Miles's Birth Story
On Sunday 3rd April - 4 days before my due date - I finally got closure on the issue with Dell after an hour or so using their online chat facility to talk to their customer care idiots. I wangled myself $100 compensation which despite being $150 short of the cost of my hard drive is still $100 I suppose.
I got my first contraction just as I closed the chat down at 10:25pm. I didn't know it was a contraction yet - I'd been having hefty Braxton Hicks' and general aches and pains for a few days and I'd convinced myself that Miles would be overdue like Jody had been - but ten minutes later it seemed pretty clear. Strong cramping pain very low down in my belly coming every couple of minutes. Roj and I were unsure what to do. We had been prepped for the possibility of a 2-hour labour after Jody's 5:40 one, but I felt the contractions, while strong and frequent, were not quite as intense as first time around and I wanted to be sure things were progressing before calling out the midwives. At 11 we called to get their advice and were told to give it an hour. After 30 more minutes the contractions had stepped up a gear so we rang again to call them out.
They arrived 30 minutes later at midnight - one midwife and one student (damn - forgot to ask for no students). By this time I was kneeling on the sitting room floor leaning my head and shoulders on our swiss ball. Contractions were strong and frequent but there were more defined gaps between most of them than I remembered from first time. Perhaps I felt more in control because I knew what was coming?
The midwife felt my tummy (and told me this baby would be smaller than Jody was - ha ha!), took my blood pressure and reported that I was 5cm dilated with bulging bag of waters. Quite good work for 90 minutes of labour. Contractions continued as Roj moved the rug and furniture aside in our sitting room and the midwives unpacked all their paraphernalia (which took the next hour or so). Tops on bottles of oxygen, checking the ventilation system and intermittently listening to the baby's heartbeat. They had already called out the 2nd midwife as they were sure that once my waters broke the baby would follow pretty immediately. Incentive there, certainly.
Very gradually I started to feel downward pressure along with the cramping pain of contractions. I hadn't felt the urge to push with Jody so I was eager to know whether this time would be different. I was still unsure that I was ready to push but the midwives told me I should go with the flow - that I would feel the urge when the time was right. Slowly I allowed myself to push, hoping that my waters would break and bring momentary relief.
At around 1:30 my waters finally broke and were clear but what followed was not relief but incredible extra pressure and a tangible sense of the baby in my birth canal - another thing I hadn't experienced while lying on my back in the Elizabeth Seton Birth Center in 2003. Still kneeling over the swiss ball and pulling against Roj for counterbalance, I had about three enormous contractions in fast succession during which I pushed as hard as I possibly could in the midst of the most unbearable and forceful pain I thought I'd ever experienced. And yes, I was screaming at this point. Barely a couple of minutes passed before I could feel the head was out and the midwives were telling me to hold up while they cleared his airway. Soon I felt an unstoppable urge to push again and did so - finding this part almost as difficult as the head (we were told that Miles had his fist up by his neck, which made pushing out his body additionally hard), and before I knew it I was looking back at the little pink body that the midwives were vigorously rubbing down to stimulate those first amazing cries.
The feeling of relief when he was born was enormous. It symbolised the end of weeks of worrying about what was to come, and the end of another extremely intense and almost unbearable birth experience. This time I had been more in control, certainly, and felt that I had chosen a great position in which to labour. And this time I didn't have burst blood vessels all over my face and in my eyes either, which is testament to Roj's insistence for me to breathe in the final phases. And most importantly - when I heard those first cries - I was smitten already and that was something I'd worried I wouldn't be. It was such an enormous relief to find that I genuinely was.
I shook uncontrollably as the next phase passed - the birth of the placenta and another handful of stinging stitches. But I was holding Miles now and feeling his warm body wriggling against mine and the worst was over.
My skin crawled for a couple of days afterwards. I would think intermittently about what I'd been through and get shivers just thinking about the enormity of the pain. I don't think I can do it again. I didn't feel inspired because of the first time; I felt intimidated, and rightly so. Birth is the nearest thing to impossible I've ever experienced.
So why do it my way then? Why, when the medical world offers a nearly pain-free birth experience, would I choose to do it without medication and in my own home.
I guess the main reason is because I want to give my baby - and experience myself - birth as it's supposed to be. I don't want to be doped up and I don't want my baby to be pumped full of chemicals either. I want us both to be alert and to lucidly experience every single second.
I'm also a firm believer in the risk of escalating intervention where epidurals lead to IVs, confinement to bed, lack of progress, induction, c-sections. I don't want to go there.
And I suppose deep down I also see natural birth as a challenge. I'm one of those people that enjoy seeing just how far I can push myself, and natural birth is about the limit. I have enjoyed proving to myself that I can do it and I feel proud of my achievements both times. But then I think every woman should feel proud of birth, whether by c-section, with help of drugs or without. Birth is just a big thing, mentally and physically. And women are tough to get through it any which way.
Having a homebirth was absolutely the right decision. It was a fast labour again and to have organised myself and Jody to get to hospital in the midst of even the early contractions would have been difficult. Jody woke a couple of times in the early phases but slept through the crucial middle hours and didn't wake until Roj was taking the midwives back to the hospital at 3am. Because I knew she was safe I was able to relax completely and take labour in my stride. Granted it was weird to be at home for birth, but not in a bad way. I felt totally able to do my own thing there and I was happy that the midwives spent the minimum of time hanging around. For lack of stress and easing into normal life quickly (you have no choice - you're already in the middle of your normal life - not removed from it as you might be by spending 3 days in hospital), homebirth wins hands down.
If you need to be surrounded by an efficient support system I wouldn't recommend it though. The midwives barely uttered a word to me during (or after) the whole process, and the three of them sat on our sofa waiting for me to get to the pushing phase as if they were waiting for a bus. Clearly their approach to a homebirth is to stand back completely from the process and intervene only when physically absolutely necessary, but a part of me expected to have at least some occasional words of support.
Thank goodness Roj took over in that respect. Once again he was infinitely effective in controlling the whole event. Again he experienced a messy and primal process without squeamishness and offered unflinching support when I needed it most. The birth itself was almost more than I could handle. Without him I don't think I could have. I don't think he knows how much I relied on him to be there through every unbearable second. I don't think even I knew how much I needed him until I was in the thick of it and utterly dependent on the feeling of his hand on my back and his voice in my ear to pull me back from the edge of not being able to cope.
Miles Michael Taylor was born 3 days early after a labour lasting 3 hours 10 minutes, at 1:37am on Monday 4th April 2005 weighing 9lbs 4oz and measuring 19 ½ inches. He has thick dark hair and deep grey eyes. He's a sleeper, a snuggler and a voracious feeder. And he's gorgeous too!
