The birth of Valentino.

Giving birth to Valentino

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Wednesday January 28th

cue epic music

To preface… my birth plan was to give birth at home with my husband as my main support person. One of my best friends Rachel was due to fly in on the 21st to support us postpartum with clean up and cooking. If I desired a female presence/support while in labor, I could call Rachel over. The flexibility of this plan felt so good!

On Wednesday Jan 28th at about 42 weeks or 10 moons after my 2nd miscarriage (what I considered my last bleed or LMP) my waters broke in the middle of the night- or 12:30 am. I had gotten up to pee and there was a pop sensation that sort of hurt. When I looked in the toilet there were green streaks of liquid, which I knew was meconium. I felt so much peace and adrenaline, so I started lighting candles around my home. Almost immediately I began to have sensations in the front of my pelvis right above my pubic bone. I had made a birth playlist just the week before because I had a spark of inspiration. Instead of what I thought might be a worship music playlist, it turned into an instrumental Avatar/Scottish Outlander medley. Quite epic. The journey began with me dancing and crying with gratefulness, that indeed I had carried a baby to term and was going to meet baby soon. My hubby woke up and came out to greet me in the candle lit living room. I excitedly said, “My water broke!” 

Fairly quickly my contractions were less than 10 min apart and the sensation felt like stabbing right above my pubic bone. Over the next few hours into the morning light, I moved my body intuitively utilizing the yoga ball, a padded mat, and the birth sling. I continued to leak mildly green fluid and then had a few quarter sized blood clots, which made me curious about placental abruption. So I called a trusted friend/birthkeeper in Oregon about the clots. At the point we spoke, there had not been any clots or bleeding for over an hour. I felt the baby actively moving and after we spoke, I felt confident continuing at home and being on watch for any more clots or excessive bleeding, which thankfully there wasn’t! 

To be honest, the next 24 hrs I can’t really remember. I do know that we ran out of bottled drinking water and I really wanted a smoothie! Blessed Rachel brought that over and dropped it on the porch. My hubby says into the night I just kept changing positions and tried to rest between contractions. The sensation was excruciating and remained right above my pubic bone. I was very vocal this WHOLE labor, and when I say vocal, I mean mostly screaming high pitch and out of control. 

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Thursday January 29th

start the car

Arriving at around 8 am on Thursday the 29th… Rachel was set to bring us breakfast, and she brought another smoothie. Yay! At this point my hubby and I were both exhausted and exacerbated, so Rachel stayed for emotional support. Things shifted and I began to feel a very tight contraction on my mid-back that unfortunately did not ‘come and go” like the sensations I had known. This was so overwhelming to me because now I had the front contraction coming and going and one in my back that never seemed to stop. Since I was so confused by this, as a birthkeeper myself, I ended up facetiming a different friend/mentor of mine who is a traditional midwife in Arkansas. She was very encouraging, asking me questions and assuring me that she had seen this a few times before. She ended up staying on the phone with us for a few hours on and off and dosing me with some homeopathy. I also texted my Chiropractor, Kate, to see if she could come over and do an adjustment. She did come, praise God, and literally put me in a trance while sitting upright on my couch. For about 30 minutes the back contraction stopped, but then came back with a vengeance.

By the late afternoon, we were approaching 40 hours and I felt like nothing had really shifted regarding the baby engaging in my pelvis. My trad midwife friend on the phone sent us some position pictures differentiating what position to try for the level the baby is at in the pelvis. It felt as if the baby's head had been sitting on on my pubic bone since the minute my water broke.  At this point my support team was really encouraging me to try some of the positions I hadn't tried yet to see if things could shift. This is where I hit the end of my emotional, physical, and mental capacity. I stopped all of them and voiced to them all that I wanted to go get an epidural at the hospital. My reasoning at the moment was that I could not go forward not knowing how much longer it could be in the state that I was in. The thought I had was “If I keep going like this, I will be traumatized and never want to remember or relive this experience. And I want to remember it as “beautiful” and good.” In that moment I felt SO clear and so empowered in my ability to know exactly what I wanted and what that could entail. Many things went through my mind here… finances, what I was giving up, and the risks of entering the hospital system at this point in my labor. Everyone was supportive and my hubby was relieved there was at least a plan going forward that looked different than what we’d been doing. He started packing a bag and started the car.

