Zoe's Birth Story

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*****

Zoe Mikhala
June 1, 2001
3:43 a.m.
5lbs
18 inches long


I had a prenatal appointment scheduled for June 1 at our new house, where all the midwives would practice getting here, and we would go over our last minute plans of how we wanted the birth to go. On the morning of May 31, Michael said upon leaving the house, "Today would be a good day, it's Thursday, you know." We'd been joking for a few weeks that she needed to be accommodating and be born on a Thursday (he has Fridays off) so that he could take the entire following week and not have to go back to work until the next week. I laughed and said, "No way, she has to wait until June now, today is my sister's birthday, I don't want her to have to share!"

Instead of sleeping in, I decided to get up and get started on the things on "the list" that needed to be done around the house. Admittedly, it's an ever-shortening list, which is a relief, but after breakfast I started not feeling so well, having to run to the bathroom every half an hour or so. After about the third time, it suddenly occurred to me that this was probably a good sign that labor was going to begin at some point, maybe not today, but soon. Either that, or the thai food we'd eaten the night before hadn't agreed with me!

I hung around the house, kind of anxiously anticipating something, almost as if I could feel it in the air. Sure enough, contractions started that afternoon. Nothing major, a little bigger and more intense than the Braxton-Hicks I'd been experiencing, in fact they were so far apart and weren't so bad that I wasn't sure they were "real" contractions at all. The hardest part was not knowing for sure!

I picked the kids up in the afternoon from school, and noticed that I was having a hard time concentrating on what they were saying if I was having a contraction. Hmm... that was a good sign. Maybe these were "real" then! I tidied up when I got home, got a few last minute things together for the birth (just in case I'm really in labor, I told myself!) and started preparing dinner. Contractions weren't really close together, anywhere from five minutes, to eight minutes, and sometimes fifteen minutes apart. No real pattern.

Michael called at five, and I told him, "Well, you may be a daddy today." Even though I told him not to, he canceled his last client and came right home. I was afraid that it wasn't really labor, and I didn't want to disappoint him if it wasn't really it! I had contractions through dinner, through clean-up, through kids' baths and bedtimes, but again, they were anywhere from five to eight minutes apart, and while they were uncomfortable, I still doubted if I was really in labor.

Finally, I called the midwife around 8:30 p.m., just to give them a heads up. I didn't want to have to wake anyone up in the middle of the night if I didn't have to. I gave her all the information, and she told me that she would call all of the other midwives, and told me to sleep if I could, and if they got worse or changed, to call her back.

Michael and I decided that distraction was a good idea, because both of us were too excited and anxious to sleep, so we played Yahtzee until 11:30 p.m. or so. We went to bed, and I curled up with Michael and the contractions started spacing themselves out. Ten minutes apart. Then fifteen. I was sleeping between them, but then I'd have a contraction and it would wake me up and I would grab Michael's hand, which would wake him up, and he'd breathe through the contraction with me until it was over and I fell asleep again. It was a good system, and I think the sleep did me good. It did us both good.

At 12:30 a.m., interestingly just as it was becoming June, my contractions started picking up. They became stronger, and started waking me up every five minutes. In fact, I wasn't so much sleeping between them as I was zoning out. At 1:00 a.m., Michael gently suggested we call the midwives. I hesitated. I was still doubting that this was "it"! Maybe they would space out again between, like they had before, how did I know?

At 1:15 a.m., Michael was suggesting it more strongly, and after my next contraction, when I sat up and had to arch my back to keep the pressure off my lower back through it, I decided that it might be a good idea. He called them while I was in the bathroom, and I when I came out he said they were on their way. As soon as I knew that, I was somehow able to relax some more, which made the contractions seem a little more bearable. Of course, that made me think that maybe this wasn't really "it" and they would slow down or stop when they showed up! My fear was of being the little boy who cried wolf (or the woman who cried labor) but in the next forty-five minutes before they arrived, the contractions were coming regularly and were fairly intense, and I became pretty sure (finally!) that this baby was going to be born on June 1.

