She’s here! She’s here!  Our beautiful Charlotte Reece was born January 2 at 2:21 pm weighing 7lbs 15oz and 20 inches long.  Based on how big my belly was, I was sure she was at least an 8lb baby, but she was just right!  Our sweet Norah is down for a nap and Charlie is snuggled up asleep as well.  As I look at my two beautiful daughters, and am overwhelmed with how blessed Chris and I are. We have joked since we were 20 years old about having two beautiful daughters we were once told Chris would give me, another story for another time, but they are here!!! We are SO in love!

I thought while the girls are sleeping, I could start to write about our home birth experience.  I am not exaggerating when I say it was one of the most incredible experiences of my life!  When Chris and I found out we were expecting baby #2, I knew that a home birth was the way I wanted to go.  I really struggled with Norah’s birth experience.  There were no actual complications, but a really long labor (30 hours) and an experience that was unfortunately fairly common, was full of joy and also trauma. I should share that a hospital is not a place I associate with comfort or care. While they are necessary and I am so grateful we have access to the care we do, I find it very difficult to feel safe or relaxed in that environment.  Any time I would tell the staff what I felt my body was telling me to do, they would tease me and have me do something different.  I won’t get into the trauma of our first birth here, but I walked away from that experience fully believing that if I had a provider who could truly advocate for us and be in an environment where I felt safe, our experience could be different.  And Charlie’s birth proved this big time for me.

I started looking for midwives right away, like the day I found out I was pregnant. Chris wasn’t sold on a home birth at this point but the more we researched and the more I stressed to Chris how badly I wanted a home birth, he decided we should do it.  We met with our midwives and decided home birth was going to happen.  Their values aligned with ours and I felt strongly that this was the way we were to go. The whole experience seeing a midwife vs. a Dr. was so different.  They gave us so much responsibility and ownership in the whole process.  We checked so many of our own vitals and levels, were given nutrition education, pre and post natal education, asked to follow a stricter diet, asked to take different vitamins and nutritional supplements, specific to my needs, and there was such an emphasis placed on our health and creating a healthier lifestyle than we even came close to experiencing with our first experience.   Everything was so natural, warm and comfortable.  All my checkups were done in a big cozy bed and I just felt so taken care of.

There were many times when I would ask my doctor or nurse a question and they wouldn’t have an answer or, after researching, I would discover many of the answers they gave me were inaccurate.  It wasn’t that I was being lied to, I was just being given the only information that they knew, which was not truthful. Our midwives gave us nutrition classes, birthing classes, pre and post-natal classes and the education aspect of this experience was so cool to me.

It wasn’t until about a month before we had Charlie that we decided to do a water birth.  The last 2 months of my pregnancy I had crazy back pain and our midwives thought that the water could provide some nice relief for me.  I’m so glad they suggested we do a water birth!   A few weeks before we were due, the lead midwife was going to be in Haiti and she would need to leave a week before my due date.  We talked about what we  might do and we decided she should go to Haiti and we would naturally encourage labor the day before she left.  At first I struggled with the thought of encouraging labor in any way because I wanted to do things “all natural” and this seemed to contradict this, but everything worked out well. (Coming in to edit this. Several years later, knowing what I know now, I grieve choosing to go about this and would advise if any provider tries to encourage you to be induced early for non medical, non necessary reasons, do not do it. We chose another midwife, the secondary midwife in this birth, for the rest of our deliveries and are so grateful we did so. Neither of us wanted to be placed in this situation and learned much from the experience. Being induced early without good reason or for convenience of the provider puts both the mother and baby in danger.)

Monday morning, December 31st, I was dilated at a 4, 95% effaced and Charlie was at station 0.  The plan was to go again Wednesday night to see how I was doing before Thursday, the morning we would encourage labor, but due to snow we decided we would just see them the next morning.   I could hardly sleep Wednesday night knowing we would meet our sweet Charlie the next day!

So, Thursday morning, Chris and I woke up early and made my labor encouraging milkshake which consisted of castor oil, chocolate ice cream and chocolate syrup.  For those of you who have never eaten castor oil, you’re not missing out on anything.  That stuff is funky.  I had read horror stories about the fun bathroom times that castor oil would give me, but I did not experience this.  I probably would have been sicker just eating at a salad bar:) I had a little bit of this concoction at 6:30, 7:30 and 8:30. Chris started juicing me a bunch of delicious fresh juices to drink during labor and I snacked away on crackers and sprite.

Our midwives arrived at 10am and I felt great.   The ladies came in with all their gear and were all set up by 10:30.   Here’s where the fun begins.

They put the tub in the dining room and set up shop in our bedroom which was so very cool.  Basically our bedroom was turned into a birthing/ recovery room.  I got all nestled in bed and felt so comfortable.  I was dilated to a 9!!! A 9 and I was experiencing 0 pain!!!  An 8 is usually when you hit transition and is considered the most painful/hardest stage of labor, yet I had no discomfort or pain at all?! I was still 95% effaced and Charlie was moving on down!  My water was broken and I started having contractions right away… Man, they were good! I guess I wasn’t expecting things to go so fast, but I didn’t mind.

I labored on the couch for a short while, walked around the house, and just hung out with everyone through the contractions.  We visited like it was any other day.  It was so cool and relaxing.  I was in active labor but I felt so comfortable.  There was no fear, no discomfort, just peace and relaxation.  There were no IV’s, no beeping machines, no chords, no hospital bedding, no unnecessary checks, no hospital smells,  no other patients for my nurses or doctor to tend to, no fall risk bracelets or big red bulky socks. Just our midwives and the people I wanted in that space with me. Our midwives laughed at me a lot and told me that I was the most positive person they had ever seen in labor.  I was just so very excited to be having this experience and so excited to meet our Charlie!

