The Birth of Grant – Part 1 – When is he coming?
Thanks to Leigh Anne from Confessions of a Misplaced Alaskan for allowing us to share her birth story from her blog onto the Hypnobabies Blog.
As many of you noticed, I did not share my due date with most people because I hate the, “you haven’t had that baby?” comment. However, now that the baby has arrived, I’m happy to tell you my guess date. It was July 20, 2012, but I expected to go late like I did with my other two children. I hoped that the baby would be born on my husband’s birthday, July 30th. This baby had other plans though.
I’ve had multiple hemorrhoid flare ups this pregnancy. For me hemorrhoids have happened about two weeks before I have a baby in previous pregnancy, but with the every two week frequency of hemorrhoids in the past month, I was thoroughly confused. I kept figuring this would be a big baby because of how much pressure I had down low and for the frequency of the hemorrhoids. I even sometimes wondered if I was having twins even though we had only ever heard one heart beat.
My husband has been working out of town at least three days a week, in Nashville, since before the baby was conceived. He planned to be home next week for the fourth of July holiday. I had no worries about him being out of town as I approached thirty-seven weeks because I expected to go until at least forty weeks. He even was in Oklahoma all last week for work.
I had been doing little things to prepare for the baby this week. I had done some crazy nesting, getting down and scrubbing the kitchen cabinet doors, making sure the kitchen was clean, laundry was washed and put away, etc. My hemorrhoids were still there, but no longer painful, so I was feeling pretty good this week. On Wednesday, I had talked to one of my bosses about my work plans. I had the need to tell him that day…for some reason.
We all went to bed normally on Wednesday night. I listened to three Hypnobabies hypnosis tracks, deepening, creating anesthesia and fear clearing. Around 2 am, Thursday morning, I woke up needing to use the restroom, feeling a little off. I laid down on the couch in the living room, watched a little television and tried to distract myself. Around three, I went back into the bedroom and laid down next to my four year old and two year old but couldn’t get the idea out of my head that I needed to call my husband. I kept saying to myself, my female intuition was telling me that I really needed to call him and I would be kicking myself if I did not. I grabbed my cell phone and thought about texting him, but decided instead to just call him. Good thing I did. His phone went right to voicemail. I went and sat on the toilet, peed, then wiped. Bright red spotting. I dialed my husband again, even though I knew it was pointless. I was only 37 weeks, that day. I couldn’t be spotting. I panicked. I called my Dad, hoping that he was staying in the duplex in Nashville with Damon, my husband. He picked up after about three rings. I said in a very urgent voice, “Dad, it’s Leigh Anne, go get Damon please.” He asked what was wrong. I said in a stern voice, “go get my husband, now.”
My dad, went and woke Damon up. He told me that Damon would call me back. I found out later, that my Dad had walked into Damon’s room. Damon was splayed out on his bed, with the lights on, completely out. Damon called me back a few minutes later, which seemed like so much time as I kept wiping bright red blood from myself. He called me and with a panicked voice, I said, ” I’m bleeding, please come home.” Damon, tried to ask a few questions, but I was a little too freaked. He called me back a little while later, once he was on the road and I told him that it wasn’t a ton of blood, it looked like bloody show, but I’m only thirty-seven weeks. He remained calm, and drove home. It was about 3:30 am. He told me that the reason why his phone was off was that he had purchased a new phone from Verizon and he thought he had plugged it in to charge, but it appears that it powered off instead.
I called my friend, Amy Poarch, a local doula, and asked if she could come over. I didn’t want to be by myself. Nick’s birth had went so quickly, I was nervous that this one might go fast too. I also needed her help setting up the hose attachment to possibly fill the birth tub. I had tried to use the tools to attach, but my nerves was so shot, I was afraid I would bust the water faucet.
The other, very important thing in my brain was, my midwife was across the country on vacation until July 1st, her apprentice was in Kentucky for a wedding. I called my midwife friend Michelle because I thought she was my backup midwife. I was mistaken or misinformed. Michelle helped calm me and gave me Debi Church’s phone number, she was to be my backup midwife. I had only ever met Debi once at the recent birth fair. I had heard good things about her, but it was unnerving for me to be prepared to use a midwife that I did not know.
My Dad called me to see how I was doing. He knew I was scared because of the tone when I had first talked with him. He made me laugh when he said he had googled, “bloody show.” I just couldn’t imagine what he was finding, but he knew that meant the baby would be coming soon. He asked me to please go to a doctor if I felt the need. I reassured him that at 37 weeks, I was good to have a home birth. He said he understood, but as my Dad, he was still concerned for me. He asked if he could do anything, but I told him no, I would be okay.
Amy came over and helped me get the hose attached. I was all over the house, gathering supplies and trying to keep my adrenaline up, invoking the fight or flight response so that this baby would not come quickly. I was so thankful that Amy came over. She helped keep me calm. I was having pressure waves, but nothing I could not handle. She asked if i wanted to listen to fear clearing, but I said no, not until Damon got home. I laid on the couch watching Netflix, Amy sat nearby reading. Nick woke up and asked me to go lay down with him. I did but didn’t want to stay in there. He ended up coming into the living room with us for a little while. I finally did get him back down. He would not go to Amy. I went and took a shower, figuring it might be awhile until I could. Damon arrived home around 6:30 am. I was so thankful he was home. I continued to lay on the couch, using my finger drop technique any time a wave came. Damon went and laid down with the boys.I sent a message to the babysitter that the boys would be staying home. I texted my boss saying I wouldn’t be in to work that day. I was not going to repeat Nick’s birth and have to drive home in labor. I decided to try and sleep, as it was 7 am or so. I told Amy she could go home if she wanted, nothing was really happening. I put on the deepening track, put my wet towel over my face and tried to relax. When the hypnosis track was over, I took the towel off my head and saw Amy had left me a card saying to call whenever I needed her.
Nick woke up and was banging on the bedroom door, wanting out. I hoped Damon would get up and let him out but he was asleep. I made pancakes for Nick and I to eat. I was starving. Then I called Michelle to thank her for talking to me in the middle of the night. We had a really nice chat. Around 10 am, Damon took over caring for the boys and I laid down to rest, finally listening to fear clearing again, for the second time in about thirteen hours. I slept until 12:30 pm.
To be continued…..