The midwives arrived at about 2:15 a.m, and of course wanted to check my progress, but I didn't want to move. Things were starting to pick up and it was becoming uncomfortable. I did anyway, of course, and she checked me both before a contraction (about 4 cm) and during a contraction (which hurt beyond belief, but I was 5-6 cm during) and after that, contractions seemed even closer together and were getting to an intensity I could barely remember from my other two births. Michael was having a hard time getting me to focus, and both of the midwives were giving pretty good directions (keep my voice low, relax my forehead, breathe, etc) and I tried hard to listen and follow their instructions, but things were getting fuzzy.

I have no idea how much time passed, but the pain went from "Wow, this really hurts" to "Oh my god, I'm going to die" so quickly that I didn't even have a chance to breathe. The midwives were still telling me to breathe through them, Michael was having me focus on his face, look into his eyes and breathe with him, and while everyone around me was saying how good I was doing, I felt like I was falling apart. Not only was I in pain, but suddenly I was really afraid. They had checked me at what felt like minutes ago, and I was only at 4, so these contractions couldn't possibly be as intense as they felt like they were, and I must just be acting like a baby. My fear (and of course I was doing the labor math in my head: this kind of intensity at 4 cm, times 1 cm per hour, that means at least 6 more hours like this?!) was that I couldn't possibly handle this much longer.

Then my water broke. I'd never felt that before. With both of my other births, my membranes had been artificially ruptured. I remembered the feeling, but this was different. This was pressure that broke the bag, and I said, "You guys, I think my water just broke" and oh my god, I remember contractions getting more intense after that in my previous births, but this was beyond anything I'd ever experienced. It felt as if the baby was coming, and not just coming, but coming right now!

I saw the midwives' faces, and the first question out of my mouth was, "Is there meconium?" She said, "Yes," and my heart sank. "A lot?" I asked. "A good amount," she said. They were setting up suction equipment, and I thought, well this is the thing, then. This is the thing that had to go wrong. Then, I couldn't think anything anymore. It all happened too fast. She decided to see how far along I was then, and she said, "Oh, you're a stretchy 7." Close to transition, then. I felt like I was dying.

The baby's head was now so low in my pelvis, I was starting to have the urge to push, but knew if I said anything they would tell me to breathe through it. I was afraid I couldn't do it anymore. Then they couldn't find heart tones. They were using the Doppler, but no matter where they put it, they couldn't find her. Finally, they heard something faintly, and thought that maybe the uterus was tipped too far back, so they wanted me on my hands and knees so that the uterus would tip forward and they could check it from underneath.

I was saying, "No, no" when she suggested it, but she was firm, and Michael helped flip me over I was amazed how good it felt to be on my hands and knees. The baby was low, really really low, but I was in so much pain that all I could do was grunt and moan. I had two contractions like that, while they were frantically checking for heart tones from underneath, and could feel myself starting to push through them, unable to stop.

The midwife had me flip back over and that's when I gasped and said, "The baby is right there!" She said, "Ok, I believe you," reaching for a glove, and suddenly I felt the familiar stretch and burn of the baby crowning. She was shocked and said, "There's a head!" Both Michael and I reached down to feel her head, wet and full of hair. They checked for a cord, and suctioned her there on the perineum because of the meconium.

As soon as her head was out, I was lucid again. One more little push and she was up on my belly. They suctioned her again, making sure to get any meconium out of her lungs. She was pale at first, but began to cry and pink up. She was born at 3:43 a.m.

I was shocked at how tiny she was! She was the smallest baby I'd ever seen, aside from a preemie. After the initial worry about her breathing (which was fine and clear from that point on), we slowly got to know her as I kept her warm on my belly and the midwives did what they needed to do, checking her, checking me, having me push to deliver the placenta (within about fifteen minutes after she was born). Blake, whose room is right across the hall, woke up when she began to cry. He came into our room, and I told him to go get Autumn. I was sorry they missed it, but we all nearly missed it, it went so quickly at the end! They were thrilled to see the baby, and crowded around to say hello to her.

She's a perfect little peanut, and looks just like Michael when he was a baby. I cleaned up while Michael held her, and then we settled back into bed and napped and snuggled for a half an hour or so while the midwives cleaned up and made some calls. They wanted her checked out by a doctor as soon as possible (which was standard practice for them anyway, but because of the meconium and because of her size, they were insistent that it be right away) so they made an appointment for us, and one of the midwives said she'd go with us.

