Birth Story of Baby Boy!
Birth Story of Baby boy
Preparation for 9 Month:
·
Personal Trainer twice
per week
·
Bootcamp 3 times per
week
·
Running
·
Yoga (prenatal)
·
Pilates for flexibility
·
Hypno-Birthing classes
·
Birthing Prepatory
Course by the Midwife
·
Eating healthy
June 19th
I
woke up at 11:30PM on June 18th to go to the bathroom (#2). This was unusual for me as I usually do this
in the morning. Within the next 30
Minutes I had to go to the bathroom often.
I had a lot of mucus come out; that could only be my mucus plug coming
out and then my water broke. After that I tried to go back to bed and sleep but
couldn’t anymore. So I walked around
and tried to relax. At around 1:15AM I
decided to wake up () and we started keeping track of my contractions at
1:39AM. They started out at three minutes apart, lasting 45 Seconds to one
minute and then progressed to between two to three minutes apart by
2:15AM. Quickly Rich and I decided that
I should take a bath and sit out the contractions in warm water, which felt
much better. After about an hour of
counting contractions () decided it was time to call our Midwife (Gelena
Hinkley), our Doula (), and wake up my mom who was staying at our house. After that the contractions came even
quicker and were only about two minutes apart.
During this time () wanted to print out sweet, encouraging words from
our friends but I did not want him to leave me, as he was very helpful with all
the contractions. I would just hold on to him and he would press on my
back. Between contradictions, he
hurriedly printed the words. Then, he
wanted to show them to me, but I was having contractions too regularly for me
to look at them.
We
waited for what felt like hours for Gelena to come. At one point, I told () that I could not handle this pain for 20
hours and that we might have to go to the hospital. He said if I wanted to go, we would go. I decided to wait a little long, and just then Gelena arrived at
our house. It was 3:28AM. After Gelena arrived Mom went next door to
get (), who was sleeping at our neighbor’s guest house.
Once
Gelena showed up she quickly checked me.
She was surprised I was already dilated 9 cm and had started pushing
already. (My body had two pushing urges before she came and
one right when she arrived.) She told
me that it would last only one or two more hours to push little boy out. My mom asked her if she could set up her
birthing tub as it is more comfortable than the bathtub in our bathroom, and
she replied, “I don’t have time to set it up.
This baby is coming now.” Gelena
helped me with the pushing urges by reminding me to breathe in-between
contractions. () helped me by holding
me and pressing on my back. The pushing
urges really felt like pushing out a big #2.
Slowly his head moved further and further down. Soon I could feel the top of boy’s head with
my hand. During one very strong urge to
push I lifted my behind out of the water and Gelena made it pretty clear to me
that I needed to choose to either be in the water or out; I couldn’t have it
both ways. Eventually the crown of his
head (with lots of hair) was out. I
remember this felt like a burning sensation.
Gelena told me that I now need to push his full head out. That took one
other large push. She then quickly
checked his neck for the cord; when she felt that everything was fine she told
me to push the body out as well.
Getting the body out was very easy after the head was out and I think it
only took one or maybe two more pushes.
As
soon as boy’s body came out at 4:27 AM (() kept track of the exact time) Gelena
lifted him out of the water and onto my stomach. That happened really fast and
he cried immediately. Our baby was
completely healthy and I was totally exhausted but extremely happy. () told me later that he didn’t think he
could fall in love with a little creature so fast, but he instantly fell in
love with boy. Little boy rested on my
stomach (his cord wasn’t long enough to make it to my chest) and we stayed in
the water for another few minutes. As
the water was a bit dirty, my mom suggested that we should come out of the
bath, so Gelena, her assistant Sandy (who came to our house about three Minutes
after he was born), and () helped me out of the water. I then laid down right in front of our
bath-tub on some cushions. Little boy
still on my stomach, we waited for the placenta to come out. While we were
waiting all females took some of the Vernix from boy’s skin and put it under
our eyes as the perfect eye cream (a trick Gelena taught us). In fact, on the
pictures you can see me with the Vernix underneath my eyes.
The
contractions to get the placenta out weren’t very intense and it was a very
interesting and relieving feeling when the placenta came out. Before the placenta came out Gelena
suggested to cut the cord as it stopped pulsating after 10 Minutes or so. Sandy prepared everything and () cut the
cord. Then, I could bring boy up to my
chest. While waiting for the placenta
to come out I could definitely feel a strong burning sensation (must have been
due to some ripping of my skin) and some contractions as my uterus was getting
smaller. Finally, the placenta came out at 4:55 AM (() again keeping
track). It took about 25 Minutes. Sandy used the blood in the placenta to
collect little boy’s stem cells. Once
that was all done, everyone helped me into our bedroom and bed. Little boy then was again back on my
chest. Gelena and Sandy inspected my
private parts. Apparently I ripped in two places; not too badly, but it did
require stitches. Gelena and Sandy
spent about one hour stitching me up while I was holding boy and () was reading
the encouraging words from our friends.
This was a very nice family bonding time,
and it did distract me from the discomfort of the stitching. Gelena tried hard
to be gentle but I could feel some of them.
() (our Doula) did arrive at our house until 30 minutes after little boy
was born. (Everyone thought our birth would take a bit longer
than it actually did. J) () and Sandy
gave me breastfeeding advice and little boy was feeding just a few hours after
birth. Gelena wanted me to eat and
drink a lot after the birth since I lost quite a bit of blood and had a bit of
a temperature. She gave me coconut
water, tea with honey, and a fruit and a protein smoothie (which included a
piece of my raw placenta). All of this helped me recover and feel better. At around 9:30 AM Gelena, Sandy and () left
our family to do more bonding. They
each received a large bag of Swiss chocolate before leaving. (I believe all of them enjoyed some of it on
their drive home. J)
Both
() and I are so happy that we chose to go the home birth route. We would highly recommend a home birth to
any of our friends that are having a healthy pregnancy.
So
that is the story of what truly was the most amazing days in our lives so
far.
Post
Story
My
milk came in on June 21 in the late afternoon.
That was a rather painful experience and also came with a hormonal
imbalance.. Gelena then brought over the placenta pills on June 23, and they
definitely helped. I stopped
randomly crying by June 22.
As for boy, three days after birth he was seven
pounds two ounces (six ounces lighter than his birth weight). He was back up to his birth weight by six
days after his birth. We measured his
length on June 30 and he was already 21 inches. www.p3birth.com
Wonderful story. I hope those who read it will find joy and hope in their own births. The pic says it all. :) Thank you for sharing.
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