Birth Story

I was skyping with my wife from work and she said "oh!" - somewhere off camera.  "What?"  I said, - "What happened?"  "Wait a second"  - she said - "hang on."   "Well what happened?" I said. "I think my water broke!"  I knew that it had, and I felt the reality slide over me, as we both shifted into birth mode...   And so it began, again.

"Now what?"  I asked (she was still somewhere off camera).  "Why don't you just wait 'til it's time to pick up Zoe.  You can get her from car pick up and come home."  So that's what I did.  I let the school secretary know that the ball had begun rolling.  I told her I wouldn't be in the following day, and I would work on getting a sub for the day after as well.  As Zoe and I walked to the car, I explained that mommy had begun to go into labor, and we were going home to help take care of her.

When the girls found out they'd be going to visit our friends while their mom had the baby at the birth center, all they could do was keep asking when their "play-date" was going to start.  It was clear that their perspective was practically the opposite of ours.  We were nervous, uncertain and scared about just how things were going to go down.  While they were anxiously awaiting the arrival of their friends - signaling the beginning of their overnight extravaganza.

Emily and I made sure our birth bag, snacks...etc. were packed, along with the girls' overnight bags, all the while stealing constant glances at every clock in our path.  When our friends showed up to pick up Zoe & Teagan, i quickly installed their individual car seats,  waved to the kids as they drove off with huge grins on their faces -  And before we knew it, we were alone with the prospect of the scariest portion of pregnancy staring us in the face.  After a few calls back and forth with our midwife, we gathered our birthing gear, double-checked for key supplies, and headed out for one last meal before our kids outnumbered us.

California Pizza Kitchen was still open, barely.  We sat down and ordered fairly quickly.  Each time Emily got up to go to the bathroom, I found myself following her with my eyes to the bathroom - like a nervous puppy, gazing after its owner.  I knew that after her water had broken, contractions could literally start at any time.  But we had no such luck.  We finished our dinner (a club sandwhich - minus all the meat except bagon, and fish tacos), and headed over to the birth center.

Ashley let us in and we unloaded everything into the cozy room, which - thank goodness -  felt nothing at all like a hospital room.  Everything included an iPod plugged in and playing music of our choosing, and a giant, inflated yoga/exercise ball.  we did a few laps down the hall and back  -  and Em half-heartedly danced around the room.  Around midnight, Ashley came in and  suggested we head home and try to catch some sleep before returning EARLY the following morning. They said we could just leave all our stuff there, so we took them up on it and headed home to an empty house.

The time in our home without our daughters was the most depressing for me.  They add so much light to our home, that being there without either of them just felt wrong.   After sleeping in brief shifts, but not in our bed (while Emily slept even less - if at all...) we took a walk to the end of our cul-de-sac in the early morning darkness.  Then we called Ashley, and let her know that Em had been having contractions on and off.  She told us to head back in.  I heated up a cup of coffee from the night before, we grabbed our stuff and loaded back into the car, hoping that however this goes down -  we'll be coming home only when we have our baby.

Back at the Fruitful Vine, we felt pumped and ready to go.  It was early  - 5:45 am, and we had to wait a bit before Ashley arrived.  Em couldn't wait,  so she peed beside the building.  That made me have to pee.  I was about halfway through when headlights burst across the parking area, causing me to close up shop in a hurry with that frustrating unfinished feeling...  Ashley let us in, and we get resettled into our room.  I headed to the bathroom while Ashley checked out Emily again, then assigned us to do some more walking.  We ambled up and down the mostly dark hallway of the birth center.  As we walked, turning about at the end of the hall every 15 - 20 seconds, Emily continued to mutter encouragingly to herself about how she's done this before, and it will be okay...

Within 5 minutes we were in the space where our daughter would be born only a few stressful, grueling, harrowing, gut-wrenchingly poignant hours later.  The nice thing is that the room was set up as if it were a bed & and breakfast - with soft lighting, hardwood floors, and tasteful but not gaudy furnishings.

Emily stripped down to her tank top and underpants and began moving around.  She would alternate between rocking, pacing, bouncing on the exercise ball, semi-dancing - all the while panting and quietly vocalizing her trepidation about the hard parts to come.  I became engaged in my own compulsive little dance of hovering around her, rushing back and forth for every little need - water, a snack, phone, camera - and dashing to the iPad to hit the Start and Stop button on the Contraction Timer app.  Meanwhile, Sharon showed up along with Laurie (the photographer).

Ashley was to be the main guidance giver, talking Em through each segment of this birth experience, while Sharon was the hands on/in midwife, willing to switch directions and try a new angle if Em showed the least bit of interest to do something different just to feel like progress was being made (not that it wasn't - it just seemed to be taking longer, WAY LONGER, than our first 2 bundles of love).

I was doing my thing of racing to hit the Start Contraction button when things converged at the sink in the bathroom.  Em seemed  to sense that she was at the brink of the really intense work/pain of the labor and she was afraid to keep going.  I felt bad, because I knew I could only be loving and supportive, but I couldn't relieve her of one single bit of that work or pain.  So I stood as close as physically possible, at least one hand on her at all times, while Ashley and Sharon kept her focused and coaxed her lovingly, but strongly through the steps to bring our baby to us.

We tried the stool, but wound up on the bed.  She would switch from her back to her side to her stomach on all fours and back to her back again before the final push.  I remember a particularly poignant moment with all 3 of us physically holding or gently pulling Emily in some way (Laurie close by with the camera) when the song playing on the iPod from the Labor playlist synced with us in a comical, but honest way.  It was the Ladies Singin' their song from Baby - ..."we have a role to fulfill it's god's will that a woman should suffer"  I remember taking a snapshot of that in my mind, and feeling that I part of something important, ...to be there with my amazing wife and these smart, strong women.

Emily was really feeling the intensity of the pain and she asked me to call her dear friend Mimi in California.  I called and put Mimi on speaker phone.   For the remainder of the delivery, Mimi was there nestled in a pillow on the bed.  She talked to Emily the whole time, a loving friend across the country, gently encouraging her through every burning, breath-taking push.  Somehow Mimi's voice gave Emily the willpower to keep doing this all on her own.  Em remarked several times that she thought she was going to pass out, but she never did.

It took a lot of strength to hold one of her legs up, while Ashley held her hand,  and Mimi listened  in while Sharon guided our little baby - one hand up beside his face - into Emily's other hand.  One more push and he was up and on her belly.  He screamed, while Emily cried and we all marveled at the tiny, purple, waxy, open-mouthed baby.  He had a full head of wet, black hair, and the the cord was still draped across Em's belly and down inside, but she had finally pushed him all the way out, all on her own.

I can't imagine being more proud of anyone, than I was of Emily at that moment.  I still am.  I feel so lucky to have been there, and to have been part of it.  Welcome to our family, Richmond.  We couldn't love you any more.  But we probably will...