Blake had gone back to bed, and Autumn was out helping the midwives prepare things. She was the biggest help to them, and is an even bigger help to me now. After the doctor checked her out and gave her a clean bill of health, I think we all relaxed a little bit. She weighed in at all of 5 pounds 3 ounces, which is slightly smaller than the minimum average (which is about 5 and a half pounds) and was 18 and a half inches long. Her head circumference was 12 and 3/4, which is on the small side and is probably why I had no second stage of labor. I didn't have to push her out, she just kind of slid right down the birth canal and into the world!

Her size is a mystery. The doctor said it could have been my blood pressure, which was borderline at the end, that may have effected placental function, and she may have been meant to be a small baby regardless. The good news is that she's healthy, and is nursing like a pro and hasn't left my arms (or someone's who loves her) since she was born.

I shudder to think what may have happened if we had delivered in a hospital. The meconium alone would have had her in the nursery for "observation" for 12 hours or so. Her size would have probably had her in the NICU, just as a precaution. It certainly could have been warranted. There are a lot of babies who are small who have a hard time holding their temperatures, who have hard times breathing. I was so grateful to be at home, with people who knew what to look for, who were willing to watch her and wait. She passed every test, and handled it all on her own, and they were satisfied with that and so was I. It was a relief and a blessing.

I can't tell you what a healing experience it was to have a baby in my own bed. In spite of the pain (which was much more intense, not only than I remember, but than I'd experienced before) and my fears of falling apart, which I would have had in or out of a hospital I imagine, I was able to have a positive birth experience, when I'm nearly 100% sure that it would have been a snowball of interventions in a medical setting that probably would have traumatized me, the baby, and my husband. I felt confident that although there were things we had to take seriously and pay attention to, the midwives would respect the normal process, and trust in my body and the baby's, and they did. It was a gift, a blessing, and a truly amazing experience for all of us.

Dmitri's Birth Story

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*****

Dmitrios Aleksandr
July 31, 2002
1:19 p.m.
9 lbs 6 oz
20 inches long
14 inch head & 15 inch chest

Our birth story:

All last night I dreamed I was having contractions. I would wake, and feel my uterus just beginning to let go of gripping me, and fall back asleep to dream of those waves again, going under and coming back up. I don’t think I woke to every contraction… just the “bigger” ones. But by 5 a.m. on July 31st, I was awake and pretty sure that going back to sleep wasn’t going to be an option! Michael woke and asked if I was having contractions and I reluctantly admitted that I was. We talked and cuddled a little while. I was feeling apprehensive about starting this process. I knew it was going to hurt and I knew it was going to be hard. I’d experienced labor just a little over a year ago with our daughter, Zoe, and here I was facing the journey again. I was also afraid of back labor, something I’d heard about and had supported other women through as a doula, but had never experienced myself. The baby was still posterior (and still kicking me up high during contractions between my ribs!) I didn’t want a long, drawn out labor. Could I really do this? Michael held me for a while and helped me get centered. He made a lot of sense when he said that it was better to get into a good mindset now, even if it wasn’t the “real thing.” That was always my fear, being the “woman who cried labor.” I didn’t want to alert anyone too early. Zoe, our 1-year-old, woke up around 6:30 a.m, and when I tried to roll over onto my right side, the pain was much more intense and sharp, so I decided to get up and take a bath. Water always felt so good for me during early labor. I spent an hour or so there, submerged as I could get, with a candle lit, breathing, breathing, feeling my belly rise with each contraction. I practiced the “breath awarness” that I’d learned from Birthing Within. I didn’t anticipate the next contraction, I simply noticed by breath during contractions and floated between. I wasn’t aware of time passing, but things were getting more intense. Oh yeah, I remembered what this felt like. This was definitely the real thing. I gave Michael some time to get Zoe settled back to sleep and told him to start calling everyone. “So it’s pretty imminent, huh?” he asked from outside the bathroom door. I smiled. “We’re having a baby today,” I replied.

