not be able to get my first appointment until May 4th---34 weeks pregnant.  So now I am in full preparation for a natural childbirth in the hospital with a midwife and doula.

It is not my ideal birth, but it will not cost me loads of money and I will be able to live knowing I did birthing hardcore by choice.