It has been 1 whole month since the birth of Mr. Arlo and as much as it has seemed to fly by (as everyone says it will when you have a child) I also feel like it has been the longest 4 weeks of my life. Probably because it has been technically on the amount of sleep that I have actually partaken in.
To preserve the wild memory that will begin to drift away into the past I have decided to put down into words my birth story. I feel that when I was pregnant I pawned after others birth stories in hope of just attaining an ounce of knowledge of the possibilities of what happens in birth.
My due date was Christmas Eve. The build up to the due date consists of many people guessing the date your baby will be born, the bulging of your ever present belly, and many conversations with your baby at 4 in the morning asking it absurd questions when you can't sleep because of sheer uncomfort or just plain anxiety. Nine months is a heck of a long time and the culmination of a body in yours comes to a mega climax around the end. Christmas came and went, the tree went up and I vowed to keep it up until the baby was born. Then came New Years. Uneventfully, Chris & I rang in the New Year together with the babe still in the belly. The days kept adding on in 2014 and the wonder of when it would happen filled my days with emotions. My parents, my brother and my friends all looked at me daily with that look of anxious anticipation. I bounced on the bouncy ball, hours of walking all times of the day, ate spicy foods, had awkward sex, chanted, manifested, acupuncture, tarot cards, castor oil, membranes swept, stared at opening roses imagining my cervix doing the same thing.....shit got wierd & the list goes on. That last week my focus was completely direct into going into labor.
I knew the dreaded 2 week mark was coming and I presumed that at that point I would give up my dream of having a natural birth as I walked into the labor and delivery floor of the hospital and they would shoot me with pitocin, which would maybe lead to other interventions along with all the machines staring at me. These were all experiences I had spent 9 months meditating not to have, but also I was accepting that life really doesn't go the way you planned and was willing to accept that with integrity. I wasn't quite ready to give up yet though and I imagined that this labor would come on the night before the induction, like a last minute field goal score in overtime. I had a dream vision it would happen on a crescent moon. On Jan. 5th, Sunday night, we pulled out of our houses driveway and looked west and there it was, the dang biggest cheshire cat crescent moon I had ever seen glowing orange and presumably falling into the ocean. I smiled.
Contractions started at 2 in the morning that night. They were light enough to cat nap in between and this continued into the morning. Chris stayed home and we wandered the house doing projects. He took down the Christmas tree, much to my dismay as I was set on bringing the baby home with the Christmas tree up. It had its time though. I had to be admitted into the birthing center that afternoon or they would make me check in to Labor & Delivery at midnight because that would be 2 weeks post date. We got in the subaru, I had head phones in my ear listening to Rhye sing "Woman" as I closed my eyes on the mountain of pillows set up for me in the back seat and begun this extemely inner journey.
After 4 or so hours of wandering the birth center halls, bouncing on a ball in the lawn in front of the hospital, enduring endless stares as I leaned over hand rails on the side of the building going through contractions I was admitted into our room at the birthing center. There was a 4 post wooden majogony bed, a big ol' rocking chair and no machines to stare at me. Chris unpacked and I sucked on honey sticks as the contractions got stronger.
We were given 2 magical fairy doulas that were volunteers at the birth center. At first they threw me off my groove but as the night progressed I felt very grateful to have them. Through the night they made me remember to drink water while holding a sippy cup in front of my face in the multitudes of positions I found myself lost in while amist the surges. The contractions swept through me. I would equate the whole feeling to stepping on a freight train and being strapped to the front of it as it went faster and faster through the landscape. There were no brakes. I was having intense lower back pain as Arlo was facing sunny side up and tilted a bit on my right hip. His big ol' noggin was low and pressing down but his position was not optimal. The waves kept coming through the night. The swells of contractions hit me like ocean waves and it reminded me of the feeling you get when you are held under by a huge set. While you under the wave there is a strong need to remain calm and know you would come up for air soon. Breathe, release, say yes, ground yourself, open, open, open, let go, trust. Then it would end and I could breath again until the next wave came and bam, there it was on top smothering me. All over again. This happened for hours, time was extremely elusive though. It didn't exist for me.
Chris pushed on my back, let me hang off of him, rubbed my feet, made me move positions when things would slow down. He was a dream husband, a dream birth partner. My team was stellar. The nurse on call was a badass, very blunt, real, and honest- just my style. My midwife, Erica, was my favorite at the birth center that I had met. I somehow lucked out and came in the night she was working. She gives off an air of casualness while being wicked intelligent, and I trusted her to no end.
