Journey: I got a phone call to come home “soonish” since contractions were happening every few minutes. After clarifying that she meant 3 minutes and not 15 minutes… Pretty quickly packed up and headed home. OFF TO HAVE A BABY!!!
Once I got home my in-laws and grandma had already come over to hang out and took our girls for an overnight – the girls were happy as usual. They sent us off to the hospital and we snapped one last “family picture” of the 4 of us before we had our little addition. Little did we know that in less than 2 hours we’d have their sister in our arms 🙂
I finished packing everything into our van (we’re officially a van family now with 5 people instead of 4), and headed off to the hospital with some traffic. Making quick time, I’ll leaving it at that, contractions had progressed a bit to every minute and a half or so – and were much stronger. By the time time we got up into the room it was every minute – and they didn’t dittle dally. It was interesting how quickly everyone moved and wasted little time.
It took a little while getting dressed and “ready to push” but once getting in the water birth tub, it wasn’t 15 minutes until pushing – and about 1 minute of pushing and then she just jumped out! Seriously kinda crazy how fast she delivered.
Being the first time, I really wondered what it feels like to deliver in a water birth tub – or how to assist a waterbirth? Granted I still wonder what it feels like to deliver a baby in general… I’ll always wonder about that one… but the whole water birth thing kinda seemed strange. In the end – it actually worked out really cool and really well.
OBGYN vs Midwife: In general – from what I’ve heard and experienced second hand – delivering in a water birth tub allows you to deliver in different positions not many OBGYNs would choose. Actually, I’ve even heard that some OB’s won’t even deliver in a birthing tub. The water not only helped her feel more comfortable – it helped support her body and “take the weight off” her body and just worked better in the end.
Happier Baby: This one I’m “knocking on wood” about, but after the birth of our first two babies I can definitely say that anecdotally this is a much happier baby. I can not say whether or not it was the water birth or the birthing position – but she’s a bigger baby so there should have been more issues but she came out not screaming and not crying. Cuddly and warm and clean(er) and definitely happier than the pushing and pushing on her back like the others. We were both concerned why our little girl hadn’t cried for the first few minutes – 10 minutes maybe? Until she was brought over for measurements while mommy transfered to the bed, she hadn’t cried and they had said it’s normal and she was healthy looking and everything. Just a happy water birth baby.
Ok, enough pushing the many benefits of a water birth 😉 But seriously – if you haven’t considered it look into it.
I’ll add another thing. It’s definitely helpful having extra helping hands at a delivery. Even if they’re waiting hands, our (my wife’s primarily but mine as well) had come to help “do” essential oils and be part of the delivery but not the pushing. Since she labored pretty much at home all the way until it was time to deliver, (we fealt bad about that) they had to just wait out in the waiting room until after the action was over. While they seemed happy to of at least taken part – a huge benefit I was thankful with as the “supportive husband” was just their help in moving my car and bringing in bags from the van. That seemingly short task would have been a big thing from my wife’s perspective – and definitely added stress from having our car parked in the emergency drop off area (even though they say it’s ok in this situation).
Having friends at the hospital – even if not there during the final delivery / pushing part – is a huge bonus you’ll be thankful for!
Looking back – as in just the past few hours – I do wish I’d designated one to be the birth photographer since I was busy being supportive and water / electronics don’t quite mix. Had she been comfortable with one of them in the room to take candid photos – it would have been nice to remember with. Particularly with my new camera (Canon 6d with 35mm f2.0 lens) that allows me to shoot nice photos in low light.
Baby #3 vs. Baby #1: There’s night and day difference between delivering our first and third. Still the same appreciation for life – for a new baby – but so much more calmness and confidence. From how things go, to where to go, to how things cycle (contraction then break, shortening of contractions, dialating to 10cm, feeling the need to push irregularly, feeling the need to push repeatedly and being fully dialated…) Being at work at 4pm getting the call that “perhaps I should come home soon” while contractions are now getting to 3 minutes apart… On our first baby we would have been on our way to the hospital – of course had we had a day baby versus night baby we might have had a different way to think… This just seemed so smooth, so natural, so seemless. Kids say goodbye to mom and dad, we’re on our way to the hospital to go get the baby out of mommy’s tummy, and we’ll see you tomorrow… Quite a different type of excitement than “oh my – are we going into labor? are we going too early? are we going to be turned away?”
40+ Weeks: Part of the difference with a quick delivery might also be the 40 weeks part. At 40 weeks, the body is ready to get that child out! Equally – she’d rather labor through the ‘getting ready to have the baby’ at home than in some hospital. So tracking the contractions and going in right when it’s time to actually deliver kinda makes sense. That said – it was quite weird delivering a baby while it’s light outside. First time for everything 🙂
60 Second Difference: Keep in mind – it was less than 1 minute of actually pushing. Yes – labor pains and the uncomfortable pains of pregnancy – and contractions – but 60 seconds of pushing (at the max). It just boggles my mind that certain politically minded people called “pro-choice” would want to classify this 8 pound baby as just a “thing” that “women and their doctor should be able to choose” whether it lives or not. Particularly with presidential elections coming up – and the power they will hold in electing supreme court justices that could potentially bring protection back to unborn children – it just boggles my mind how anyone could label something “just terminating a pregnancy” and calling this unborn child a fetus or anything other than unborn child.
It breaks my heart – thinking that in less than 1 minute of pushing this baby went from something that our world deems highly valuable – something worth protecting and has all the human rights of any human being – yet less than 60 seconds ago was nothing more than a “blob of tissue / fetus / choice between the woman and doctor on what to do”.
