The Birth of Eden - After thoughts

I'm finally coming around to do the last part of Eden's birth. Congratulatuions if you've made it this far!
I hope to answer most of yall's (Texas is rubbing off on me) questions here.

I wrote my birth story for the one and only purpose of wanting to share my experience. I was NOT trying to convince anybody of anything, promise. Don't come yelling at me if you decide to go natural and you end up having the most painful birth ever!

Perhaps you're wondering why Eden's birth was so healing to me. I know a lot of people who had much more traumatic experiences with birth than I ever did, I actually had a good birth with Luca. But Eden's birth brought healing from things I didn't even know I needed healing from. I needed healing from not recognizing my baby. I needed healing from thinking my baby didn't like me. I needed healing from Doctors telling me I was pre-destined to have such a horrible condition (Obstetrics Cholestasis) and that it would only get worst with each pregnancy. The problem with Cholestasis is not just the itching, but your baby has higher chances of being still born if you have it - we're talking dead babies people! I felt so BROKEN when I heard this.  I needed healing from feeling scared. I needed healing from too many changes all at once, I needed healing from things just not working out. I needed asnwered prayers. Eden's birth was the most beautiful end to such a difficult year.

And then you might think I have a crazy high pain tolerence. But let me tell you a secret, at Luca's birth I was a total whimp! I begged for the epidural before I was even 5 cm dilated. Because when you're in the hospital it just... hurts more (I don't know how to put it better). I know a big part of it is because I was on Pitocin, but another huge part of it is because, once at the hospital, I just get all tense, and that plays a huge part on how painful contractions will be. You have the monitors and IVs hooked up on you, nurses checking for dilation all the time and then you start to get worried labor won't progress or something will go wrong. There is not a lot of things you can do to cope with the pain at the hospital, you might have a long detailed birth plan, but once you're in there, chances are you're going to deliver laying flat on your back.

Now for Eden's birth: I was super relaxed the whole time. I was visiting in my living room with family for most of my labor. A contraction would hit and I would concentrate and then I would go back to the conversation like nothing had just happened. And then I got to this Bed and Breakfast and was having a good time with hubby in this super nice, cozy room getting excited to meet my baby girl. Then they put me in this awesome jacuzzi tub when things got painful.
I'm having a hard time trying to explain how much of a difference being in a loving confortable environment versus being in a hospital makes as far as pain goes. It might be sufficient to say that looking back, I was way more unconfortable at Luca's birth than I ever was with Eden's. And with Luca I had the epi super early and with Eden I went all the way natural. I totally reccomend this book, it explains a lot about how your mind cotrols your labor.

I never plan on going back to delivering at hospitals (unless, of course, I need to for medcial reasons), but if I do, I'm so getting the epidural again! (Gasp!) I just have no intention of going through the pushing part of labor in land (not in the water). The water was so soothing and conforting, it really is the midwives' epidural! Since there's not much I can do to cope with the pain at a hospital anyways, might as well make myself confortable the way they know how to. (I know plenty of people who had great natural hospital births, this is just my opinion).

Someone asked how long Eden's labor was compared to Luca's. Luca's labor was about 5-6 hours, but I was on high doses of Pitocin. As for Eden's birth, this is a hard question to answer. My midwife called me a "putter, putter, boommer", that means I keep having contractions that lead to nowhere for a while. And then when I actually go into labor things happen really fast! While having on and off contractions might be frustrating, they are actually doing a lot of work softening your cervix and getting baby into position, so then when you actually go into labor things go really smoothly :) So if you count from the time I started having contractions I was in labor for days, but if you count from the time I started having real labor contractions, it was about 6 hours, but for most of those six hours I was watching movies in the living room with my family (I started having contractions at 8pm and she was born at 1:34 am).

Had my midwife not warned me about not waiting too long to go to the birth center, she would have been born in the car! I would've waited until my water broke to go to the birth center, and since baby came 30 min after that, she would have been born in the car! J said it's common for moms who had Pitocin before to wait too long to get to the birth center, because they wait until contractions get to be as painful as they remember from Pitocin, and natural contractions only get that painful when baby is about to be born (in my case, natural contractions were never as painful as Pitocin contractions, and I had the Epi super early in labor).

I didn't take birth classes. Ryan and I read a book J gave us that had a bunch of coping techniques to practice, but I don't think I really used them. I don't want to discourage anyone from taking birth classes, but I think your attitude will play a bigger role on how you'll cope with labor pains than anything. I wanted a birth center birth so bad, but my chances were so slim of ever being able to have one that I never really cared about how much it was going to hurt, I had a "whatever it takes" kind of attitude. When labor started I was just excited and in disbelief that this was really happening. That Inna May's book I mentioned was the most helpful, even though it's not a book on how to deal with labor pains.

Wow it's really late and I need some sleep! Let me know if you have any other questions!

xxx The End xxx