Birth Story: Part 3 – Ashlyn, the One Who Changed Everything

August 15, 2014 / Anne (Grace is my Superhero) / 5 Comments

I was two weeks away from my due date. It was late at night, and I felt a strange gush. I thought my water might have broken, but I wasn’t sure. That had never happened to me before, except at the very end of labor. Labor had not even started, but perhaps it would start soon.

Then I thought back to my first birth when the doctor had broken my water when I was half way dilated. How that had increased the pain! And now my bag of waters was already broken before the first contraction had commenced. Would I have to go through this entire labor with intense pain? Suddenly a tiny seed of fear took hold. During that sleepless night, it sent out invasive roots into my mind that became intertwined with every thought. I couldn’t relax or rest. I was too scared that any moment a contraction would come and assault my body with pain. This may seem very strange if you are familiar with my wonderful previous birth experiences. Why should I be so afraid this time?

My family had been living in an atmosphere of mounting fear for the past few years. We had started going to a new church when we moved to Colorado Springs, 6 years earlier. At first it was wonderful, full of life and joy. Slowly it moved away from the love and forgiveness of God and had begun to concentrate on our personal sins. To listen to our leaders counsel us and rebuke us time and time again, you would have thought we were teetering on the edge of hell. One wrong move and…we were done for! Talk about an atmosphere of fear!

This of course does not sound like the gospel of Jesus Christ at all! Yet there was just enough truth woven into the lies that we continued to try to reform ourselves and gain the approval of our leadership and of God.

Later I realized that I had always had God’s love and approval despite what my church was telling me. God had even told us to leave the church. He had given me a scripture that said, “Do not have sons and daughters in this place.” At the time, I thought He meant that we should not give birth to this child in Colorado Springs, but rather in New York, where some of our church members lived. We tried to move, but it never worked out. We thought we had messed up somehow, but we weren’t sure how. Months later, I read that verse in my journal and the meaning became so clear! I shouldn’t have given birth while under this leadership of fear. But right now I was still in the thick of it, and the panic was holding back the very thing that I most needed…contractions!

The sun rose and labor had not started. I didn’t realize what sorrow was in store. I had no indication that the child within me had a rare chromosomal abnormality that the doctors had never heard of. I had no idea what trauma she would have to endure in the first two days of her life, and how it would hurt my mother’s heart. (This is another story for another time. But don’t worry; this story ends with God’s wonderful redemption, just like every story in the life of a believer.) Yet I had a feeling of impending doom. I tried to shake it off. I tried to find my peace in Jesus, but my mind just kept spinning in fearful circles.

After we ate lunch and there were still no signs of labor, Chris and I decided to go to the hospital. The nurse we talked to said she needed to look at the fluid under a microscope, but I had none leaking out at the moment. The nurse didn’t think my water had broken, and was inclined to send me home, but instead, sent me on a walk and told me to come back in about an hour so she could check again.

Chris and I strolled around downtown Colorado Springs. It was a lovely, sunny day in January, and we walked around the Olympic Training Center. It was so beautiful, and I knew that I should be enjoying the time with my husband, yet my stomach was in knots. I was hoping that the nurse would just send me home and I could go into labor on another day, a day free from this weight of worry. Nervousness kept bubbling over until I started to cry.

Chris tried to comfort me as we entered the hospital again, but I didn’t feel any better. All that walking had released some amniotic fluid, and they confirmed that my water had broken.

“When did it break?” the red-haired midwife named Alice asked.

“Last night around 11,” I answered. It was now getting close to supper time.

The red-head immediately snapped to attention and spoke with alarm.

“What?! Your water has been broken for over 12 hours? We need to start you on Pitocin right away. And we will have to give you intravenous antibiotics to ward off any infection.”

That is not what I thought a midwife would say. I thought a midwife would have faith in a women’s body to do what it needed to do without artificial hormones.

I started to cry uncontrollably. I was devastated.

“I don’t want Pitocin!” I insisted.

“We have to do it. We have to deliver this baby as soon as possible because we don’t want you or the baby to develop an infection. But we will start the drip slowly.”

