It was April 11th, 2016 when the hubby and I decided to take a journey down ‘let’s try to have a baby’ road. All it took was one time. Yep, God decided to bless us with a baby after getting jiggy once upon a Monday night… I missed my next period and sure enough, we were pregnant!
As I stared at the stick, the first words I uttered were “Oh my God.” When I showed my loving husband he said, “You drew it in.” Nope, we’re going to be parents, babe! We were really surprised, but so happy. After taking the path of sobriety in 2014, we knew that this was part of God’s plan for us. Time to prepare and move on to the next chapter of our lives.
From the very beginning, I knew I didn’t want to give birth in the hospital. Praise God for modern medicine, but hospitals freak me out. The fear of that big fat epidural needle sticking in my back scares me more than the fear of pain. Plus, I didn’t want people I didn’t know in my birth space telling me what to do. Despite people saying things like “get the epidural!” or “just schedule a c-section”, I wanted a different experience. Being 32, healthy and low risk, meant I was a good candidate for an out of hospital natural childbirth. My intuition told me that this baby was meant to have a peaceful water birth.
Our midwife was amazing. She made us feel comfortable from the very start. We met with her and she set my mind at ease. She would take the position of my main care provider, including one hour prenatal visits and be there during the birth. She could even draw my blood at the birth center for all the testing throughout pregnancy. The most important part was that she explained that birth was all about mindset. It’s about surrender.
Women have been giving birth naturally since the beginning of time. If a woman is left alone in her own space to feel the power within her, she can usually birth her baby safely, with no interventions. The midwife is there to keep monitoring baby and mama and make sure everything progresses as it should. If she has any doubt, we transfer. The body is amazing and it knows exactly what to do. “Have faith in your body and your baby,” she said.
So I started reading books like Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth, Birthing from Within, Mindful Mama, Orgasmic Birth, etc. I read birth stories, watched birth stories, made sure to eat a balanced diet, exercised and meditated regularly to ground myself and connect with my baby. The first trimester I was nauseated and pretty much exhausted 24/7. The second trimester was better. I had more energy and felt myself becoming a mama. As my belly grew, my heart grew. My husband and I found out it was going to be a boy and the excitement was out of this world (although… I already knew it was a boy). 🙂
We bought a condo and started getting the nursery ready. Everything was great, but I still had a lot of anxiety about the birth. What would contractions feel like? What would transition feel like? Could I really do it? Would everything go okay? Would there be complications? Would I need to transfer to the hospital? What if my midwife couldn’t be there? My mind raced with the “what ifs”… But I just kept meditating, bouncing on my birth ball, talking to other women and trusting God. I envisioned what the birth would be like. I kept envisioning it… Us in the birthing tub. The sunlight of the spirit shining down… I knew that it would happen exactly as it was supposed to.
The third trimester was a little more challenging. I was getting big and uncomfortable. I had lightning crotch like crazy the last few weeks of pregnancy, and my anxiety was in overdrive. Beyond that, an immense sense of gratitude for my life. I had no issues during my pregnancy and our midwife assured us that all would go fine during the birth. Fear would only make my labor longer and more painful. “All you have to do is relax, and breath for your baby,” she said. These words were very comforting.
We hired a doula who was a huge help. She was there to answer all our questions and provide emotional and physical support during labor. She helped me to relax once the contractions finally started. And start, they did. On Friday, January 13th around 6 pm. It’s true, when they say “oh, you’ll know when it’s a contraction”, because when I felt the waves coming in, I knew. All the wondering if I was in labor before flew out the window. I was definitely in labor now. Though it was uncomfortable, I was super excited. Soon I would meet my baby boy!
Contractions were irregular until about 11 pm that night when they started coming in about every 5 minutes or so. Our doula came over. She sat with me for several hours as contractions went irregular again, so she said she would go home for a bit so my husband and I could try and rest. Having someone enter my birth space may have slowed my progression. But there would be no rest for me, soon after she left, things picked up again. By 6 am Saturday, January 14th, my water broke. Things got real.
Our doula came back. The contractions were much stronger and closer together. While my husband and doula were on the phone with our midwife, getting an idea of where I was at, I was going into zombie mode, just trying to make it through each wave. It was so intense. The doula said “That’s your baby’s head pushing against your cervix. Let him know it’s okay to come down.” So I did. It was time to go to the birth center. I yelled out, “Am I going to make it to the birth center?” The doula said, “Do you trust your midwife?” “Yes,” I said. So we got things together and got in the car.
The ride to the birth center was a blur. My husband put on a meditation for me to help me through it. By the time we got there it was 8 am. Â When I saw our midwife, I fell into her arms. I was in tears. This was it. No turning back. It was going to happen, and it was going to happen soon. Our midwife checked me and said, “You’re half way there.” Then I got into the warm water. For the next few hours I moved around freely, finding my flow and space to birth my baby.
Our midwife kept checking baby boy’s heartbeat with the doppler and keeping tabs on me. Soon enough, I said, “I feel like I want to push.” Our midwife checked me. I was fully dilated and she said “whenever you’re ready, you can push.” Hell yeah! I’m ready. So I started pushing. With each contraction I pushed harder. I could feel his head with my hand and it was crazy. I thought, “Oh my God, he’s really coming!”
It was hard work. When I thought I couldn’t do it anymore, I prayed… I prayed to God to give me strength. The doula and the midwife gave me a spoonful of honey for a boost of energy, and the encouragement I needed. My husband comforted me and supported me. I couldn’t have done it without him…
Then I looked up out the window. I felt the sun on my face. I prayed to God again. This was what I had envisioned. A calm swept over me. The sun was shining down on us. God’s light was surrounding us. And with one more push, baby boy’s head popped out, then the rest of him. He gently flowed into his daddy’s hands, then right up into my arms. It was 12:02 pm. He was here and he was perfect. His first cry was nothing short of a miracle. It was magic. Pure magic. Oh, the love. The joy. There’s nothing like it in the world…
Birthing naturally in the water was such an empowering, beautiful experience. I’m so glad I followed my heart, trusted my body and chose a loving midwife to guide us on our journey. The power to bring my baby into the world was within me. The power that was given to me as a woman, a spiritual being with faith in all that I am and was made to be.
I’m not going to say natural birth wasn’t excruciatingly painful, because it was. No one ever told me it wouldn’t hurt (except maybe that Orgasmic Birth book). People said there would be pain, but I could do it. My own mama always told me, “Giving birth is painful, but the moment you hold that sweet baby in your arms, you forget all about the pain.” I’m in awe of it all. Thank you for my life, mama.
So there you have it. After 18 hours of labor (6 hours active labor), my beautiful baby boy was born. Our midwife described it as a Zen birth. He was healthy and safe. I never felt like we needed anything other than what we had. Unfortunately, I had some tearing that our midwife was able to stitch up, and that sucked, but it’s a small price to pay to have my family together, happily enjoying a big oxytocin love fest!
When I look back now, pregnancy and childbirth were easy compared to the whole parenting thing… But Tristan has brought such happiness to our lives. I didn’t understand it until I experienced it. We are beyond blessed. God is good.
This is Tristan’s birth story. I understand that not every woman is able to birth the way I did. Some choose not to, while others endure complications along the way that are no ones fault. Whether it’s a natural water birth, a medicated birth or a cesarean section, birth is birth, it’s amazing and beautiful and a gift from above. Every mama is a warrior mama.
A special thank you to Tiffany at Pure Births Pregnancy and Wellness and Cali at Tenderbees Doula Services 🙂