By 8 a.m. I was out of the tub, feeling clean and good, and still having contractions. Our doula (one of them) showed up, and was very helpful feeding me, getting me to drink, having me up to use the bathroom. Her hands were fantastic, her words encouraging. She reminded me of the baby all of the time, something I always forget during my births as the sensations take me over, and I would focus on him, imagining his descent, his journey parallel with my own. I was on my left side for a long time (strangely, my right side, especially just above my pelvis, hurt a LOT, and we didn’t know why at the time. Speculation was that it could have been an arm or hand pressing there, but we couldn’t feel anything when we massaged, and later it was just too tender to touch) curled up against Michael with a pillow between my legs, and my doula curled up behind me, both of them stroking me, talking to me, reminding me to take them just one…. at…. a…. time…. I didn’t feel out of control, although I felt things starting to intensify over time. It was here that all of the breath awareness that I’d learned from Birthing From Within really helped. Staying present, grounded, centered, in the moment. There was no time, nothing else existed but these waves, rising and falling in my belly.

Another of our doulas suggested a bathroom break, and a hot water bottle on my back. My midwives arrived and the baby sounded wonderful, my blood pressure was good, and they didn’t need to do a vaginal exam. (I had requested minimal exams, if any, and didn’t want to know how far dilated I was because it has too much of a psychological effect on me. I start doing labor-math, figuring out how much longer I might be at this, and things seem to just fall apart!) They helped me labor, too, and the words “sink into it… good… relax your shoulders… perfect… you are sooo strong…” still echo in my head. They were incredibly encouraging, buoying me up wave after wave.I could hear Zoe in the other room, which was a distraction… my baby wanted her mommy! I had to remind myself that I needed to stay focused on my belly-baby. Thankfully, my mom soon arrived to keep an eye on her and my father also showed up! I was surprised when heard his voice. It gave me a moment’s pause but then I sank back into labor. At that point, Santa Claus could have arrived and I wouldn’t have cared! I was pretty lost in laborland by then, and getting excellent rest between contractions. I actually fell asleep after some of them, as did Michael. He would wake when I grabbed his hand or shirt and I started that deep, deep cleansing first breath. By this time, the room had been cleared of most people except our midwives now and then, and Michael and I labored together, moaned together. A few times, I couldn’t bear to be in bed anymore and would get up and labor standing, which hurt more, ohhhh wow did it hurt more, but I could feel the baby start moving down and down. The pressure was getting intense. I would hold our footboard and rock, rock, rock my hips lower and lower and was nearly squatting by the time each contraction peaked and then I would rock my way back up again and lean over the footboard and rest until the next wave. When I couldn’t stand the pressure any longer, I’d crawl back into bed again.

People came in and out, with quiet suggestions, encouraging words, soft hands. Our photographer snapped labor pictures from the corner. I was really just lost. It hurt a lot during contractions, I could feel my head spinning sometimes, and I would moan low and loud. A few times I could hear Zoe in the other room imitating me! That made me smile, even during contractions. But I didn’t feel panic or fear, which I was grateful for, and I didn’t experience back labor, just that strange pain in my lower belly that no one could account for which made leaning forward for hands and knees positions unbearable, along with that feeling of my body and cervix opening wider, wider, widest, as the baby moved down and down and down.

The midwives did check me once per my request but I didn’t want to know the “number.” I wanted her to feel for the sutures and see if baby was still posterior. She said my cervix was “like butter,” nice and open, baby was very, very low and either LOP or ROA. I found out later that at the time I was 7-8 cm (Michael couldn’t resist asking after he was born!) but I was still taking them just one at a time. The hands and knees suggestion came up again, and I said I’d try it. It worked for two contractions, although “worked” is relative, because the pain it caused was so incredibly intense. I suddenly felt like pushing and couldn’t help bearing down a little… POP! My water broke, not a huge gush, because baby’s head was so low. And getting lower every minute! That feeling of fullness and stretching began. I rolled over to my side.

