A Birth Story: A Fairly Honest Recounting of the Events Immediately Preceding the Birth of Our Daughter

Preflections

I love my birth story, so I don't know why I haven't wanted to write it down. While pregnant, I read many a birth story and found a lot of comfort in them. They provided a possible framework for my own story, which seemed mysterious and expansive from my outsider's perspective. Generally, hearing other women's stories left me feeling iron strong and freakishly confident; but the odd time, they came with a twist ending that left me absolutely terrified.

What was I afraid of? It wasn't the pain or the possibility that I couldn't do it. Nope, there was never a doubt in my mind that I could do it. Maybe it would hurt like hell, but the pain would be merely physical and I would persevere in the throes of active labour. Then, I knew, the pain would be over - it always does have an end - and I'd be left with a child. I'd be left with my brand new universe.

I wasn't afraid of the unknown, either. That's too big and broad a fear to apply to a discrete event that literally has a countdown, however inaccurate, leading up to it.

Most of my fears were specific, and I was able to manage them as they arose throughout my pregnancy. For instance, I feared the possibility of hemorrhaging after the birth and being rushed to the hospital, so I had an INR test to convince myself that this wasn't going to happen. I was also wary of the looming threat of having a hospital birth from the get-go, which opened up a whole snowballing of fears: at the hospital, I would be hurried along, I wouldn't know my patient's rights well enough, I would be induced with hormones which would make the contractions unbearable... I would beg for an epidural, which would numb me to the experience, I would push too hard, too fast... I would rip wide open and before I could recover from a hundred stitches they would have my perfect daughter drinking formula from a bottle and wearing makeup and refusing to look me in the eye after breaking curfew...

Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

Ultimately, I had nothing to fear but fear itself, as my story illustrates.

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Part One
The At-Home Part

On November 4th - my estimated due date, mind you, so a baby was what I least expected - my contractions started late in the evening. "How delightful!" I thought. Every ten minutes, I would feel my uterus gently clench, a kind of pleasant discomfort. They weren't nearly as bad as cramps. I was off to a grand ol' start.

On November 5th, at 4 am, just as I was starting to doubt that this could possibly have anything to do with labour, my waters broke. My side of the bed was soaked. But how could I be sure? Classic denial. I googled it. Convinced, I called the midwifery hotline, where a male voice congratulated me and advised me to get some rest. A midwife would be 'round in the morning. Obviously, I didn't sleep that night, despite my best intentions.

When the midwife arrived, we were hustling about, preparing snacks and putting a tarp on the bed. I baked goods and contracted at home, while John went out to gather some last-minute supplies. We told family that it was on, and we all put on our game faces. The midwife, a stranger to me, checked my vitals and prescribed me extra-strength Tylenol or Baileys (a no-brainer) and a Gravol shot in the leg. I took it, and I passed out for a couple of hours.

By 11 am, the contractions had come to a complete stop. Visions of my worst fears started skulking about in the darker corners of my mind. That poor midwife was my scapegoat: I would blame her for killing my contractions for quite some time, until I am told by my own midwife, a fountainesse of wisdom and knowledge, that, "If you are really in labour, nothing can stop it. You needed the rest".

Although relatively mild contractions had resumed by mid-afternoon, they weren't accelerating or intensifying nearly enough to silence my monkey mind. I knew that they wouldn't let you sit around with your waters broken forever, and I couldn't shake the awareness that the clock was ticking.

At 5:30 that evening, we went for a walk, and as I walked through the neighbourhood I secretly stimulated my nipples and tried to relaaaaax. My anxiety was seeping into John, and I could feel it coming back at me in full force. Castor oil! John went and got some. I guzzled those fish oil bubbles down like my life depended on it and I didn't notice the taste. After big fat nothing for a few hours, I spent an hour on the toilet. Wrong kind of contraction. Still, the contractions I was needing to stay out of the hospital eluded us.

At 7 pm, Claudia - my secondary but equally super-human midwife - comes over for another cervical sweep, and the contractions start in earnest that night. Honestly.

It's now November 6th. At 2:30 am, Claudia returns for another round of antibiotics. All along, I've been receiving antibiotics intravenously every 8 hours, a reward for being Group B Strep positive. She informs us of our options and their associated risks and, when pressed, advises us of both her professional and personal opinions. She has attained the perfect balance of compassionate care and professional discretion.

Because I'm on antibiotics and the baby and I are both doing fabulously, she grants me the gift of time and empowers us to make our own decision by morning. I'm to call her at 8 am. After listening to some hypnosis, I drift into a night of 3-minute catnaps between contractions which are about 40 seconds long, every 7 minutes. Give or take.

At the crack of 8 am, we touch base with Claudia. Then we're out of bed and off to the dog park for a walk in the woods. In the car, the contractions are gaining an edge, and my heart goes out to women who've had to labour in bed. The unpleasantness of the pressure of the car seat is ever so slightly mitigated by the fact that we have heated seats. At the dog park, the fresh air makes everything more okay, and I arrange to be next to a tree for each contraction so I can assume the pose that will get me through the next million or so contractions - bending at the waist at a 120 degree angle is where I find the most relief. The car ride back pretty much sucks.

At 10:30 am, we meet our beloved Claudia back at our place for an antibiotics date. We also have an uninvited guest, who gushes in and can't be ignored - green baby poop. Meconium. Procedure and common sense dictate that this is the point at which we must go to the hospital. I know this. Claudia confirms this. Despite having tried to remain open to a hospital birth throughout my pregnancy, I feel the loss and cry it out. After 5 minutes, John brings me back to positive zone and a sense of acceptance, then urgency, takes over. It's off to the Civic we go.