Birthing Pan
I wrote this birth story 14 years ago, on the eve of Pan's first birthday. Although some of the writing now makes me cringe, I've decided to keep it as I wrote it, because it's how I experienced it.
I had a completely healthy pregnancy with Pan. Everything progressed beautifully towards the midwife-assisted birth we planned to take place in our basement quarters of Sebastian's childhood home. We took a hypnobirthing course together with an instructor in Chicago. We read Ina May and Pam and Penny.
My mom came out to be with us for the baby's birth -- however, we thought the babe might come a lot sooner than he actually did so she was with us for 3 weeks before he was even born. There was a lot of waiting.
I had one night of pretty intense warm-up contractions -- lasting 1-2 minutes each, at about 4 minutes apart for several hours -- that we thought was the big show. But it wasn't. And we waited two more weeks for the real birthing time.
I started having show on the 16th of November, which just felt like FINALLY, something real is happening. It grew heavier over the next day and I was having fairly intense and regular contractions as Sebastian and I ran errands (or rather, went thrift store hunting) for the place we would be moving into after the babe came. At that time, Seb was working a bakery job with odd hours so I had much of the evening to myself (as much as you can have an evening to yourself when you are living with three soon-to-be grandparents who are awaiting the new babe just as anxiously as you are). I remember knitting a bit, maybe listening to a book on tape for a while, until Sebastian got home around 2 AM. We snuggled into bed to watch an episode of The Office, and I pretty much immediately began having really intense contractions.
What was unexpected about these contractions was that they were in my back. They came hard and long and close together and they took me completely by surprise. I didn't even know you could have contractions in your back. I could not sleep and Sebastian went back and forth between timing the contractions with me and drifting into sleep a bit. I went upstairs around 5 AM to tell my mom and Alexandra (Sebastian's mom) that I felt like this was it, and tried to take a shower to help ease the pain in my back. However, the contractions were so intense that I had a really hard time with standing and felt nervous about falling in the shower. Sebastian came upstairs to rest on the couch a bit and Alexandra went downstairs to be with me while Seb took a break. I remember that she had this wonderful concoction that she would mist about the room every so often -- a special birthing blend of essential oils that had frankincense and myrrh and other goodness. She told me that what I was experiencing was back labor and pressed into my back during the contractions. Margaret, our midwife, came around 8 AM.
Something wonderful about Margaret is that she is very good at explaining things in clear, plain language. I'm often helped in tackling my fears just in understanding them and what is actually going on, in facts. When she came, I was really pretty terrified by what my body was doing. It was intense and it hurt terribly. I didn't understand why all of the preparation I had been doing for this birthing time -- all the breathing and relaxation and visualization -- wasn't working. I felt defeated, and we had only just begun. But Margaret explained that the babe was posterior and that my good big pelvis was actually allowing him just too much room to dig in -- and that is why it hurt so bad in my back. She set Sebastian and I up in a position where he kneeled behind me in bed and dug his knees into my back while pulling -- really, really hard -- on my hip bones to open me up during the contractions. Every couple of hours, she gave us a variation of this position to try. We spent some time in the birthing tub, some time on the commode (we had set up a commode down in the basement so I wouldn't have to climb the stairs every time I needed to use the bathroom -- this was probably the most used object throughout the whole birth).
Honestly, I feel as though Sebastian worked as hard as I did during the birthing time. I leaned on him hard, both physically and emotionally, and he was so solid. It wasn't easy, trying to both dig into my back and pull on my hips while in the water, but he held tight and pushed hard during each contraction I had for the three hours we were in the birthing tub. I was scared pretty much the whole time, my confidence in myself completely drained. And he held me, and told me I could do it, that I was doing it. One of the best positions Margaret set us up in involved me sitting on the commode (a brief note on the commode -- this was my favorite place to labor. With each contraction, I was leaking a bit of fluid and had a strong urge to pee at the peak of it. Sitting on the commode felt like the most natural place to be when my bodily functions were acting as such) and him sitting across from me on a chair, face to face. During the contractions, he would push back on my knees as hard as he could and we just looked at each other, never breaking eye contact, breathing in sync. We did this for over an hour.
I didn't really experience the typical signs of transition (I felt fear during the whole labor, so that never seemed to be an indicator of transitioning). I think there was a brief point of relief in the contractions, but it didn't last too long. The birthing time really started moving along around 4:00 PM, when Margaret was having a difficult time getting a heartbeat on the baby and we realized he was in a distressing position. She convinced me to leave the commode for an all-fours position on the bed, and I HATED this. I insisted on moving back to the commode and as soon as I sat down, my waters broke. We had been uncertain about whether they had broken before, because I was having continual leaking, but this was definitely the real thing. Such a surprising pop and gush -- right into the commode! They were clear and fine, which was good to hear, but we were still concerned about the baby's heart rate and position. Margaret told me I needed to push, and I had no idea how to do this. I didn't want to do it. I gave some grunting nudges, which must have been enough to get the babe down and in a safer spot.
When it came time to really push, my body completely and totally took over. I was actually trying to resist the pushes -- but my body convulsed and bore down of its own will (which is a really good thing). Because I wasn't trying to force push, but rather just let my body do the work itself, it only took three pushes to get the babe to crown. During these pushes, I yelled. Big, ringing, make the room vibrate yells. Everyone (at that point, Margaret and her assistant, Violet, my mom and Alexandra, and Sebastian were in the room) was a bit in awe of these big yells. I was in awe of these big yells. I didn't quite realize they were coming out until they were -- much like the pushes. They grew with the intensity of the push. And then the head came through, and with one last push, Pan shot out, bright pink, arms pumping, screaming right down to the floor.
Pan Rainier: Born at 5:10PM on November 18. 8 lb 14 oz. A perfect 10 on the apgar scale, immediately.
It was exhilarating. After he came out, it was as if the last 15 hours hadn't happened. Such a huge rush of joy and relief and awe.
I had torn fairly bad, due to a previous injury I had, and Margaret ended up stitching me up (very gently, I must say) by candlelight with a head lamp as the electricity went out just as she was starting. But with all of that, it was a very beautiful birthing experience. It was the hardest thing I had ever done, and it was scary and painful. But my strongest memory of it all is in color, in the warm glow of the candles that Sebastian lit all over the birthing space. My recollection of the details is a bit shaky, but I can tell you how it felt, how intimate and gorgeous of an experience it really was.
And I can tell you how gloriously happy we were -- and are -- to have this little Pan come into our lives.
