The Faster Than Expected Home Water Birth of Lucia

by S. Bower I’m finally writing my birth story, almost twelve weeks later! I meant to since the week after Lucia was born, but more went into it than I expected! But I am so excited that I finally got my home water birth! I woke up on July 3rd feeling a bit miserable. I had another night of pain in my pelvis, backache, and needing to pee every few minutes, and mild waves that I’d been having for over two weeks! I was planning to take my son to the zoo that day, but I was so tired. My mom came over to visit and brought us breakfast, and I ate almost a whole box of kolaches myself! We took for a walk and joked about how I would probably birth that day since I was already exhausted. But the waves stopped while I was up and moving and the rest of the walk was calm except all the kolaches gave me really bad heartburn. I got really grumpy as the day went, and guessed I was just tired from not sleeping great for several days. I needed to do some paperwork that was already over due, so after mom left and I put my son down for a nap I sat down to fill it all out. I couldn’t focus on anything at all! I gave up after a few tries and laid down to take a nap instead. I woke up to waves that I couldn’t sleep through. I didn’t want to say to the hubby or mom that this was it because I though it was still early and I knew they would both want to come back to the house right then. I started getting the pool ready and moving some birth supplied around. My midwife had suggested we keep the birth kit together with some towels, extra sheets, and other stuff on her supply list, but it had all gotten scattered and now I couldn’t remember where I put everything. I was still so tired, but I couldn’t sleep and laying down was miserable. Finally, I stopped messing with the birth stuff, and sat on my knees by my bed so I could rest against it and lay my head down. I put my a Hypnobirthing affirmation track on and tried to breath through rushes that were really intense. I tried to lay on…

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Postpartum Depression Tried To Kill Me, Community Saved Me

by A. Jones Content warning: mention of traumatic birth, attempted suicide, postpartum mood disorders, unplanned cesarean, and failure to thrive in a newborn. My baby was born in the hospital that was across the street from my apartment. My OB was the first one that came up on my insurance’s website. They were convenient, and I trusted their credentials completely. They knew what they were doing, so I didn’t have to. I didn’t take a childbirth class because my doctor reassured me they only help women who are trying to suffer through without an epidural. I didn’t hire a doula because my doctor promised me they would start an epidural as soon as I had contractions and I would sleep through labor. I came in for an induction on my due date. I never went past 2cm dilation. I had a cesarean for failure to progress. After, a nurse reassured me that I would never have to go through labor again. Any other births would be scheduled surgeries. I had never wanted an intervention free birth, but I felt heartbroken. It all felt wrong. I developed postpartum depression, but didn’t know what was going on. I felt like a failure as a mother as all of my expectations went bust. I tried to kill myself. While I was hospitalized, my husband filed for divorce. I didn’t care. I felt like he and our son were better off without me. The fact that they were apparently doing okay without me cemented the thought. I had every intention of trying again once I was released. While I was still in inpatient care, my incision was not healing well. The nurse who came to help with wound care talked to me while she worked. She told me about her own cesarean, and how traumatic it was for her. She told me about the VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) she eventually had and the support she got from other VBAC parents. No one had talked to me before about how traumatic an unplanned cesarean can be. Everything before had been “but you have a healthy baby”. After a few talks, I broke down crying and released everything that I’d had bottled up since my son’s birth. She taught me that you can love your baby and hate their birth at the same time. She also put a flier for a VBAC support group in…

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Babies Are Not Pizzas: An Interview With Rebecca Dekker

The Birth Mag connected with Rebecca Dekker, PhD, RN of Evidence Based Birth regarding her new book, Babies Are Not Pizzas, in which she shares her own birth experiences. We got the chance to ask her a bit about her journey in writing the book, experiences with birth before having children of her own, and thoughts about how the birth community can do better. Babies Are Not Pizzas is available now here! After years of sharing research through Evidence Based Birth, what inspired you to write about your own story? Rebecca Dekker: So, I’ve shared little snippets here and there. Most people know that I had a first traumatic birth where I was separated from my baby for hours, followed by an empowering birth several years later with a midwife who provided evidence based care. But for the most part, I kept my personal experiences to myself. For example, I did not talk publicly about how my traumatic birth occurred at the academic medical center associated with my own university, where I worked as an assistant professor. I didn’t talk about how I hired an underground midwife, how I had two home births, how I was afraid to go to the hospital for an induction at “42+4” weeks because I knew some of the nurses didn’t like me or my blog, how so many women were experiencing racism and obstetric violence in my home town. The nightmarish stories from doulas and parents in my town just seemed never ending. I poured out all my frustration into the Evidence Based Birth® blog—spending all my spare time reading research, analyzing research, and writing about it for the public. Then there came a tipping point, about 4 years into my blogging journey, when I had to decide—was I going to leave the security of a paycheck and do EBB full-time? Or was I going to continue working for an institution that had indicated they would censor me if I tried to speak up, and that was using pressure, coercion, and force to make women give birth on their backs, in stirrups? I ended up leaving my faculty job, and it was one of the hardest decisions of my life. It was also one of the best decisions of my life. Two years later, after leaving my job, I had begun writing a book. It was meant to be a “Guide to Childbirth,” all…

