This is the story of the birth of our daughter on April 27th. A more medically complete account exists in a note on Facebook, but I wanted to post this story here with some photos. Enjoy!My water broke at about 2:20 am, after some really mild contractions for maybe half an hour or so. I called our midwife Louisa, and went back to bed, but didn't sleep much as contractions continued sporadically and built up toward the morning. While having a little breakfast, Kevin called his parents, and we got in touch with both of his brothers; Connie and Rory planned to be there and arrived early afternoon. My brother Matt left for school and other brother Michael was on his way home. My dad, unfortunately, was out on his only trip for the three weeks surrounding the due date and was stuck in Orange County. He made it home a few hours after the birth wrapped up. My mom was right there with us all along and busied herself with a final clean up, getting me anything I needed, cutting up fruit for snacking on, being generally an amazing grandmother. Lastly, aunt Tara and my 5 year old cousin Iris came over for a few hours in the morning, with flowers and snacks and hugs of encouragement.
We had a bunch of family surrounding us, which I had really wanted, but all the activity kind of slowed down my early labor. It was a good trade-off, though, I thought, to have the family support present even if it added a couple hours to the labor. Louisa and her assistant Christina arrived a little ahead of noon and started tracking my vitals, contractions, and everything. I had a heplock put in for IV antibiotics. I used a birth ball and really found that helpful for back labor, as well as counter pressure. We eventually put a towel in the floor of the shower so I could be on my knees leaning into the ball with hot water on my lower back.
When we moved toward pushing, I spent some time on the bed, still leaning over the ball, and Louisa, birth assistant Christina, Kevin, and my mom were standing all around massaging me from four corners- awesome. Then, apparently, I pushed for about an hour on the toilet. I was surprised when Louisa said it had been that long; of course it felt like it was dragging on FOREVER, but I was so far in labor land I don't really remember anything. That's not exactly true. I remember flashes of images, and feeling everything in my abdomen trying to shift downward with each contraction. Pushing became really effective and I moved into the main room, where I actually delivered the baby on my hands and knees on the floor.
The two grandmothers ended up exclaiming a gender announcement ("It's a...." "Girl!!!") as I rocked back and scooped her up- Kevin was super supportive and wonderful all the way through but became pretty deer-in-headlights at this moment. Time kind of stopped and my sense of the world expanded back out of my body. Eventually he did announce her name: Edythe Irene Connally.
We had a bunch of family surrounding us, which I had really wanted, but all the activity kind of slowed down my early labor. It was a good trade-off, though, I thought, to have the family support present even if it added a couple hours to the labor. Louisa and her assistant Christina arrived a little ahead of noon and started tracking my vitals, contractions, and everything. I had a heplock put in for IV antibiotics. I used a birth ball and really found that helpful for back labor, as well as counter pressure. We eventually put a towel in the floor of the shower so I could be on my knees leaning into the ball with hot water on my lower back.
When we moved toward pushing, I spent some time on the bed, still leaning over the ball, and Louisa, birth assistant Christina, Kevin, and my mom were standing all around massaging me from four corners- awesome. Then, apparently, I pushed for about an hour on the toilet. I was surprised when Louisa said it had been that long; of course it felt like it was dragging on FOREVER, but I was so far in labor land I don't really remember anything. That's not exactly true. I remember flashes of images, and feeling everything in my abdomen trying to shift downward with each contraction. Pushing became really effective and I moved into the main room, where I actually delivered the baby on my hands and knees on the floor.
The two grandmothers ended up exclaiming a gender announcement ("It's a...." "Girl!!!") as I rocked back and scooped her up- Kevin was super supportive and wonderful all the way through but became pretty deer-in-headlights at this moment. Time kind of stopped and my sense of the world expanded back out of my body. Eventually he did announce her name: Edythe Irene Connally. So that's the birth. Kevin cut the cord and the whole birth process was just shy of nineteen hours, start to finish. When stuff kind of settled down and Edie and I were a bit wiped up, Kevin read a blessing written by st. Patrick and his dad prayed a thanksgiving/blessing, which was really meaningful for us. Both grandmothers, one grandfather, and two uncles were present, as well as Louisa, Christina, and Julie, the RN midwife from class. A splash of wine was passed around to toast. The baby's measurements were taken and we were both checked over for vitals.
Then came the only drama part: I tried getting in the shower. The heat was the last straw I guess, on top of reasonably solid blood loss and anemia, and I passed out a bit. I had a really weird dream that was like a commercial that I couldn't understand what to buy. So we did some oxygen via mask, a catheter, and two IV bags with another dose of pitocin to wrap everything up. I was shaking pretty hard with adrenalin but emotionally felt stable. I'd rather have the complication after the birth than during... so poor Louisa slept on the weird little chair in our room for a few hours until I was completely stabilized.
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