My Birth Story and Our Newest Addition!

So, I realize I haven’t posted in a few weeks–by the end of the pregnancy I just wanted to hibernate until the baby was born. I am now ready to share my birth story and introduce our newest addition! I had my 40 week check up last Thursday, and once again they stripped my membranes. Since I was stretching to 4-5 cm and almost fully effaced, my midwife wanted me to stick around the area for a few hours and get checked at the birth center before heading back to Falmouth (the hospital is about 35 minutes from my house). I was hopefully after walking for a quite a bit that I might make some progress, but Baby M had some other ideas!

When I went to get checked four hours later I was still not progressed any further. I was super bummed, but I knew at the same time that there really wasn’t much I could do about it at that point. They gave us the option of walking around for a few more hours at the hospital or going home. We chose to just go home. I will admit that I burst into tears when leaving the hospital. At that point, I was frustrated having so many contractions that weren’t doing anything and just wanted to give birth!

Thursday nothing happened and I went through Friday until early evening Friday when I knew something was starting to happen. The contractions started following a peak pattern and were anywhere from 8-12 minutes apart. I woke up on Saturday and said to my husband: “We’re going in and I’m not leaving!” Thankfully one of the midwives I loved was on that Saturday and she admitted me and told me to relax and that I would not be leaving until I had the baby. Contractions grew stronger over the course of the day, but I was definitely able to breathe through them. I was checked when I got there and was 6 cm fully effaced. After 4 hours, I was still 6cm, but the head had moved down considerably.

We waited until around 7 pm to break my water, since we knew that would kick things into high gear. The contractions were getting stronger, but not necessarily closer together until the very end. My midwife and the student midwife wanted to wait until the women in the room next door gave birth, so they could give me their full attention–something I was totally fine with! The student midwife was AWESOME! She had just gotten back from 2.5 years in Costa Rica studying and doing home births.

At around 7, the midwife broke my water and there was a little meconium in it. I was allowed to get back into the tub (which I had been in and out of all day–they don’t call it nature’s epidural for nothing!). I started crying right after my water broke, because I knew sh$t was about to get real in this birth story, and it did! I quickly started feeling the hard-core contractions and urge to push. Since, there was a little meconium when the water broke, I couldn’t deliver in water. I told my midwife I wasn’t moving, so on the fly she decided to lower the level of water in the tub so I could still be in it, but the baby would be delivered out of the water.

I was on my knees with my arms draped over the side of the tub. The midwives kept pouring warm water over my back and were so encouraging as I started yelling “I can’t do this anymore” and “Get it out!” I had done a lot of reading on natural birthing, so at least I knew this was going to happen. It didn’t last long after that, and soon I was holding our new baby William in my arms! He was born at 7:44 p.m. at 8 lbs 7 oz and 20 inches long. I feel so fortunate to have had the birth experience I wanted– a unmedicated, midwife assisted birth. I loved everything about my experience at Beth Israel Deaconess Plymouth (formerly Jordan), and I would highly recommend their Birthplace.

I am recovering well and William is doing wonderful, gaining weight and being loved by all of us! 🙂