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| Ezra's Birth |
I woke up around 12: 35 in the morning on Wednesday with a gush of amniotic fluid flowing onto the bed. I had been dreaming about that very thing just before I woke up, so at first I was convinced that I was still dreaming for a moment. I woke Barry, and he got my mom up as I called the midwife. At first I contemplated going back to sleep, but the immediate onset of some rather significant contractions told me to do otherwise. The midwives were still at the birthing center with another woman who was being transferred to the hospital, so they asked me to come in to do a few tests and make sure that I was indeed in labor before they lugged all of their equipment over to our house.
By the time I made it into the clinic, I was 3 cm and had not, as many women who think that their water has broken have done, peed in the bed. Lucky me! They sent me home to labor and Barry to start working on the pool. While we were gone, my mom had done a little bit of housecleaning to prepare for our guests. As the contractions began to speed up and intensify, I ate toast and fruit, and Barry tried to comfort Arlo, who had woken up with all of the noises and business going on in the house.
Around 2 or 2:30 the midwives arrived and finished working on the pool, which Barry hadn't gotten to because Arlo needed his Daddy. However, thank goodness that Arlo fell back to sleep for the rest of the night not long after the midwives arrived.
By 3, I think, they did a final cervical check before I could get into the pool. 6 cm! The water was like a natural epidural for the first few minutes, and I thought, "Oh no. Labor is stalling." No, it was just waiting in the wings for its big entrance. After about 5 minutes or so, it came roaring back to life. There was perhaps a minute or less between contractions, and I could barely catch my breath. Barry was a champ and got into the tub with me; he pressed my hips together with all of his might throughout the duration of each and every contraction. My mom held my hands or pressed on my shoulders. All of the counter-pressure helped me to focus my energies and concentrate on the progression of each contraction...sorry to be hackneyed here, but it was like moving through a wave of pain. I tried to move up to the crest, right up to that peak near-breaking-point of pain, and then smoothly come down without tumbling...without losing my ability to go back up again. So hard. At the very edge of the pain, I would grip the side of the tub, and try to do the opposite of what the pain said to do; instead of screeching, I would push out the air low and deep. Sometimes the playlist we had going would reach my ears, and I would shake my head to the music or even sing along. At one point Joanna Newsom came on, and I started crying, "No, not her! Not her!" Normally, I'm a big fan, but her tinny affectations didn't gel with labor.
After about an hour of this, I began to insist that, and I'm sorry to be scatological here, I had to poop. For those of you who are in the know, this is a classic sign that a woman is nearing the pushing phase. As someone who chose home birth, I have a strong lay knowledge of the birth process; however, all my smarts went out the window while I was in the midst of said process myself. Nope. I wasn't pushing...I had to poop, damnit! So, I sat down on the toilet (actually a great place to get the baby down and into position) and tried desperately to "poop." The midwives tried to convince me that I was in fact pushing, and at one point I actually cried out, "You don't know what you're talking about!" (Sorry about that Lindsey.) Of course, they did indeed know what they were talking about, and they eventually convinced me to get off the toilet and walk back to the pool.
I barely made it. At one point, I involuntarily had to squat down and push while the midwife practically dove underneath me to catch the baby. He wasn't quite there yet, so I continued walking down the hall to the pool. Getting in was a bit of a struggle, and I complained, but everyone managed to help me in, and the warm water helped to ease the pain a bit.
Then I truly began to push. I think perhaps I had 5, maybe 6, pushes before his head emerged. At one point, the midwives encouraged me to reach down and feel his head. That brought me out a slight torpor that had started to fall over me. His head. Right there. Almost out. It didn't feel like anything all that special, but it was there. I began to push harder and harder. Barry sat behind me and helped me to hold my legs.
And there it was. Th
at awe-ful, impossible, wildly understatedly named "rim of fire." His head. I had to stop. I had to breathe, and then one push and several screams later (my throat hurt for a day or two afterward), Ezra was on my chest. He was blue, and he had a loose knot in his cord (no worries...the pulsations were just fine), and he had some mucous in his throat, but he was beautiful and tiny and lovely and mine and Barry's.Arlo awoke about an hour later, as I was still being attended to, and he was able to meet his little brother. The baby cried, and he said, "Baby ouchy? Awww...baby...no cry." Love.
And that was it. Right now, Ezra is laying across my lap, mewing like a kitten because he is about ready to nurse again. And we have a complete little family.
