Baby Kenny's POSITIVE water birth story!

There is so much FEAR regarding birth in our culture. People are often quick to tell pregnant women all about the pain and the negative, scary parts of labor... but what about the GOOD? What about the positive parts of it? Are there any beside getting to hold your baby at the end of it?? YES! I want to shout it from the roof tops!   I had a wonderful experience and LOVED giving birth!!  I will write a separate post on the things I did to PREPARE for this to help others hopefully have a great experience too.  In the meantime, here is Kenny's birth story:  (I've included every detail so I can remember it forever! :)

Kenny’s birth story

If I could summarize Kenny’s birth in one word, it would be: WOW.

THE SHORT STORY:
The reason this birth experience was so amazing was because it was so smooth. It was so smooth because I’ve learned the power of listening to your own intuition in life, “trusting your gut” or “following the spirit.”  You know exactly what you need, it’s intuitive and natural. It comes from within your body, your spirit, your mind. You just need to learn to listen and not be afraid act on it. This is true for every aspect of life. I worked hard to prepare myself ahead of time with knowledge, positivity, creating the best environment, etc and I witnessed that pay off, way more than I could have expected. I saw the power of surrounding yourself with positivity and a great support team. And the power of choice; the power of choosing a new, more positive birth experience.  I was able to witness the miracle and the power of the female human body in bringing a baby into the world with minimal intervention, and have the pain be managed as well.  And the entire experience went so fast: The first timed contraction was at 2:00 AM and Kenny was born at 5:51 AM. Holy cow! That is 1/4 the time I spent in labor with Teddy. It was beautiful and wonderful and I’m eternally grateful I could have this experience.

THE DETAILED STORY:
Kenny’s due date was May 22, 2016.  I’d been fairly positive/happy and patient up until this point, continuing to live life like normal knowing he’d arrive when he was ready.  It ended up being 10 days past his due date. The night before he was born, Memorial Day, I had started to get frustrated and slightly discouraged- physically I was feeling pretty good, but emotionally we were just so ready for him to arrive and I didn’t want to feel like we were just “killing time” anymore.  We went to my in laws house for a BBQ. I went out for a walk and said “That’s it! I’m not stopping walking until I’m in labor!” 

   **Also, I had planned on Jon coming for the walk with me and he ended up staying home to watch Iron Giant because he was feeling tired. It made me unusually upset and I was feeling mad (through my walk I re-identified the emotion as I felt mad because I wanted him to come join in connecting together and him helping me move this labor along instead of feeling it was all on my shoulders… Really I was feeling sad that he wasn’t coming, and then really the underlying emotion of THAT was that I was feeling fear- scared of labor and making sure the baby was healthy and everything would be okay, etc.
  ***Several people told me I should just be induced- why was I waiting?  I really, really wanted to avoid it if possible because I’d heard some horror stories. And I genuinely believe in the body’s ability to be able to do this without it.  If I got to the point of being at 42 weeks and it was starting to be a threat to mine or my baby’s health, I absolutely would start looking at other options! But at my check ups, everything was healthy so I trusted my intuition and kept waiting. 

  About an hour and a half later, it was starting to get dark so I headed back. I had a heart-to-heart talk with Kenny. “Look, we gotta work together here. You do your part, and I’ll do mine. We just really need to to come out!” Some people may say you can’t control when you start labor, but in this moment, I really felt connected with him that we were in this together.

 We (Lisa, jon, Teddy and I) went home and Teddy was being real sweet and cute.  He asked if we could snuggle in Mama and Dada’s bed. Normally I don’t want to set bad habits so I stick with his usual bedtime routine in his room. He was persistent tonight and since I knew life would be changing for him soon enough so I said “sure!” and we got all ready for bed and got in our bed to read books, tell stories, and snuggle.  He was soooo happy. And even though he was so tired, he kept turning to look up at me and raise his arm up around me and tuck his head into me to squeeze me and give me a hug and say “mmmm! I love you mama!” with a smile.  He fell asleep between me and Jon. I fell asleep while snuggling and woke up about 20 minutes later with his sweaty head making my arm fall asleep. I lifted up his dead weight, cute little blue and white striped “Zap!” pajama’d body, and put him in his crib.  