I was taken into a birthing room and hooked up to monitors and a Pitocin drip. I couldn’t stop crying. My dream of a natural birth was being taken from me. I had talked to other women who had Pitocin, and their reports had included hard, heavy contractions with intense pain…in one word – torture.

The nurse looked at me with my snotty nose and puffy red eyes. She seemed annoyed, as though she would rather not deal with me at all.

“We will give you one round of antibiotics now and another around midnight.”

“What if I have the baby before midnight?”

I had gotten on her last nerve!

“You are NOT going to have this baby before midnight,” she snapped. “You are not even in active labor. It takes lots of hard contractions to birth a baby. You probably won’t even have this baby before morning.”

I should have realized that I knew a lot more about birthing babies than she did. After all, I had already had three, natural, wonderful births. In my fearful, emotional state, however, her words pushed me into depression. I saw a night of agonizing pain in front of me and I saw no way out of it. I wished that they could just do a C-section and be done with it. I didn’t know how to labor under the influence of Pitocin! I just wanted to die. Death would be better than what I would have to go through.

“And if I do get through this alive,” I thought, “I am never having anymore babies!”

Chris could see that I was falling apart.

“You are so upset because you are not in control. You just need to give up control and trust God! God is in control, and it is going to be just fine,” he said.

A small flame of faith was lit in my heart. I relaxed a little and tried my best to trust in God. It was 5:40 and I was only at 4 cm.

Our friend Chris came to the hospital and brought my husband Chris some supper. She encouraged me to fall into the arms of Jesus.

“Pray, ‘Whatever it takes, I will do it and trust you,” she said.

I prayed that prayer and surrendered. I was starting to feel more peaceful. Around 8pm the contractions started in earnest. At first they were surprisingly painful.

“If it hurts this much when I am only 4 cm dilated, how will I make it when I am at 8 or 9 or 10?!” I asked Chris, despairing again.

“Don’t worry about that. Just take them one at a time.”

My wise and loving husband got me back on track again! I finally remembered to relax during each contraction. I would lean over the bed and let my belly drop and hang loose. I would relax my arms, then my legs, and finally my face muscles. Instant relief!

The grumpy nurse had ended her shift, and she was replaced by a solemn and worried looking nurse. This new nurse wanted me to get into bed so she could check my cervix. I hated lying in a bed; it was so uncomfortable! As soon as I lay down, however, I uttered to everyone’s amazement, “I have to push!”

I gave one push and the baby’s head was visible! The midwife ran out to get Alice. The midwife ran in and said, “Wow, it was a good thing I didn’t go home for supper like I was planning on! Alright, let’s have this baby!”

I was able to quiet myself and hardly push at all. It was like a moment in a movie when everything is in slow motion, and you are aware of every small detail. I could feel her little head crowning and easing out so gently on her own, without much extra effort on my part. And then she was born! So quickly, so easily! I was in awe! Instantly the worry and fear gave way to relief, joy and overwhelming gratitude! I had made wrong decisions. I hadn’t trusted God. I had descended into the depths of despair, and God had reached down and pulled me out! And in His great mercy, He had given me a fast, smooth birth. It was 8:20pm. God had proven that grumpy nurse wrong! I was holding my sweet little Ashlyn Autumn, “God’s Vision for the Harvest” and I was content!

I learned that fear is the enemy of labor, and Jesus is the enemy of fear. Rest in Him! Trust in Him! He can always turn our nightmares into a sublime Vision of His Goodness!

Birth Story: Part 2 – Cole, the Easy One and Cadin, the Firecracker!

August 13, 2014 / Anne (Grace is my Superhero) / 1 Comment

I was watching my 17 month old girl play on the jungle gym while talking to my friend, Chris.

“So you can keep Areli for me while I am in the hospital?” I asked.

“Sure, we are looking forward to it. We go to Mexico next week, but we will be back before your due date. You don’t think you will go early, do you?” Chris asked.

“Oh, no,” I said. “My midwife says she thinks I will go to my due date or maybe after. I think so too.”

When I found out that I was pregnant for the second time, I had returned to the same OBGYN. I was pleasantly surprised to find that he now employed a midwife who he also happened to be married to. They worked well together, even though she seemed much more naturally minded.

