How my home birth experience fortified me to be the mother I am today…
Being a first time mom I did know what to expect from the birthing experience. Even after reading or listening to others experiences, everyone’s story is different so there would have been no way of knowing how it would be for myself. I gained hints from friends and books… One of the most helpful tips coming from a practical stand point, “ it’s like the biggest shit you’ll ever take.” Turns out… apt. But even if I could fully understand, like many things, I could not fully know until I had had the experience myself. In the end I would just do it and it will be my own unique story.
I realize my story is just another story but my hope is by sharing it, it can inspire, educate, and empower other mothers to be who are curious about home and natural birth as well.
* Disclaimer*:
The need for hospital care for certain pregnancies is very real and potentially life saving. Home birth is not right for everyone; however, if you are at low risk levels during your pregnancy & birth or deemed safe to do so by your birthing team, YOU CAN birth in the comfort of your home, on the timing of your natural rhythms, safely in the hands of highly educated midwives. Even if you are over 35, aka “geriatric”. Your safety is monitored during your whole pregnancy and birthing progress, your midwives will know if this is a safe option for you. Only you though, will know if it is the right option for you.
My advocacy for home birth comes from my experience and reflection. If you get through the whole thing there is also a list of reasons for natural birth from a medical point of view as well.
After watching some water birthing videos in my prenatal classes, my hope was that I too would sit quietly in a pool, like a mediating frog Buddha deep in my spiritual depths, masterfully fighting the force inside… Turns out that wasn’t that case. Insert screaming Amazonian woman. Apparently, it’s called labour for a reason. Who knew? Ha.
…My labour started at night with mild but relevant menstrual like cramps. Heavy at night and then petering out through the day. And they went on then off the next day and the next . I went to the hospital for some morphine to help get some sleep on the second night to help gain enough energy for the heavy labour ahead. By the time my contractions became 3 minutes apart and into the heavy labour, I was 2 nights short of good sleep and food as I had vomited a handful of times throughout those days.
I was anticipating the heavy labour like the feeling that comes when the roller coaster is about to get to the top of the hill but instead of that free falling exhilaration you get, when the hard contractions started, I was hurting. Literally feeling like someone was kicking me as hard as they could in the gut. And with the help of a good play list tears streaming down my face.
One of my midwives said it was like I had been psychologically delaying the labour to protect myself by skillfully withdrawing from the pain. And she was right. Mentally I could control everything I wanted for so long but turns out in the end, birth isn’t that kind of game. You can’t out smart it. You can’t make it on your rhythm or command. You have to SURRENDER (…Ouch that word can be such an ego bruise). So while I wanted to birth like a peaceful Buddha, the reckoning was coming. It’s hard to describe but as the waves of contractions came rolling in, I was brought to my knees to bow and surrender to a force greater than my self. The animalistic ancestral wisdom of my body knew what to do. “ I” needed to relinquish my need for control. I kept checking in with the midwives to know what was happening but the knowingness did nothing whether it was happening to my body or not. The baby was coming out no matter what.
Into “labour land” I go. Like a primordial trance. It was not a mindful choice, not an induced medical drug, it was my body colliding with creation much like the moment of conception during sex. Sex is an highly animalistic act. Birth is animalistic act. Hormones taking over your body and heart and mind are in an altered state. Sex can be a very divine act if feeling emotionally connected. Birth can feel like a very divine act if emotionally connected.
At some point at birth, typically there is a moment where the women feels like they can’t do it. After the first 4hrs. of heavy contractions I remember keeling over on the floor & feeling like it was hopeless like I couldn’t continue – literally actually suggesting going to the hospital for an epidural – Which in hindsight even if it had given me some relief – the effect of transportation and transition into the hospital in full labour would not have been worth it – instead, as planned with my doula and midwives we tried two more ways of soothing to see if it would help before making a decision. With my teams support I was able to push through. No pun intended.
When it was time to push a sense of relief washed over me that the end was near and I humbly felt in the drivers seat again -> This baby was coming out and I felt empowered. Pushing was fast and furious. Squatting, labouring on the toilet (its the place where we know how to push the best ;), and on my back. Over and over. I could not stay still my whole labour. I am a mover & moving helped me work through the pain.
After two hours of this and then gracefully been lead through the final contractions while our baby was crowning, She was there. The baby I knew and felt inside me for the last 9 months was safely in my arms. We were hers and she was ours. Our world was forever changed. She was birthed into this world and I felt my husband and I were carried through a journey that also birthed us as parents.
My physical body morphed from some sort of pear shape to my previous form in 10hrs (hard labour and pushing) in a wild ride.
In those 70hrs (early labour, hard contractions, and pushing) my husbands heart, nervous system, and physical energy were stretched while he was holding me. And then all, of a sudden his heart, mind, and soul imploding with the sight of his wife delivery his child and literally actually pulling his daughter out into this world.
Those hours delivering your baby are hard work but are quickly lost in the seconds of holding your new child. Apparently the moments after birth are when a women will feel the most oxytocin (the love hormone) in her life.
The best description of unmedicated/home birth I have heard “is walking through the fire”. Fortified like a sword through the flames. There was no turning back in those hours.
My feeling from this experience is that it is there for a reason. When you feel like you have died and been reborn for a person what are the chances you will ever let something happen to it? You will defend it till death. A mother’s love is fierce.
