Nine Years Ago Today: Reflecting On the Birth of My Son

Today, October 30th, is my son’s ninth birthday! He was born on October 30th, 2016, at 4:57 a.m. at the local hospital, where I had a drug-free, natural birth. Every year, the windy autumn weather and the turning of the leaves inspires me to reflect on this pivotal, life changing experience.

Early Awareness

Years before Max was born, I watched a documentary called The Business of Being Born in one of my college classes. It highlighted the cascade of interventions that can happen in hospitals and emphasized the benefits, as well as the common misconceptions, of home births. That documentary stayed with me for years and shaped my understanding of birth in our modern society.

When I became pregnant with my son at 28, I knew I wanted to have a natural home birth. However, I soon learned they were quite expensive, and because my insurance covered a hospital birth, that option felt more financially feasible at the time. I knew that, even if I was going to give birth at a hospital, I wanted a drug-free birth that felt as natural as possible. I took hypnobirthing classes with an amazing nurse at the hospital, which helped me to feel more mentally prepared for moving through labor and contractions in a natural way.

Ideally, I would have loved to have the option of a water birth, but the hospital only had a couple of birthing tubs available at the time. There was no way to know if one would be available until immediately before giving birth. A handful of midwives rotated throughout my appointments, so while I got to know all of them a little bit, I wouldn’t know who would be with me during labor.

Pregnancy and Pre-Labor

During my pregnancy, the book The First 40 Days came out a few months before my son was born. It is an incredible book. It prepared me for the postpartum experience in ways I wouldn’t have been ready for otherwise.

After my due date came and went, I began to count down the days. I did not want to be induced, so I started to feel concerned by the time I was eight days “late”, because I knew that I would begin to feel pressure to be induced a the 42 week mark. I asked one of the midwives at the hospital what she recommended for naturally inducing labor, and she gave me the contact information for a local acupuncturist. On a very windy and stormy October night, this amazing acupuncturist came all the way to my house and did the session for me in the comfort of my own home. I will always be grateful for her generosity and kindness. She did not feel there was any need to use needles, so she instead focused on gentle acupressure. Towards the end of the session, she placed a small elephant statue on my belly for strength, saying this was for my son. That night, I went to bed feeling calm and peaceful, and in the early morning hours, my contractions began.

The pre-labor experience was genuinely enjoyable. The contractions were still quite spaced out, and I breathed through them using the techniques I had learned in hypnobirthing. I made brownies from The First 40 Days recipe section, and in the evening I prepared a delicious salmon dinner and enjoyed that with my husband. We went on to have a fairly relaxing evening, despite the contractions.

When they started to gain in intensity, I knew it was time to get going, and we set out on our thirty minute drive to the hospital.

Hospital Arrival and Labor

The drive to the hospital was uncomfortable, to say the least. Once we arrived, everything shifted. I had felt calm and peaceful and empowered at home. When we got to the hospital, the lights were bright, and everything felt too loud, in every way. I wanted to be in a calm, cave-like setting, with soft Himalayan salt lamps and candles, soothing music, and essential oils misting in the background. The hospital was anything but that. When we arrived at the birthing room, the nurse on duty checked my vitals, as well as my son’s, and discovered that his heart rate was high. I vaguely heard the word “tachycardia”, and before I knew it, I was being hooked up to an IV, and suddenly this large, awkward contraption on wheels became a very unwelcome companion to my birth. I became dimly aware that there were a lot of people giving birth that night, and the birthing tub was not available. Suddenly, I was in a hospital gown, feeling very vulnerable and exposed, a little cold, and I was unable to close the door to the bathroom due to this large IV contraption that was now by my side. I could no longer move freely or rotate my hips, and the labor became much more intense and uncomfortable. It was a lot to take in.

The next several hours were extremely difficult. I found myself on my back, a very uncomfortable, unproductive position, which I think happened as a byproduct of being connected to the IV and feeling there were no other options. I felt the full intensity of the contractions pressing toward my back. I later learned that my son was posterior, or “sunny side up”, which made the pressure and discomfort even more intense. We did not learn this, however, until just before my son was born. There was a student midwife present, and as kind as she was, her timid energy and gentle suggestions made me feel as though no one knew what to do, which increased my stress and discomfort.

Finally, I asked my husband to go get Lynn, the midwife I had connected with most during my appointments. She was a veteran midwife, tall, confident, and had been in and out, tending to all of the births going on that night. I felt like I needed her strong, confident energy in that moment. When she arrived, she reassured me, saying she could see I was having a very hard time and that we would get through this, and that this was going to be one of the hardest things I would ever do in my life. My son and I both needed that strong, elephant energy that my acupuncturist had shared with us the night before, and it came all at once, like a powerful wave, when Lynn spoke those words to me. I knew then that we were going to get through this, we were going to make it. Some time later, at 4:57 am on Sunday morning, my little boy was born. Holding him for the first time, on my chest, felt like the most sweet, peaceful relief.

We spent the next few days snuggled up in the hospital bed, and though there were numerous distractions throughout the day and night, I was so happy and relieved to have my happy and healthy little boy, Max.

Postpartum and Reflections

Coming home made me realize how much my body had actually been through during the birth. It also opened my eyes to the fact that this birth may have been unusually challenging. I see now that it was. I was able to move around fairly comfortably just a day or two after my daughter was born a few years later. But I was wheelchair-bound and could barely walk into my own house with my son. My husband prepared lots of nourishing soups and stews from the First Forty Days to help support my recovery. But when he went back to work just a few days later, I really felt like I was unprepared and on my own. I quickly realized just how much help is truly needed, especially after a difficult birth. I had trouble walking, and my abdominal muscles had separated during my pregnancy, which made me feel quite vulnerable. Fortunately, nursing went beautifully, and my son and I spent hours and hours snuggled up together. I feel incredibly fortunate to have been able to spend this unlimited time with him as a baby, and for the years that followed. More on that in a future post!

My first birth taught me so much about resilience, trust in my body, my own intuition, and the unexpected twists and turns that can come with any birth. My son helped me to open my eyes to the realities of the medical system we live in, the incredible kindness of many of the people who work in hospitals, and also the unfortunate bullying tactics that can occur when we choose to do (or not do) something that goes against the status quo. Nine years later, I look back on that day with gratitude for my son and the lessons of strength, patience, and the importance of informed consent that came with his birth.

Note: Years later, when my home birth midwife was reviewing my records while I was pregnant with my daughter, she told me that Pitocin had been given to me through the IV after birth. I was shocked, and at first I did not believe what I was hearing. However, when I called the hospital to confirm, they said, yes this was in my records. I came to understand that they had added the drug into my IV, when it was already hooked up to my arm, to reduce postpartum bleeding. While I thought I was getting saline, I was being given one of the drugs I had worked to hard to avoid. This was frustrating and felt like a real violation of my medical sovereignty. Ultimately there was nothing to be done, except to be aware and make informed choices in the future. When my daughter was born, my midwife had an herbal tincture ready to go. It actually was more effective at reducing bleeding than the Pitocin was.