   **This is a part of Kenny coming later than expected that ended up being so beautiful which is the connection we got to have with Teddy.  These last two weeks he seems to have grown.. more sweet, more thoughtful, more affectionate.  He shares hugs and kisses and it was like he sensed the magnitude of the change that was coming for our family. I love him so much. He is the sweetest, most special little boy. I’m really grateful for the extra time I spent with him these last few weeks.

After that, I was unable to go back to sleep. Even though I get up and have to pee a lot while pregnant, I'm still able to get back to sleep pretty well so this was not typical. I dinked around for awhile on my phone and ended up posting some funny cartoons on Facebook about the struggles of babies who are past due. Less than one hour after posting that, I went into labor!!

*LABOR BEGINS*

At 2:00 AM I timed my first “real" contraction. It wasn’t very painful but it felt different than the contractions I’d been having the last couple weeks. I timed them for about 30 minutes and they were about 6 minutes apart, with inconsistent pains every 3.5 minutes. I couldn't tell if these in-between pains were contractions or gas pains or something but I thought I'd better page the midwife and check in. She asked about the level of pain and I said I wasn't feeling too much of it so she said “great! Sounds like your labor is starting so plan on calling me/heading up to the hospital when the contractions get a little closer together.”  We hung up and the very next contraction became INTENSE. And the little inbetween pains became obvious contractions!       Before I knew it, I was having intense, drop-me-to-the-floor contractions every 3 minutes! I had woken Jon up at this point and said “I think we need to leave to the hospital like, NOW!” He did a great job of getting us out that door! My mom is in town visiting so we notified her and she stayed home with Teddy who was asleep.  

  **I had an overwhelming mix of emotions at this point. I was so excited that my labor was finally starting! But I was kinda confused by the contractions and unsure if I was going to have a baby 14 hours from now or while on the way to the hospital! I’d been preparing for MONTHS for this moment that was finally here, and now it was going so fast, I couldn’t wrap my head around what the original PLAN had been— all the messages I’d planned to read, the shower I planned to take and make my hair look cute before hand, etc was all out the window! But I had prepared enough that I wasn’t SCARED. I knew I just needed to trust my body and it’d be okay!   I was startled at how I instantly was taken back to Teddy’s labor and the pain associated with that. It’s an emotional scar for me and was pretty traumatizing which is why I prepared so much for this time around. I think I nearly went into shock during these first big contractions because I was scared of the anticipation of what pain could come as this labor progressed. Fear. 

  **While we were making the 15 minute drive to the hospital, I was in the middle of a contraction when we saw this white hairy nasty dead possum in the middle of the freeway. There was no time to swerve and you just heard/felt a “thunk thunk!” as we rolled over it. I was pretty emotional and gasped and turned to Jon and genuinely said with sad eyes “why would you do that??” Hahah. We both cracked up. It was so gross and sad and funny!  Later my mom mentioned she saw a flattened possum and she laughed when I told her it was us!

We arrived to the Legacy Salmon Creek hospital around 3:30 AM and Jon dropped me off at the front where I was on the ground in the parking lot from the intensity of the contraction. A sweet girl brought out a wheelchair and zipped me up to labor and delivery floor 4.  Every single person we interacted with from the minute we got to the hospital was SO nice and helpful! Each one contributed to making the experience so great! This gal kept my mind off things by asking about the baby’s name, gender, telling me I was doing great, reminding me to breath, etc. 

I made it to the water birth room where I met my nurse Christen who was AWESOME. She had a long brown braid and friendly brown eyes, and she knew exactly how to calm me down. She talked with me throughout the whole delivery reminding me to breathe, relax, and even would press her finger in-between my eye brows and force my eye brows to stop tensing during contractions and softly press my shoulders down when they tensed.  She said her shift finished at 6:00 AM and she hoped she’d be here to see the delivery, but in both our minds, there was no way that was actually going to happen.  Kenny pleasantly surprised both of us so she could witness what she described as one of the most beautiful, perfect births she’d ever seen and was so grateful she could be a part of it. 

  **(I learned the importance of surrounding yourself with the right support group for you. It was fate for Kristen to be my nurse as she was just the person I needed, Elizabeth was my midwife and was so calming to be around- she directed me just enough and yet allowed me the respect and space to make decisions too, Jonno was there to emotionally support me but since I had these other two gals, I didn’t need him for THAT piece as much this time around so he was able to set the mood/tone in the room with music, aromatherapy, visuals, etc.)

