My Natural Birth Plan and Story

For years my ideal birth would have been a home birth, but when I got pregnant things changed and I felt nervous about how my body would truly handle labor and birth. Knowing I would now be having a hospital birth I knew I wanted a doula to have another advocate for my natural birth plan besides my husband. Going into it all I wanted to labor at home as much as possible then go to the hospital just "for the finale". I knew that the longer I was at the hospital the more possibility there would be for unwanted interventions. At my 40 week appointment my OB asked me if I wanted to schedule my induction and I was clear that I did not. I was trying all the supplements, tinctures, exercises, and wive's tales possible at home to prep my body for birth and I knew there was much more to try prior to the dreaded PIT. Also, I had been having some consistent, rhythmic back pain since week 38 and Braxton Hicks since about week 20. This baby was coming on her own in my opinion. 

Thankfully, my birth did play out as I had hoped and here it is...

At about 10:00 pm on Sunday August 26th I started feeling pain I had never experienced before. I typically had a lot of tightening and 'zings' at night but never anything quite like this; this was back pain and Braxton Hicks combined. I hoped that it was the real thing and figured I had a long road ahead so I tried to get some rest. At almost 1:00 am I woke my husband up and told him that I thought I had been having real contractions. I definitely couldn't sleep and started tinkering around the house and messing with the hospital bag. We were timing my contractions and they were often 4 minutes apart, with some randomly 10, so we thought we should call the doula just to check in. We had an appointment with a couple local midwives that morning to hopefully avoid my 41 week appointment with my OB and to see if they could help get things started. We decided with my doula to keep the midwife appointment and she said that sometimes things fade when the sun comes up so we were hoping that wouldn't be the case for us. As the sun came up that morning we walked a ton and I bounced away in hopes to keep contractions steady. 

At the appointment I was dilated to 3cm and they were able to get me to about 4cm. As we were walking out to the car my contractions instantly intensified making for an interesting ride back. When we got home I hopped right into the bath to try and relax knowing it was my first baby and it would most likely be awhile until we would get to meet her.

After laboring for a bit my husband called the doula, per my subtle request. I was at the point where I felt I needed her there with us being that my contractions were 2 minutes apart.

When she arrived she knew how dilated I was at the midwife appointment and that things were too intense to sustain until I would be fully dilated. She made me some herbal drinks to slow things down and I drank a bunch of Calm (magnesium). My contractions stayed at the same intensity but grew further apart so I was able to recover better in between. This continued on throughout the afternoon until my water broke at 7:00 pm and whoa things really got fun; the "cushion" had left the building. We left for the hospital about 30 minutes later and arrived at 8:00 pm. We went right into triage due to where I was at in labor and the trail of water I had left in the lobby. "Clean up on aisle 7!" I was at 6cm but I swore it was more like 7 or 8. They gave me a hep lock, though I didn't really want one, monitored me for a moment then we were on our way.

We moved into our labor and delivery room where contractions, breathing exercises, and working through it all continued. The nurse checked me after a bit and I was at 10 with one little portion that still needed to "flip" back. She thought a few more contractions would do it.. but I had my fingers crossed for sooner since my urge to push was taking control. I wanted to tap out and go for the nitrous oxide at the very least, but I just kept telling myself "one more" and "after this next one". Finally, it was time to push; which was good because I had already been sneaking pushes here and there for relief. I wanted to use a squat bar so they popped it on and it was go time. From what we can recall I pushed for about an hour with 2-3 pushes per contraction. 

                          

Our 8lb 7oz and 21inch long daughter arrived at 11:04 pm the night of the 27th; 25 hours after it all got started. At that point we realized our life would never be the same again and that we needed to let some close family members know that she was here.

Some other birth plan wishes we were able to follow.

No IV fluid given, no vitamin k shot (unless birth trauma), delayed hepatitis b vaccine, no antibiotic eye ointment, immediate skin to skin for golden hour and breast crawl, delayed cord clamping by at least 5 minutes, no pacifier in hospital, no bath in hospital, placenta encapsulation by doula, and one parent to always accompany our newborn.

My awesome Doula and Encapsulation services were by Christie Cambridge at Cambridge Midwifery Care, (916) 412-7140
Additional support from One Heart Midwifery