The Wood Between the Worlds

Long birth post!  Read at your own discretion.

Wednesday July 28th (37 weeks):
Brent and I spent a lovely morning at the Portland LDS Temple.  I was counting how many contractions I had within 1 hour.  I counted 10.  It felt like early labor.  When I got up they persisted.  We went to pick up Toby and Joshua.  Contractions persisted.  We drove to my midwife appointment.  We went grocery shopping at Winco.  Contractions persisted at the birth center and all around the store.  I was started to feel excited.  When we got home I started to feel nervous.  I was NOT emotionally ready for the baby to come yet.  And I still had more stuff I wanted to get done before he came.  I had not made up my mind yet if I was going to have the baby at home or at the birth center.  Would it feel weird having this baby in the same place where Elsa was born?  On the other hand, would I be able to make arrangements for my kids and still get to the birth center on time?  I had decided to prepare all the necessary supplies for a home birth, but not make my decision until I was in labor.  Too much going on in my brain.  Labor stopped.

(picture by Toby)


Wednesday August 4th (38 weeks):
After a week of on and off contractions, I woke up very early in the AM with the urgent need to void my bladder.  Normally I am such a sound sleeper that the need to urinate does not wake me up until about 5 or 6 am, even at this late stage of pregnancy.  When I rolled over to get out of bed, I suddenly realized that I could NOT get up.  I was having a contraction.  A VERY hard contraction (that extra squeeze on my bladder is what woke me up).  After having gone back to sleep, hard contractions woke me up every 2 hours for the rest of the night.  In the morning, I lost my mucous plug.  I panicked!  I was still not feeling ready for this baby.  After I got up, my contractions stopped.

Thursday August 5th:
I had an appointment for a prenatal massage.  I was hoping that this would loosen me up and help me to feel more relaxed about labor.  I realized the obvious as I was driving to the appointment:  I HAD to be ready.  Now.  There is only one way for the baby to come out and the longer I waited, the bigger he would be!  I decided to completely let go of the anxiety and fear.  When I talked with the massage therapist briefly about my situation, she let me know that the baby can sense my anxiety and he won't come until he is wanted.  I do believe that there is a connection between the mother and the baby in that way.  I had my massage, which was very relaxing.  Then on my way home I decided to allow the current nameless baby to be the ONLY baby I thought about.  Sorry Elsa, but you had to go to the back of my mind.  Sorry future baby(ies)...you are NOT now.  I centered my thoughts in the present.  I formed a stronger connection with baby.  I was ready for him to come.

Friday/Saturday/Sunday:
Brent had these days off.  I was now READY!  I was wanting baby to come on one of Brent's days off.  Because of the nature of his work, it is usually complicated for him to leave in the middle of the day.  Things would be much easier if I went into labor on a day off!  Of course, now that I was ready...the contractions pretty much stopped.  Grrr...  By the time Sunday night came around, I had given up on making it happen and went back to a neutral attitude.

Monday August 9th (38 weeks, 5 days):
I spent the entire night/morning waking up to powerful contractions every two hours, as I had become accustomed to during the past week.  I was fairly certain that when I got out of bed they would disappear as they had done all those other days.  I lay reading in bed extra long that morning, which kept the contractions coming every 5 minutes or so.  I jumped out of bed about 15 minutes before Joshua's piano lesson at 10:00 am.  I decided to play it safe and cancel my noon chiropractor appointment for that day since the chiro was located 45 minutes away.  I scurried around to get everyone ready and in the car.  Sure enough the contractions died down, but they did NOT stop.  I still did not know when to believe that active labor was starting.  I didn't want to jump the gun and call Brent home from work, and call my midwives away from their appointments for the day...only to have it be a false alarm!  But I knew because of how hard the contractions had been that once active labor set in, it would be QUICK!...

So I took Joshua to piano, and set about my tasks for the day.  First up on the agenda was to drive down to the library to pick up some books on hold.  Toby and I drove down to the library only to find it closed.  Joshua's piano lesson is only 30 minutes, so I did not have time for another errand before picking him up...but it was still too early to pick him up.  So I allowed Toby some time to play on the old-school huge metal slide and swings outside of the library.  The time that had elapsed between dropping Joshua off and arriving at the closed library was about 10-15 minutes.  The contractions were definitely NOT going away, and in fact I thought they were getting stronger.  I stood at the playground watching Toby...breathing through POWERFUL contractions every 2-3 minutes.  In comparison to my other births, these contractions felt like the ones right before I hit transition (transition is defined as last part of labor before you feel the urge to push.  It is usually the most intense part of labor).  Things were getting serious fast!  I decided at this point that a home birth would be my only option...and I had better get Brent and the midwives to my house.  I called them first and then pleaded with Toby to leave the playground...

As I drove up the hill back to our neighborhood, I did not know how I was still able to drive.  It was a good thing I was the only person on the road because I could not concentrate.  I was only going 10-15 miles per hour so that my reaction time didn't need to be so quick.  We got to Joshua's piano teacher's house and waited.  Sometimes his piano teacher keeps him 10-15 minutes longer than the lesson time.  Normally I don't mind.  Right now it was (!).  He finally came out and we made it home at about the same time that Brent arrived home from work.  (Thankfully on Mondays Brent is not the only professional of his kind, so he could leave work without delay).  At some point (I don't remember exactly when) I called my friend Tara to come pick up my kids.  I set Brent straight to work inflating and filling the birth tub.  I managed to change my sheets on my bed and tidy up my room and my kitchen between contractions.  When Tara arrived she thought I was alone (!), and offered to stay until the midwives got there.  Haha!  Thankfully Brent was there.  But I was starting to feel desperate for the midwives to get there!!

Tara took my kids to another friend's house and came back to take some pictures for me.  My midwives were still not there!  And in the confusion of the morning, I had neglected to eat anything.  I was starting to feel shaky and was needing some nutritional reinforcement...but I was hitting transition and could not stomach any solids.  Tara made me some orange juice.  Between contractions I was still getting the space ready for the birth.  When a contraction hit, it became SO intense VERY quickly.  The most comfortable position I could get in quickly was standing by my bedroom window, leaning forward onto the body pillow on my dresser.
  It was a beautiful and peaceful position to be in.  Just outside my bedroom window is our wooded backyard.  At this time of the day, the sun was shining through the leaves and lighting everything up with a warm green glow.  Ah!  The Wood Between the Worlds.  During labor, I was too focused on working with my primitive brain...my conscious mind barely hanging on by a thread, to realize the significance.  I only felt peace.  After the birth I remembered the heavenly, ethereal, spiritual connection that I feel to the warm glow of light shining through leaves.  I felt that Elsa and others in the spirit world must have been there watching over us.

I got up after a contraction and remembered that I needed one last picture of me pregnant :
 
As I waited for the placenta to come, I was keenly aware of everything.  More so than I have been with any of my other babies.  I was so awake and alert and the sunlight was so bright shining through our bathroom window that I could take in every detail.  I studied his umbilical cord and noted that it was white and smooth and coiled...AND there were no hematomas.   Everyone in the room was emotional that he was good and alive!

Overall, this birth was my quickest birth...but not my easiest.  The quicker the birth, the more intense!  But at least when it is THAT intense, you realize that it will be over FAST.  The part I love is feeling back to normal so quickly after giving birth.

My two midwives and the apprentice did the newborn exam right there on my bed as I rested.