They checked me right away and said I was 5cm dilated. I had planned on doing a water birth but had been open to anything, depending on what my body needed this day.  The contractions were much more intense than I expected and it was such a whirlwind how fast this was all happening. I told them I wanted the epidural NOW and the nurses said I needed to do bloodwork and have an IV first but they could give me a dose of Fentanyl now. Within two minutes, I felt it take affect and felt much more calm. It took the edge off. I got in the warm tub (there was one tub for soaking and one for birthing) and relaxed. Jon set up stations throughout the room with essential oils diffuser, rocks, Enya, cute Teddy reminders (a car, batman figurine, and a little Piston Cup) and got the Go Pro set up to record. He gave me a blue lapis lazuli rock to hold (it is said to provide strength- it totally worked) that I held pretty much from that point on and draw strength from. My awesome, calming midwife Elizabeth arrived. (She’s got long dark hair, a kind smile, and is pregnant and expecting her baby in July. She has a very calming presence. I'd only met her once before for five minutes which was long enough for me to hope she was the one on call the day I went into labor!) I told Elizabeth I was starting to feel more intensity again and increased pressure and maybe the meds were wearing off.  She said “let’s go check and see how far dilated you are.”  I got out of the tub, laid on the bed, and she said “Okay, looks like you are at 9 CM.” and I said “WHAT?!” This was the complete opposite experience I had with Teddy where I labored for HOURS and only progressed ONE cm. Now I just labored for ONE hour and went from 5cm to 9cm!!  She said “if you’d still like the epidural, we can do it now, but it may or may not have time to take full effect- you’re progressing quickly. I’m not sure we’ll even have time to fill the tub up!”  Holy cow!!  So we decided to get the tub going, forget the epidural, and let’s do this!!

I spent the last 20 minutes or so of labor in the birthing tub.  Jon came over with the Go Pro camera strapped on his head and while I could feel the baby was really low and about time to start pushing, the pain wasn’t nearly as bad as I expected.  My Fentanyl had worn off, but I was OK.  Between contractions I was smiling and so happy that baby Kenny was finally almost here!!  I was so excited!!  (**I had written myself some notes beforehand to read at different parts of labor: “Read THIS when you start labor, Read THIS when you are in the middle of it, Read THIS during a difficult time of labor” etc. I didn’t have time to read them during labor, but I thought about the words several times. I had told myself “REMEMBER to ENJOY the moment, be happy and smile between contractions, and know baby Kenny is ALMOST here! You’re doing great!” It really helped! Also, the supportive and encouraging words from family and friends I had read beforehand too lifted my spirits and helped me KNOW I could do this!) 

A major difference in this labor and delivery vs my first was my ability to listen to and trust my intuition.  This labor flowed so naturally. A big reason it flowed so smoothly was because I didn’t get in my own way, I just listened to what I needed and made it happen.  So when I felt like it was time to push, I trusted that and pushed.  After one or two pushes, Elizabeth said “you can reach down and feel his head.”  Feeling that gave me strength to keep going- knowing I was making progress and he was so so close!  After about three pushes, my water broke = more progress!  It was feeling intense and I knew I could do it but also knew I needed some support. I turned and made eye contact with my midwife and said “Elizabeth..” she knew exactly what I meant and needed.  She directed me with her words to keep going, I was doing great, almost there, breathe through this.  I was tempted to just push and get this over with but I felt like if I pushed too hard and forced it, I would tear. So I allowed myself to be patient and calm. On the next push, his head came out and then the rest of his body.  No tearing, no stitches needed. (With Teddy I had three severe tears that took a long time to heal post-partum.) I lifted this precious baby up from the water and put him on my chest and hugged him.  He was perfectly calm and quiet. His skin was a dark purple color.  I was so happy and then got nervous.. why wasn’t he crying? Was he okay?” I asked the midwife and she said “He is HEALTHY and PERFECT, he is just relaxed and enjoying this moment still being in the warm water with you.”  (Water birth babies are said to have an easier transition into the real world because they’ve been in this warm, wet environment for the last nine months and now they are born into another warm, wet environment so it’s not as startling of a transition.)

He had his eyes open looking around, his purple skin color eventually changed to pink. The first thing I noticed about him was how different his nose looked from Teddy’s and his distinguished “butt chin!” :D  It looked like a little “W.” AND how LONG his fingers were.  He was smaller/skinnier boned than Teddy had been and I knew right away he wasn’t > 8 pounds like I’d expected since he was so much past his due date. His spirit was sooo… sweet.  Calm. Peaceful.  Our hearts were connected. 