I was excited to have another baby, and I felt peaceful about waiting a few more weeks before I met the precious bundle and learned who was kicking in my belly.

Later that week, I began having Braxton Hicks contractions in the afternoon. It couldn’t be labor yet, but that got me thinking. I hadn’t even packed my bag for the hospital yet! I waddled around the house to gather all the necessary supplies, up the stairs and down the stairs and then up the stairs again. Every twenty minutes I was having a contraction. I called my midwife to let her know. She told me that it probably wasn’t labor and that I should sit down, prop my feet up and drink a big glass of water. As I was doing that, my husband, Chris, returned home from working at the Olive Garden. We sat on the futon together as I gulped down water, and my contractions actually started coming faster! We had to come up with a plan B babysitter for Areli since our friends were still in Mexico!

In a few short hours my midwife met us at the hospital and checked my progress.

“You are 5 cm already! Looks like you ARE going to have a baby today, two weeks early!” she announced.

I was overjoyed! I looked at the clock and it said 7:30pm.

I prayed, “Please Lord, let me have this baby before midnight!”

The contractions were beginning to feel more intense, so Chris helped me get set up in the shower stall with a birthing ball and a hand-held shower head. I sat and pelvic tilted slowly on the ball. I held the warm water right on my gigantic belly. The intensity of the pain almost seemed to melt away and run down the shower drain. I was so comfortable and so happy that Chris left the bathroom to continue watching the football game that he had started at home. I was glad he could keep busy doing something he enjoyed. Chris and men in general are usually a bit impatient. I firmly believe that a woman midwife will be a much better support at a birth than a man doctor. I know that there are some amazing exceptions to that rule, but… men like to control and protect. They like to take action and be proactive. Labor is all about waiting, trusting, and letting your body and your baby do what they were created to do.

After an hour or so, Chris popped his head into the bathroom and asked how I was doing.

“Good,” I responded rather sleepily. I was so relaxed! “How is the game?”

“It’s a good game, but I can’t believe you are asking me about football while you are in labor!”

Probably another hour went by and Chris was back.

“The midwife wants to check you.”

“OK, after the next contraction, I’ll come out. I am just so comfortable here.”

I wanted to stay there forever, but I dried off and made my way to the hospital bed. The midwife checked me and I was at 10 cm! All of us were a bit shocked! I had totally missed the fact that I was in transition because I was so incredibly happy in the shower!

I gave one good push. Intensity!

“Jesus, help me! Jesus Help me!” I called out.

I gave one more push and HE was born, our little Nobleman and Victory of the People, Cole Patric!

I looked at the clock and it was 10:35pm. God sure answered my prayer with time to spare. I was blissful!

My midwife kissed me on the check and said, “That was a beautiful birth. You have babies so easily, you should have a dozen!”

“Well, we think we want at least six.”

Looking back years later, that was one of my easiest birth experiences. My emotional state during each pregnancy has a lot to do with how labor goes. This time I was very peaceful and relaxed. When labor came early, it was a surprise gift I was more than happy to receive. My mind and body were ready to let that oxytocin flow!

Cole was almost two when I was three weeks away from my due date with baby number three. This time we knew he was a boy. I was feeling very uncomfortable, and I thought the baby was sitting very low. Since Cole was two weeks early, I thought that this baby would be early as well. Maybe even three weeks early since he was so low already. I started a bad habit that all extremely pregnant women should avoid. Every morning I woke up thinking that this was THE day! I would think every Braxton Hicks contraction was the beginning of labor and start timing. I would hope and pray for labor to start, RIGHT NOW! Chris would talk to my belly and tell the baby to come out NOW. Every night that I would go to bed still pregnant, I was sad and disappointed. I was becoming more uncomfortable and impatient with each passing day. I didn’t realize it, but my body was becoming rather stressed and tense.

This went on for two weeks until I woke up at 4am with a strong contraction. I couldn’t go back to sleep because they kept coming every 20 minutes.

“This really could be the day!” I thought excitedly. Still, I didn’t want to wake Chris up and cause a fuss for no reason. When he got up to get ready for work, he noticed that I was timing contractions. As soon as he realized what was happening, he called his mom to come get Areli and Cole.