Three NEW things were done around this time, truly a miracle it seemed, and everything shifted!! One- I sat on the couch leaning back and pushed above my pubic bone SO hard (trying to push his head down and under the bones). Two-during a contraction my friend Rachel did an “abdominal lift and tuck” from the front. Three-I sprayed Rescue Remedy, a flower essence for shock, in my mouth. Then I got up and went to my bedroom (for the first time in 40 hours) to grab something to bring to the hospital (I think it might have been my “sexy” period underwear that I ordered special for postpartum LOL). In my room I had another contraction, but noticed something was different, the baby had engaged in my pelvis!!! I immediately shifted from screaming high pitched to moaning low, and saying “wow, wowwww, that’s a lot of pressure!” instead of a blood curdling, “Jesus why? Or Fuuuu****” Also, the sensation was very tolerable and the back contraction had ceased! Rachel was in the room across from me taking pictures. And my friend was still on FaceTime at this point, with the phone being placed right in front of my vagina. (LOL not that I wanted it there but that’s where the phone got placed). It was about an hour and a half of what I would describe as allowing my baby to come down with every contraction (not really pushing). A lot of this time I had my fingers in my vagina feeling the head come down with every one. As his head crowned I literally felt my vagina tearing open. I remember asking “is the head out?!” Rachel grabbed my hand and guided me to feel it, saying “his head is out and his body is right there!” I had sort of dissociated at this point, after having a lot of clarity while he descended. I reached down and pinched his shoulder/arm and pulled him out onto the pad below. He flopped like a fish and immediately cried. I grabbed him and turned him over and saw he was a BOY and said “I knew it.” David cried in sweet relief and we laughed relishing in the sound of his little cry.

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The Placenta and Healing

spoonful of honey

I pushed my placenta out on hands and knees with a contraction 40 min after birth. I sat there on the floor and felt super weird. My heart felt like it was pounding out of my chest and like I couldn’t speak. This was the first time through this whole process that I felt fear. After a few seconds in my head reminding myself to breathe, I finally got the words out that I felt weird and needed a spoon full of honey. Rachel brought the jar and I downed two spoonfuls. I felt much better within a few minutes, then got cozy on the floor pad and breastfed in bliss.

We kept the placenta and his cord attached (called a Lotus Birth), did a blood placenta print on watercolor paper within 24 hrs, then preserved the placenta in a bowl with salt and fragrant herbs. What was very inconvenient and annoying at times turned into something very sacred. We replayed the peaceful birth playlist on repeat those first few nights and wept over and over again at this miracle blessing God had gifted us with after waiting almost 9 years. Something I’ll never forget is my husband weeping, his tears dropping into the placenta bowl, as if his gratefulness poured out for this incredible process of pregnancy, birth, and new life. With those tears he also released fear and grief that had been held for many years of infertility and a long hard birth.

Recovering from this birth felt slow because I felt like I got hit by a train. I was decimated in bed for 10 days- my vagina torn and tender and my bones aching with every move. I birthed a perfect son and feeding him was magical. So many years of walking alongside other families, longing to be a mother, it felt like the most natural thing.

The cord fell off his belly button after 5 days. My hubby and I had a spicy encounter (I’ll spare the details) after 2 weeks. I share this because most people don’t talk about sex and pleasure- in general- but especially surrounding postpartum. My tear was fully healed by about 6 weeks naturally. And you better bet I wore those black lacy period underwear. One thing I have to highlight as the BIGGEST blessing postpartum was Rachel making us a 2 week set food menu. She cooked fresh breakfast, lunch, and dinner for us. I don’t know what my postpartum experience would have been like without that..