   **I’d felt connected with him first when I was about 6 months pregnant and I went to a yoga class.  I finally was in an environment that was quiet and calm enough that I could really connect with him. I felt him kick around and called him my little Yogi baby. :) I knew he was a special guy then and that he would have a more calm, quiet, introverted demeanor in life. Another time later on, I had an experience of dreaming and visualizing my body and seeing my own strong heart beating and then a little tiny red heart quickly beating in the lower right of my tummy and realized how interconnected myself and this baby were.. And the realization pretty soon after he was born that my own heart is still beating, but the emptiness in my tummy where he once was for so long, and there is no longer a second heartbeat there.  **Teddy has loved the idea of heart beats for awhile now too.  Ever since he came with me to Kenny’s first Ultrasound appointment and heard Kenny’s heart beat. He was fascinated by it. Anytime he sees a heart shape, he calls it a ‘heart beat.’  “Mama, can I please have a chocolate heart beat cookie?” :)** 

  I think because I was able to listen to intuition more, I could connect with him in a different way.  Like I wrote earlier, I’d had the heart to heart talk with him just the night before. I know the power in our bond and the strength between us. He has a powerful little spirit.

I sat there in the tub holding my new son, enjoying each second, each moment. This experience had just gone so FAST and it was MAGICAL. I was in disbelief Kenny was really here, I’d just had this incredible, beautiful, nearly PERFECT experience.  Jon had joined me in the tub for the last couple minutes. One of the most special moments is watching the face of your partner hold your baby for the first time. So much love in his eyes as he adores him and in his thoughtful smile. It makes me fall in love with Jon all over again to see him love this baby we created together with love. 

We got out of the tub and got cleaned up. I laid on the bed and held Kenny longer and a few minutes later my mom walked in the room and said “a BABY!” and was surprised!  We had called my mother in law Susie to head over to be with Teddy so my mom could join us at the hospital.  Because I progressed so quickly, there wasn’t time for her to make it. I was really hoping for her to be there because it’s a special gift to be present to witness a baby be born and she does a great job capturing the moment with photos. However, life just has a way of working out..  It ended up being kind of nice to have the intimacy of just Jon and myself there. Who knows if that is one reason it was so perfect is because it was so much more personal. When I was about to start pushing, Jon’s phone was ringing and I could see texts coming in from both our moms.  I started worrying about THEM instead of focusing on being in the moment. I actually felt my pain increase in that moment. I asked Jon to put his phone in the other room so I could stay focused and the pain decreased. 
  **My mom was so great and has been up here the last two weeks and was happy to be home with Teddy or in the hospital room with us, either way, whatever she could do to help. And Susie was so great to zoom over to watch Teddy and brought us treats and flowers to the hospital to greet us and a prize for Teddy becoming a big brother.
  **(When Teddy was born, there were lots of people in the room, even student nurses I didn’t know who came up to me after to tell me “Thanks for letting us watch your waterbirth! It was our first time witnessing one!”  I felt much more vulnerable. I read somewhere that if an animal is in labor in the wild and a predator comes around, the animal will stop their labor and go to a new, safer location then continue. They said humans can be the same way- a labor can begin and progress well, then you get to a hospital and feel scared because of bright lights and people poking at you and strangers staring, and you close up and labor pauses. That made sense to me!)

Later on, Teddy got to come to the hospital and meet Kenny for the first time. I was in the bathroom so I didn’t see their first moment but for months, Teddy has been so excited to meet his baby brother because he was going to bring Teddy some prizes for becoming a big brother!  We had two big bags with three wrapped gifts inside. Teddy opened up a new big talking Tow-Mater toy, a big Lightning McQueen basket car, and a little Chick Hicks car. He was sooo happy and said “THANK YOU baby brother!” and gave him a kiss.  He spent the rest of the time on the floor playing with these cars and eating all the tic tacs Susie had brought. :) The nurses all loved Teddy and his car obsession and fun loving personality and entertainment he provides.  

We handed out Apache Tears rocks my Grandpa Darwin collected and polished along with his instruction card on how to make them work their magic to all the nurses and staff along the way. It brought smiles to everyone’s faces to take a piece of Kenny Darwin home with them!

We love this boy so much and look forward to all our adventures with him in the future!