Whether choosing to have a home birth or not my advice is this:
1.) Have a good birthing team – Have a medical professional whether Midwife or Doctor, that you feel is informing you throughly and educating so that you know your options. My midwives and doulas were amazing. The whole way through out pregnancy, birth, and post care I knew my options. Having a Doula can also provide emotional support and practical assistance during pregnancy. Labour is intense so having a team that can help stand up for your choice during the labour and act as your voice to help you navigate choices. I know for myself if I was in the hospital I would have definitely have taken the epidermal but after having my natural birth experience and from speaking with other mothers who have had both experiences, I am so so so glad I didn’t. I know my strength and went to a depth that delivered me to a new height of confidence. I feel my experience gave me a huge leg up going into motherhood. *Also read below on other possible drawbacks below on epidurals.
2). Prenatal classes might help you make more informed choices as well. If you are interested in home or natural birth, seek out centres that offer workshops or info. on those is important.
3). Remember that it is your body that is having a baby not the medical professional or their shift rotation. They are there to support what your body is doing.
Medical Reasons to consider a Home Birth:
From information from my midwives and prenatal classes, as well as other mothers experience:
Intervention often leads to more intervention. Interventions including but not limited to: Induction, Epidermal, C-section, Episiotomy etc. When these things are performed either to make the birth faster or less painful rather than the immediate safety of the mom and baby their intended benefits decrease.
- Induction -> can make labour more intense which can make an epidermal more appealing.
2.) An Epidermal ->It can be excoriating for some mothers to have to stand still while they insert the needle into the spin and are no longer able to be moving around for the rest of the labour once administered (for me moving helped me go through the contractions).
3. C-sections -> In many cases are life saving and undoubtably necessary; However, in other cases where they end up happening from complications from other interventions (that were optional) or the risk level was deemed too high for the doctor instead of the mother, or the time line would taken “too long”, or pain level “too much” C-sections can led to a slew of other consequences. They sometimes can be emotionally jarring or disorientating for mothers as they are no longer the ones delivering their baby while many people are in the room performing tasks and they are left guessing what’s happening with their body and baby while intense sensations and hormones are still going through their bodies.
Too, the time surgery takes from a c- section can also postpone baby kangarooing (skin on skin) time that helps let down the milk. This delay can potentially create more nursing issues which definitely will be more stressful in the early weeks with baby.
Lastly, for both c-sections and episiotomies I have heard from other mothers that dealing with infection from these procedures was the worst part of the whole birthing process.
Also, if you body is releasing an amazing amount of oxytocin and adrenaline after natural birth to bond you with your baby, allowing your body to feel all of it without pain medication, is the best natural lollipop from the universe congratulating you for doing all your good work.
My point is that unless you truly need those interventions for the immediate safety of you or your child… no matter what you do your birth will be painful and or intense. No intervention in and of itself is going to make that untrue but I believe it is going through that experience that you will be fortified as a mother or at least give you a leg up. Often in the western world we are looking for quick fixes and band aid solutions, which can be great, when you have a cut. Not when you are having your child. I can’t help but feel women are too often being robbed of their birth right to go through a ritual that can mentally fortify and prepare for motherhood.
Society has crafted it self to be more and more “comfortable” often in fear and protecting ourself from pain …but at some point we have to realize there is no life worth living without some pain. And let parenting be our biggest teacher on this. Parenting is not an easy ride and the uncomfortable/hard things we will have to do/ do for our children is endless.
Again, I share this in hopes that more mothers are left with a birthing story that empowers them and let them know their strength. Birth trauma is very really and can be more likely when moms are being disconnected from the process itself.
I feel lucky to have been able to have a home birth. I feel like it was a gift. I felt empowered and amazed after my birth because I knew my depth and what I can do. I was safe at home with my comforts around me, eyes mostly closed in a familiar space, knowing my husband and my birthing team were there to support me and at the end of the labour, my baby in my arms.
I leave you with this:
Words by Words by Catie Atkinson:
What if we told women the truth about birth
We’d have to tell them that contractions will probably be more than “surges” or “sensations.”
That they’ll probably rock your fcking world and leave you begging for salvation as you clutch the edge of the tub or the hospital linens
That your gentle breathing exercises and your Spotify soundtrack will be left in the dust as you sweat and pant and sway and swear your way through it
That you’ll trip harder than any mushroom you ever did in college and vomit with the same ferocity and travel to places deep within yourself that you didn’t know existed. That you’ll float above your body and simultaneously be trapped in it with an intensity you’ve never tasted
And in that intensity, in the sweating and the swearing and the swaying and the vomiting and the endless hours of contractions crashing down upon you
You’ll find your strength
You’ll find a resilience you’ve never known
You’ll find the power you need for the journey of motherhood ahead
In the messy humanity of it all
You’ll find that you are holy
A portal to the divine
Capable of indescribable miracles
A vessel of sacred life
What if we told women the truth about birth?
We’d have to tell them they are capable of anything
Worthy of being treated like goddesses
Made to walk through the flames
Surf the tidal waves
Dive into the underworld
And come out alive
Not unscathed
Not unchanged
But whole
And healed
And ready to take on the world
If we told women the truth about birth
We’d have to admit that we’ve lied about everything else
And that they are more powerful
More fierce
More capable
More beautiful
Than we’ve ever let on.
If we told the truth about birth?
We’d shatter the world.”
Krista Cameron 