When Chris’ mom arrived, Areli and Cole were ready, but my contractions had completely stopped. I felt awful for having Corrine take a day off of work and drive all the way to our house for a false alarm. Corrine decided to take them home with her anyway. Chris decided to go to work. I was home alone with nothing to do but read and wish that labor would start again.

The entire day passed with no more contractions. Chris got home from work and announced that we should go out on a date since we didn’t have the children. We went to one of my favorite restaurants, and wouldn’t you know it…contractions! By the end of the meal, I was leaning over the table and breathing through them!

We got to the hospital at 10pm. I got into the shower straight away and expected that same comfort I had received last time. Only this time there was something wrong with the hospital’s hot water. There was none, or only a trickle in between bursts of cold. I was shivering uncontrollably, and miserable, yet I didn’t want to give up!

“You need to get out of there!” Chris told me as he gently forced me to dry off. I got dressed again and sat down on the rocker. This was definitely not as soothing as a warm shower, and I wasn’t happy about it. The painful hours ticked by. I noticed that Chris was dozing off in a chair on the other side of the room.

“Don’t go to sleep! Don’t leave me!” I said, pitifully.

“I am just so tired, I can’t stay awake.”

“Yeah, but I have to push a baby out before I can go to sleep!”

It was the middle of the night. My wished I could just forget all of this giving birth nonsense and just go to sleep! Yet my body had other ideas, continuing the work of bringing the baby down into position. I had to stand up and lean over the bed to get some relief.

All of a sudden an incredibly urge overpowered me.

“I need to push!” I said to the midwife on call, who happened to be standing right next to me at the moment.

“That’s alright. You can start pushing standing up.”

I pushed and groaned and felt the head crowning!

“I feel his head!” I said even though I could barely talk through the intensity of the moment.

Chris was very afraid of our son smacking his tiny skull on the hospital floor and the midwife must not have wanted to lie down to deliver. In a split second, the two of them flipped me up on the bed and I was pushing again.

“Wait, I’m not ready.” I heard the midwife say. But it didn’t matter. Cadin Christopher, our confident Follower of Christ, was born. He burst into this world like a firecracker at 3:20 am on the Fourth of July!

I Love a Good Birth Story: Part One – Areli Endura

August 12, 2014 / Anne (Grace is my Superhero) / 2 Comments

I love hearing about the miraculous journey that brings a new baby into the world. I adore talking with a mother of a newborn to hear her entire story. I enjoy reading about births, and I must have watched about 30 episodes of “A Baby Story” on TV. But 15 years ago, when it was time for me to give birth for the first time, I had none of these inspirational and informational stories under my belt. I was young and rather clueless.

I got married at 20 and had my first baby at 23. The birth of my first child was the first birth I had ever been to. I didn’t have older sisters or close friends who had given birth to talk to, so I didn’t have many stories to draw information from. My husband and I did attend a birthing class while I was pregnant, and I learned a lot. They showed us a video of three births. Wow! Talk about graphic and horrific and wonderful all at the same time. Still, I wasn’t scared to give birth. I figured that women have been giving birth since time began and if they all could do it, I could do it too! Many women have very easy labors, and maybe I would be one of them. Maybe I wouldn’t even feel much pain at all!

I quit my job as a bank teller two weeks before my due date. I spent those two weeks cleaning every inch of the house, taking walks, taking naps, and enjoying some alone time. Finally, I had done everything I could think of to do, and waiting was all that was left as my due date came and went.

Chris and I snuggled on the futon for a three-hour movie that Saturday night. I was getting Braxton Hicks contractions and Chris decided to time them. They came every 20 minutes like clockwork throughout the entire movie. We decided to try to get some sleep since the next day, we might be having baby! I lay down and got comfy in bed, but I just couldn’t sleep. Those contractions kept coming! We headed to the hospital at 3am.

We arrived to find that my doctor was the doctor on call that night. I was thrilled, because I really liked him! He said I was dilated 5 cm (only half way there), and without explaining or asking my permission, he pulled out something like a knitting needle and broke my water. Experience has taught me to keep the bag of waters intact as long as possible. Boy did the contractions become intense after that!

