Everett's Story - Part two

Part One of this series covered Everett's conception and pregnancy and can be found here. This post will cover the birth.

I knew I still wanted to have a homebirth. In a perfect world insurance would cover whatever kind of midwife you want and there would be more continuity of care between OBs and midwives when necessary. I like very hands off care during labor and birth, so paying thousands of dollars out of pocket for someone to watch me give birth just seems silly. I researched and prepared for all the what ifs and knew that transferring to the hospital was always an option. Some people call this an unassisted birth, others call it a free birth (which I prefer). 

On Wednesday, the 14th of November, at 36+5, I forgot to take my progesterone before bed. I was only suppose to take it one more day anyway and had missed doses before, so I’m not sure if it contributed or not.

We had been passing viruses around since mid September and I still had a cough. My upper stomach muscles hurt so bad. I told my friend Serah that I wasn’t ready for him to come yet. Not to mention I had been having a lot of neck and back pain. Despite this, I had been nesting and Summer helped me get my birth space ready. On Thursday I woke up still a little congested but my cough was better and my stomach muscles were feeling better.

I had a chiropractor appointment with a massage at 10:30. It was the best adjustment I had gotten in my neck and for the first time, I didn’t get sore afterwards. I stopped at the consignment store to get a little jacket suit for Everett since we aren’t using a car seat carrier this time.

While I was gone Summer had taken the littles to the park. Deacon had slept on the way there, but didn’t get a long nap, so around 4 o’clock he got real fussy and wanted to nurse. Because of all the contractions I had been having I had cut him down to once or twice a day and sometimes we’d even skip a day or two. I also kept the sessions short. I figured I was just hours away from 37 weeks though, so I went ahead and let him nurse to sleep.

Before we went to bed I was being neurotic about straightening up. Summer was making fun of me asking if I was going to do that every night until he gets here. I told her I knew it probably wouldn’t be that night, but who knows. I WAS having lots of Braxton Hicks. That was normal for me though.

I thought maybe I’d bounce on my birth ball while watching tv before bed at about 8. It made my uterus just tighten up without relaxing and was uncomfortable. This wasn’t new either. It would happen a lot when we’d go to Costco right after eating lunch.

Everyone had fallen asleep, but I was starting to wonder if maybe I was going into labor because the Braxton Hicks were still coming. I had had them for 4-5 hours before though so I wasn’t sure. At 10:15 I decided to start timing them.

They weren’t regular really, but even getting up would trigger another and they were starting to feel different.... lower. I got up to pee after one that felt stronger at about 12:15 and had a good amount of bloody show. I knew now I was dilating and this was it. I woke Summer up at 12:40.

She started running my bath. Once I got in she got the bed ready and made my labor-aid. I was just watching tv from the tub. At 2:00 it started getting more intense and I told her to go wake up Scott.

Deacon woke up just before 3 though and he went up to get him back to sleep and fell back to sleep. I started feeling nauseous around this time and thought maybe I was getting close to transition.

Around 3:30 or so I started getting really tired and started to doze between contractions. I thought the contractions might be spreading out some. I thought maybe I was complete and my body just needed to rest a little. This was different for me. At 4 I decided to get out of the tub and rest in the bed for a while. I threw up as soon as I laid down. Then got as comfortable as I could. That lasted an hour. I barely moved and slept between contractions.

At 5 I went back to the tub. I started feeling the contractions in my back an thought maybe he was posterior and that was why I wasn’t getting the urge to push. This is when it would have been nice to have a midwife on hand. I don’t regret freebirthing, but I did have a moment of weakness. I knew I could push him out sunny side up, but was afraid of pushing and not being complete. If I wasn’t complete and he wasn’t lined up just right... I could still have hours to go and I was tired! I told Summer I wanted to go to the hospital. I was mostly thinking I wanted an epidural and a nap! Lol But I also could have done like Emilee, the founder of the free birth society, and got checked and if I was complete.... just go back home and finish birthing. Of course it also entered my mind that I’d have him in the car. As all this was racing through my mind, I got sick again. When my stomach muscles engaged I felt a lot of downward pressure and decided I would give it one good push before I committed to going to the hospital. I had told Summer to turn off the camera, so I had her turn it back on. I waited for the next contraction and pushed him right out! He was born at 5:41 am. He was perfect.

I started having after pains pretty quickly but waited 30 minutes to be sure it was fully detached before I birthed the placenta. I knew I had a succenturiate lobe placenta (and extra lobe) and there can be a risk of retaining the extra lobe. It all came out perfect too. Then we got out of the tub. He nursed at about 1 hour old. We had considered doing a partial lotus birth and leave the placenta attached for about 24 hours or until the cord had dried enough that there was no need to tie it off. His cord was so short though, I decided to go ahead and tie it off and cut it. Summer did the honors. His stump fell off at 3 days old. We weighed him at some point, 6lbs 1.5oz.

For Part Three - Everett's 1st week click here