After about 30 minutes, I decided to get into the pool which felt AMAZING!!! I just hung over the side and rested through each contraction.  They were coming on stronger and stronger and lasting longer and longer, but still not super uncomfortable.  One of the big differences I experienced between our experiences with our midwife and Dr.’s and nurses is the way I was taken care of through the whole process.  At home, I was the only person being tended to. There were no other patients, no other agendas, no beds needed, no strangers in and out, and nothing conflicting with our birth. The only goal was to make sureI was cared for and as comfortable as possible while waiting for that beautiful babe to arrive. Rebecca rubbed my back through my contractions in the pool & whispered words of encouragement, while my mom rubbed my arms and played with my hair.  I like to be touched, but even more so during labor.  It’s hard to describe what the water did for my contractions but the ladies told me to ride my contractions out.  I rocked and floated through each contraction and it was like I just melted through them.

I got out of the pool and learned I had a cervical lip. It was adjusted and immediately I was adamant that I needed to use the loo… They knew what was happening but they let me get up and go to the bathroom anyway.  That’s when I realized I didn’t need to use the ladie’s room, just have a baby!  I told them I felt like I needed to squat, so I left the bathroom and came out and squatted on a C stool, an awesome stool used to help you deliver in a squatting position.  I squatted, pushed once and the ladies suggested I hop back in the pool.  Again, the water felt INCREDIBLE! I laid back and the ladies told me to push on my next contraction.  I bared down and there was Charlie’s head! I had no idea she would be here a push later!

While I was pushing, they were putting hot oil compresses that had been soaking in oils in a crockpot on my lady bits and asked me if it hurt anywhere.  They had me push very slowly through my first contractions which made them seem to disappear, like not hurt at all. Chris was by my side, holding my hand and was just so awesome the whole time.  I was anticipating lots of pain and being in the tub for a long time, but I was way wrong. Our midwives ensured that I was comfortable during the whole labor process. Surprisingly, I only felt very little pain and when I told them when and where I was experiencing discomfort, they just supported me so that I wasn’t hurting or stretching in a way that could cause me to hurt or tear.  The infamous “ring of fire” that I had heard so much about was nothing like I had imagined.  Like pretty much nonexistent.

There were also some other things they did to help assist my body,  like instead of administering pitocin to speed up contractions, they maybe suggested Chris twerk my nerps a bit to help produce natural oxytocin. No complaints there:D  Fun and effective:D  One more push and there she was! It was the most incredible feelings!  I felt the most insane rush of adrenaline and a feeling of joy that I can’t even describe! Norah had napped through my whole labor but woke up right as I began pushing.  My mom was holding her across from the pool so they could watch and when Charlie came out of the water, Norah held out her hands and yelled, “MY BABY!” It was SO cool.  I felt like I had just climbed Mt. Everest!

A perfect Apgar score and was, is, absolutely beautiful! After cuddling and nursing in the water for a while, Chris cut the chord and I delivered my placenta which was also very different from my hospital experience.  They took their time and it came out gently and pain free. We headed back to our bedroom to to check on Charlie’s vitals and I snuggled up and got all warm and watched as they weighed and measured our precious new babe.  It was so cozy.  Chris and I just kept smiling at each other and saying how awesome of an experience this was and how thankful we were! There was no stress, no fear, no anxiety, no discomfort…just so much peace and joy.   From the time my contractions started until we met sweet Charlie was right around 3 hours!

About 10 minutes after I was all cuddled in bed, I had to use the restroom.  I got a little scared because this was more painful than birth itself with Norah.  In fact, it hurt to sit down or go to the bathroom for 8 weeks after having Norah… However, I was surprised when I had absolutely 0 pain, tenderness or sensitivity! Had it not been for sweet little Charlie laying in my bed and my cute little jelly sack of a belly,  I didn’t feel like I had just had a baby at all!  I have had no pain or tenderness in my nether regions whatsoever since having Charlie!   Another thing I’m so grateful for is no back pain!  I had really bad back pain where I received the epidural with Norah that still hurts. It caused permanent damage for me and was a completely unnecessary procedure. I begged the staff not to give it to me with Norah and give me an explanation as to why I needed it and they said if I didn’t get it,  I would be too tired to push when it came time to push and then threatened a C-section or an epidural. We know so much more now, but we didn’t know how to advocate for  ourselves then. It’s hard to not feel sad when I think about Norah’s birth knowing what we know now, but all I can be is so grateful that we have learned what we have and get to choose to have different experiences now.

Big sister Norah holding her little sister for the first time!

Charlie’s first bath in our kitchen sink:)

Getting those sweet little footprints

I am so thankful we got to have this truly redemptive experience.   I believe being trusted and supported along with the comfort I was provided  played a huge role in this experience as well. Thank you so much to everyone who encouraged us and prayed for us during our whole pregnancy and through this process.  Chris and I are so grateful for all of the encouragers in our lives!  Charlie is such a blessing and we are so excited to watch Norah grow into her new role as a big sister!

I also want to add that we fully understand that everybody’s circumstances are different and home birth might not be and does not have to be the experience for everybody. I so badly wish every mother could experience the birth she wants, in the environment she wishes for, with the care she deserves, and with the outcomes she dreams of.  We are all coming from different places with different stories, concerns, preferences, needs, options, and desires. This was a beautiful experience for us, but we do not share this as medical advice,  to push our preferences onto anyone else, nor discredit anyone else’s experiences or stories. Thank you for reading and celebrating with us!