I sat in a rocking chair and just rested with my eyes closed. When a contraction came, I felt like my entire body would cramp up, and I couldn’t relax it. Chris encouraged me to try all the wonderful positions we had learned in birthing class to bring the baby down. All of them made the pain worse! So I resumed my post in the rocking chair as my mother-in-law and a dear friend of the family looked on.

The sun began to rise and the contractions started to come one right on top of another. I never cried out, but sat as still and relaxed as possible, breathing slowly and deeply.

“Do you think you want to push?” asked my mother-in-law?

“I don’t know.” I said. I really didn’t know anything about giving birth or pushing. Now I could tell you that I was in transition and that the baby would be coming soon. But at the time, I had no idea whether it was going to be 5 minutes or 5 hours until I was ready to push.

They called the doctor in and he confirmed that I was completely dilated and could start pushing. He had me lay in the bed and push with every contraction for 1 hour and a half. Most exhausting work I had ever done! With subsequent births I have learned that it is best to wait to bear down until you really feel the urge, rather than start pushing with all your might as soon as your doctor gives you the go ahead. I was unsure what the urge felt like, yet when it comes…whoa baby!!! Heaven and earth couldn’t keep you from recognizing and obeying that powerful force. Using gravity to help the baby descend is another great idea. Standing, swatting, or kneeling are great positions! When that baby is in just the right position, your body and the baby work together in a beautiful dance of spirit, hormones, and love. It is glorious when you don’t even need those red-faced, blood vessel bursting efforts. Without much exertion at all, your baby will slip from you quickly and peacefully. But I am getting ahead of myself and telling a different birth story!

This time I didn’t know any of that, so I was in bed on my back pushing for a very long time. The doctor gave me a local anesthesia and an episiotomy before the baby emerged. Again, he did not explain or ask; he just did it. I would recommend not doing those things and talking about it with your doctor beforehand. The postpartum pain was 10 times worse and the recovery time was 10 times longer than with any of my other 7 births.

But I wasn’t even thinking about any of that at that moment! No pain, no worries…just joy and excitement and bliss!

“It’s a girl!” I heard someone announce at 9:21am on Palm Sunday.

The precious dark-haired princess latched on right away and nursed for the next hour. I was so happy and complete. I was holding my Areli Endura, “Heroic Lioness of God with Endurance.”

My doctor visited me the next day.

“You had a wonderful, natural birth. It was good for the nurses to see that.”

I marveled at his comment. I thought my birth was pretty normal, but perhaps not, if the nurses were not used to witnessing a birth like mine. I have since learned that most births do contain some interventions and medications that often lead to complications and other interventions. As the years went by, I started collecting birth stories from other women and a common thread emerged.

PAIN! Intense pain that would push the woman to submit to any procedure recommended in an effort to escape it. This was a little curious to me. Sure, I had experienced the worse pain I had ever felt in my entire life! Yet I never felt like I couldn’t handle it, and the thought of medication never enter my mind. Why? I just don’t think I experienced the pain that most women do when giving birth. But why, I kept asking myself.

Then I remembered a teaching tape I had listened to before I was ever married. The preacher was talking about the verse in Genesis 3:16 that refers to “multiplied pain” in child-birth. He said that it was a curse and that ALL curses were broken when Jesus became a curse and hung on that tree. I could be free from the curse of multiplied pain in childbirth! I prayed that prayer right then and there in my bedroom 4 years before I ever gave birth.

“Jesus, I thank you that you have taken every curse. In your name I break the curse of multiplied pain in childbirth. I will not believe the reports and stories that say that childbirth has to be excruciatingly painful! I will give birth without multiplied pain!”

And it really did work, all those years later without me even actively thinking about it. And guess what? Jesus died to take every curse from you as well! Pray that prayer, I dare you!

The first step to experiencing a natural birth with very little pain is to believe that it is possible! There are hundreds of factors that come into play to determine the outcome of labor. Many of these factors we have no control over whatsoever. But God is in control of everything, and I am convinced that He meant childbirth to be an honor for a woman to participate in with overflowing joy! Jesus suffered pain so that we would not have to. And the pain that we do experience in pregnancy, labor, and motherhood can always be used by Him to bring forth something beautiful!