As the intensity increased I remained very present with the process. I also, deep down, was figuring I must be almost there, almost fully dilated, almost ready to push. The contractions were a minute apart and I was fully engaged. My back hurt like a mofo, I couldn't stand up straight and I knew I was reaching my capacity as I was approaching 24 hours of these growing contractions. My midwife came in and checked me around 11:00 that night. I was sure she was going to tell me I had jumped from my previous 5 cm. to 9 cm. in the last 4 hours. Instead she pulled her hand out and said I was still around 5 cm. dilated. What the hell? My positive cool balanced attitude fell out of my body and sunk into an abyss. They convinced me to take a shower to ease the pain that was becoming unbearable for me. In the shower I whimpered to Chris, "I can't do it anymore, it's too intense, I'm in pain, I want an epidural, I want it to stop, I want to sleep". I was serious. I was basically telling him to strap me to a chair and take me to the other floor and shoot me up with some mega painkillers. He wouldn't let me get away with it though. " No, you can do this Erin. You will regret it". The midwife said the same thing as I gave her the same sob story. She knew me, she knew what I wanted, she knew how hard I had been working to get it and she wasn't letting me throw in the towel. When I could think for brief interludes I began to think of ancient goddesses, other women who gave birth before me, with me, my ancestors, all my friends and family who believed in me. I called them there, I told them to please take away my pain. I knew I was almost there.
The nurse gave me a basic iv pain killer to take my edge off as I assume I was sort of losing it at this stage (once again, don't remember, blocked that out I think). I was on the bed on all 4's groaning and speaking about how I had this need to push and how I didn't know how much longer I could take it. I was convulsing at this point and my body felt out of my control. My mind put a time constraint on the whole experience when I started to lose it. I wanted to know how much longer it would take and everyone just looked back at me with puppy dog eyes telling me there was no way to tell. Human beings like time, we like to measure life on time. I had to let it go. Damn it. I was on my brink. I knew something was shifting though. Only an hour or so had gone by since my midwife checked me but I demanded she come back in. No one believed me but I felt like I wanted to push. She came back in and I told her I couldn't do it any longer, I couldn't last through the night, I wanted this baby out. She noticed I couldnt stand up straight, she tried to shift my stance but I felt out of my body because I couldn't control it. She said she would check my dilation. That's where life took a very happy turn for me. Erica looked at me and said that I was not going to get an epidural because I was at 10 cm and this baby was moving down the path closer to my arms. Cheers of elation echoed through the room, through me. Oh yeah. Thank you.
Let the pushing begin. From holding back my legs on the bed, to squatting, to birth stool I was using every last ounce of energy in this phase. Instead of breathing out I put all of my energy in and down visualizing it pushing the baby out. They put a mirror out for me. There's the top of his head and then there it goes back in. There it is and then back in. This went on for quite a while. I started to realize I was about to really have a baby and this whole part of the birth felt very dramatic. The team started to get restless I was noticing. Deep breaths in, every ounce of air I could find and then push. Pretty soon I saw panic on the midwives and nurse face. I heard something about them calling for extra nurses from labor and delivery to come to the room asap. She said the heartbeat was dropping and the baby had to come out now. She told me she was going to have to cut me. It was a blur but I saw her get scissors out and turn a light on to begin the incision. I yelled out, "have you cut me?". She said,"not yet". That is when I got serious and took the biggest breath in I have ever taken and pushed it all down in me and out of me. I refused to be cut. I imagined myself full of strength, my energy shifted. Then there he came. Plopped out on the bed. Chris in shock, in awe. His limbs everywhere, his little body squirming. He had pooped during the last phase of birth so they swept him away to clean him up and suction him out in case he swallowed any. Of course, he was too smart to do that. I saw his little penis swinging in the air as they whisked him away. "It's a boy!". Chris's eyes hadn't blinked in like an hour. We did it. I truly had the birth that I had dreamed of. I mean I would of dreamed of birthing in an ocean with mermaids and dolphins if I really had my way, but on realistic terms I did feel very blessed.
When they brought his naked body back to me and laid him on me I saw my life change forever. In him I saw myself, I saw Chris, I saw the meaning of happiness, I understood life a little bit more. His eyes were deep pools of blue and they were wide open staring at mine. He had been on such a journey, as had I, the release of him from my body was deeply ecstatic. He grew in me for 9 1/2 months and it was like we were long lost pals. His delicate and soft skin just sank into mine and from then on it was a connection like I have never known and am still very much figuring out. Chris and I wondered how we could ever create something so entirely perfect. It is emotional and yet I couldn't cry. He was here. What a long trip it had been. Welcome home little Arlo. Let's do this.
