Joshua Caleb

The night before I had Caleb, I had asked my husband if we could go out to eat at least one more time due to the fact I knew we wouldn’t be able to for a few weeks after the delivery. I was 8 days overdue at that point and very frustrated, so a night out was exciting. We went to the Olive Garden and had a great meal, then went home and went to bed around 9. Around 2am, I woke up with an upset stomach. I went to the bathroom to find out I had to go diarrhea which actually made me very excited since I knew that could be a sign of labor coming soon. I then noticed a bloody show when I wiped, so I thought that might be my mucus plug. After I went to the bathroom, I realized I was having contractions that were more consistent. I decided to stay up a little bit to time them, being so excited since I had been having them for the past 3 months…now they were finally consistent! They were between 8 – 10 minutes apart till about 3am. Not painful at all, just consistent enough to notice them. I decided around 3:30 to call my midwife Allison to let her know to expect a baby sometime that day. She told me to drink a beer and try to go back to sleep (I had been craving it so bad throughout the whole pregnancy – so I was pretty excited about that! ). Well, I drank about half a beer, went back to bed, but had the thought to put a towel underneath me in case my water broke in bed. Well lucky me, about 5 minutes after I laid down, I felt a gush of water. I got out of bed and went to the bathroom to find the mucus plug in the toilet. I woke up my husband to let him know I was in labor and decided to lay back down. The contractions then began to get more intense as I was laying down to where I couldn’t talk during them. I asked my husband to begin timing them and they were beginning to be between 2 – 3 minutes apart. It was too painful to be lying down, so we decided to get up and walk / clean the house. I called my mother to let her know she needed to make her way over and asked her to bring some rice so I could make so hot / cold pack in socks. Which unfortunately I never had the chance to use. I then called Allison to let her know I was now 2 – 3 minutes apart. Later she said when she talked to me then, she knew I was pretty far along based on my voice & breathing. That thought never came to me. After walking around my living room for 30 minutes or so, I decided it was time to get in the hot tub. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as hot as I would have preferred, but it was nice to get in. It was then around 5am and our 6 year old Ireland woke up. I had wanted her to be in the room when he was delivered so she came and layed on my bed. We then called our friend Cathy to let her know Ireland was up as she was going to take care of Ireland when she got bored or scared. She was on her way and my mom then arrived. Once I got into the water, I kept waiting for a break between the contractions. I never got one, they were one after the other. After watching me through two contractions and crying through each one, Ireland decided it was too hard to watch her mommy be in pain…so my mother took her out and they watched a movie in the living room. After being in the tub for about 5 minutes, I began to shake all over. I started to wonder if I was in transition – then I began to feel nauseous and I knew then I was in transition. My sweet husband ran to me and brought me something to throw up in. That was something I was really dreading – I hate throwing up! But it really wasn’t bad at all – it actually helped the pain for a minute I think. Once I was done, he ran outside to dump it in the yard. I was wondering why he didn’t just put it in the toilet, but he was so nervous he wasn’t really thinking straight. As he was outside, Allison & Jasmine pulled up. Throughout all of this, I never really noticed when he was gone or when people came in the room. I was in my own world of pain, trying not to concentrate on the pain, but that was really hard. I remembered Allison saying when she was in labor she would groan in a very deep voice and that helped the pain. I decided to try it. It really did help – I’m not sure about the pain really going away, but it helped me manage it and not freak out. About 10 or 20 minutes (I think) after the girls arrived my body suddenly started to push. It was such a strange feeling – as if my body had taken control of the situation. Once that happened, I began to purposely push. Jasmine & Allison encouraged me and it felt great! I wasn’t feeling the painful contractions anymore, I was just pushing away! What was so cool was that they never did an internal exam (which I hate – and think it is painful!) nor did they ever tell me when to push. My body knew when it was ready to deliver Caleb and when to push – I just had to trust my body. They also never told me what position to get into so I was able to listen to my body and move to whatever position seemed most natural. I changed positions about 2-3 times before he came out. One of the girls told me at one point that I would be able to feel him inside – so I put my hand up there and felt his soft head & hair. I remember saying that he was so far up there! I just couldn’t imagine how he was going to come out!! Once he began to crown though, I started to feel major pain and pressure on my perineum. I kept saying it felt like he was coming out of my butt! Kind of funny now.  I started to feel the ring of fire that I had been so dreading to feel and began to wimp out on pushing him out. I really started to freak out at this point as I felt like I was going to be ripped in two. Allison reminded me that the Lord did not give me a spirit of fear, but of power and of sound mind. That really helped me come back to where I needed to be. I would begin to feel the sting through the push and give up. Jasmine told me to push through the pain because if I didn’t, I’d have to feel it again each time he went back up. Once she told me that, I knew I wanted it to be over with so I pushed through the sting and his head came out. I was able to feel inside of me to feel his head as he was coming and it was so awesome. At one point I actually tried to open myself up wider with my hands, but that didn’t work! I was expecting him to slide out once his head came out, but he didn’t! Jasmine told me to lean forward and push once more and then his body came out. She handed him right to me and that is when I felt his genitals. At first I thought he was a girl, but then I got a better feel and realized I had my first son! Everyone was in shock with how big he was – especially me! We were expecting an 8 pounder at the most! It took longer than they would like for him to start breathing, so they got the mask and pumped some oxygen. He was very blue when he came out but very beautiful! He pinked up quickly once the umbilical cord was cut and handed to daddy. Allison asked Mark to take off his shirt (which he says because he is so studly!) so that he could hold and warm up his son. They got me out of the tub and into my bed to deliver the placenta. As they were checking me out, they informed me that I didn’t not tear at all! Hallelujah! I had torn with my daughter (7lb) and I hated that recovery! I really believe that I didn’t tear because 1. I was not laying down in a unnatural position 2. I pushed when my body told me to, not when a doctor told me to 3. I took my time pushing (even though it was from fear) and it stretched my perineum better. About 20 minutes after Caleb was born I decided to take a shower, which was fabulous. Then we all, caleb me and mark layed in bed together to take a early morning nap. Caleb was born at 6:14 am after 20 minutes of pushing and 3 hours of intense labor. I said that I would never ever do that again an hour after he was born, but 2 days later I decided it wasn’t that bad and we could do it again in a year or so. I would highly recommend a home birth to anyone that is able to. It was so comforting to be in my own setting, in my own bed with my son and husband. They never took him away from me. Caleb is now a healthy 6 week old baby with a very loving happy big sister. We are all so happy and blessed to have been able to experience this. I actually feel like I have been through child birth now compared to when I had my daughter in the hospital with an epidural. Even though her birth was great – looking back, it seemed more like a medical procedure was done, rather than birth. I don’t know if that makes sense to anyone else but me. It was also so nice to be able to have all the people that surrounded me during the birth – Mark, Allison, Jasmine to be people that I love and have relationships with. Not just someone’s “patient” that I’ll probably never see again. That was really awesome!