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The Birth of Nolan Sebastian

by Jasmine Buschbacher It was 1:02pm on Mother’s Day, and surges started off slow and steady coming about 10-12 minutes apart. I decided to lay down for a bit and have a snack to see if they’d wear off. They never did so at around 6:45pm I went outside and took a walk around the block while listening to my birth affirmations. I practiced hypnobirthing for this pregnancy. I always had my relaxation and affirmation tracks with me. I walked around my neighborhood for about 20 minutes and my surges started to get closer together. They were now about 7-8 minutes apart. I called my doula, Katie, to let her know that this was the real deal and that I would call her when it got a lot more intense. I texted my midwife, Anissa, to let her know that surges were consistent and that I would call her when things got more intense. My husband, Jonathan got the kids ready for bed and called our friend over to our house to stay upstairs with them while I labored downstairs. At around 9pm, I called my doula to let her know that I really needed her. She made planned to grab some food and head over. I already talked to my midwife to let her know that it was really go time and that my doula would be heading over. My midwife got to our house at about 10:40pm and surges were still about 7 minutes apart but VERY intense. I listened to my hypnobirthing tracks and just went with my body. I kept thinking about how important is was for me to stay calm and trust my body and my baby. I slept between surges and while awake, low moaned through them. This kept going on for a few more hours. At around 12:16am, surges started to slow down but got WAY more intense. Jonathan, Katie and Anissa stayed close to me and helped me through surges. I put on my birth playlist and just relaxed and listened to music. I started going to the bathroom more frequently so I had a feeling that things were getting close. I had Anissa check to see how dilated I was and was happy to find out that I was 7 almost 8 centimeters dilated. I slept off and on until about 3:30am. That’s when things got super intense. I got up…

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Supporting The Client’s Wishes: An Adoption and a Tubal

by Anissa Sartini LM, CPM All names have been changed for privacy. I first heard about Steph through my insurance biller. I knew she was from another state and had attempted an herbal abortion. When that did not succeed, she decided to give the child to her brother and his husband, who had longed to begin the next stage of their family. She would be staying with them for her third trimester through postpartum recovery. I told my biller sure, pass my info along. I never did hear from them, so I didn’t give too much thought to it. But, months later, Steph called me. Soon after, we had our first prenatal visit scheduled at 29 weeks. When I first met Steph, she had just gotten back from her travels, preferring life on the road to a standard one-place residence. Steph was loud, beautiful, with short thick black hair and covered in tattoos. Her strong and assertive energy greeted me; we bonded quickly and easily. She shared that she had been consistently very stressed, emotional, but excited to meet me and start care. Her blood pressure measured a little high, but we agreed to try some remedies and watch it closely. When that proved insufficient, we tried medication, which held us over for a while. When my assistant and I greeted her at her 35 week visit, her swollen face, high blood pressure, +1 proteinuria, neurologic changes, and 26 pound weight gain hailed us with the very obvious information that her pregnancy had progressed to pre-eclampsia. We did a 24-hour urine test and referred her to a trusted OB. They confirmed what we knew and tried to keep her stable enough to birth at 38 weeks. However, at 37 weeks and 3 days, her symptoms let us know that baby needed to meet her new parents now.  I had met with Steph and kept in touch closely during this time. When the day of birth arrived, something told her she did not want to induce labor. Following her intuition and research, as surely as she knew she did not want this child for herself, she knew she did not want to subject herself or the baby to induction of labor. We discussed the risks and benefits of induction vs. cesarean. “It just seems wrong,” she maintained. “I’d rather have a cesarean. I just don’t feel right about an induction; I…

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