Suddenly the room was a flurry of activity. I said, “Check me, I want to make sure its ok to push!” The midwife grabbed a glove but before she could reach in, I was pushing HARD. There was no way I could stop it. It would have been like stopping a freight train by holding your hand against it! She said, “Ok, baby’s head is right here.” But I knew that already. He was there all right. I called for the kids to come in, and the room flooded with people. He felt so BIG as I pushed, and with that push he was right on my perineum. Then came the burning sensation. I was saying, “It burns, it burns!” and they said, “Breathe through it,” His head felt huge, and I could actually feel bone against bone as he moved under and out. Someone showed me in a mirror, and I felt his wet, slippery scalp with my hand. My baby!! Pushing his head out was harder than any of my other births had been, and when his hand came out next to his face we knew why, and there was a good explanation for that strange pain on my lower right-hand side, probably his elbow digging in there! His head was out, but still there was that feeling of incredible fullness and I pushed again, and felt every part of him as he slipped out of me. What a relief! I pulled him up to my chest, and actually laughed. He seemed enormous to me, covered in vernix and starting to cry. He looked like a little sumo wrestler!

There were a few minutes when the midwives worried about bleeding and gave me some herbal remedies. Bleeding slowed, thankfully, and the placenta delivered in half an hour. That, too, seemed enormous to me. Michael said a blessing and cut the baby’s cord with his knife after it stopped pulsing, and then we cut off the twine bracelets we’d braided and had been wearing since my Blessingway ceremony. My perineum stung a bit, but no real tears, just a “skid mark.” Baby nursed within 15 minutes, perfect latch, and didn’t stop for an hour, when we got up to take our herbal bath. That was incredible, looking at him over my deflated belly, floating supported by my hands, submerged in water except for his eyes, nose and mouth. His eyes were wide open and curious. I fell in love.

After the newborn exam, (9lbs 6 oz, almost twice the size of my last baby!) slowly, people said goodbye and left. By 4:30 p.m., we were cuddled in bed together becoming a family of six. Autumn and Blake clamored to hold him. Zoe wanted mommy and I cuddled her and introduced her to the new baby. As I write this, he is nursing vigorously and is a little over 8 hours old. I can’t believe he’s here, that I’m not pregnant anymore, that all those months of waiting, planning, wondering, are over. What a journey it’s been… what an incredible journey we are about to begin.

Insomnia

I can sleep through a nuclear explosion. The only time in my life I've slept lightly was right after I had my babies, and that was only when they were sleeping right next to me. Then, I seemed strangely connected to them. I'd wake up and look at the clock and note the time: 2:12 a.m., and think, "What am I doing awake!?" and then the baby would stir. Not cry... just stir a little. Hungry, ready to nurse. Nature is amazing.

But now that I'm old (shut up, thirty-seven happens to feel very old lately, okay?) and don't have little hungry babies to wake up for, I sleep like a rock. The problem is, when I do wake up, I'm UP. I even fight having to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night because I know once I get out of bed, I won't be able to get back to sleep. If something manages to wake me up and I actually have to get out of bed, I know I'm in trouble. I won't be able to get back to sleep, usually for at least an hour, maybe more.

It's funny because, as a doula, when I was doing births, I could sleep anywhere, almost instantly, and I could fall back asleep within minutes if I was awakened for some reason. When you have a job that requires you to be wide awake at two in the morning at the ring of the phone, it was quite a boon to be able to sleep whenever, wherever, however.

However, with one exception (a lovely home birth just before we moved here) I haven't done a birth in a year. I got quite burned out after doing six births in a month and decided to take a break. The break turned into a BREAK. Now, just I don't know. As much as I love doing births, that's about as much as I hate being on-call. And my family hates it even more.

But lately I've had time to wonder what this waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to go back to sleep is all about, because Dmitri's been going through a 'bout of nightmares, and I inevitably end up awake, tossing and turning and unable to go back to sleep long after he's snoozing in flying-dinosaur-monster dreamland again.

I guess this waking up and not being able to get back to sleep is called "late waking insomnia" or some such thing. I call it damned annoying. But I'm beginning to wonder if maybe it isn't related to my not doing births anymore? Maybe my ability to sleep was part of being a doula, knowing I had to get as much sleep as I could, as fast as possible, because I might be up for the next 24 hours at a birth?

Whatever the reason, whether it's age or job-related or something else entirely--I really wish it would go away. Sleep is one of my greatest pleasures in life. I hate not being able to sleep.