On Friday, May 18th, 2018 around 4pm, my mom arrived at our house. I was outside with Patrick and Aldo, planning where a new set of perennial flowers would be planted in the back garden.
Ari's due date was May 17th, and our plan A was to have our dear friend, Aubrey, come over when I went into labor. She would attend the actual birth if Aldo didn't wake up, or be Aldo's support/supervisor if he did. Based off of Aldo's week-early arrival, we thought that surely Ari would arrive early as well. He did not. So we went to plan B. Aubrey left the state for a family trip, and my mom made the journey from Southern Illinois to take her place as birth and postpartum support superhero.
She would take Aubrey's place in birth/Aldo support and would stay for TWO WEEKS of postpartum support. Yep. I was spoiled. But based on my postpartum experience with Aldo, I felt I needed to cover my bases. My midwife educated me on how important postpartum support was, and I wanted to take that seriously. Especially after having a challenging postpartum period with my firstborn.
I need to take a break from the story to say that my mom is an amazing support person, and by the time I had Ari, she had attended 3 daughters during 5 postpartum periods. This would be her sixth grandchild, and 6th postpartum support stay at a daughter's home and bedside. She is truly amazing in her love, support, patience, humor, and experience in mothering the mother. I thank my lucky stars that I have her.
When my mom arrived on Friday, she couldn't help giggling about how my belly stuck out "like a basketball." I didn't think I had gotten all that "big" as a pregnant person, but my mom seemed to beg to differ. It certainly didn't hurt my feelings! I still think it's funny remembering her giggles.
After I spent some time doing my stretches and prenatal exercises (another benefit of having a midwife is that you are taught and encouraged to do certain exercises daily) on Friday night, mom insisted that we get a picture of my belly. And here it is, my last picture as a pregnant woman:
On May 19th, 2018, around 1:30am, I woke up with contractions. This was not out of the ordinary. I had been having contractions for over a month. I had had several "false labors," but I dutifully started my contraction timer app just in case. Looking back, the only thing that might have been different about these contractions is that they seemed to last longer than my false labor contractions. But, my contraction timer was telling me that they weren't coming at short or consistent intervals, so I stayed in bed to rest. I was paying attention and timing my contractions, but not getting my hopes up.
By about 3 or 3:30am, I got up and went to the bathroom. After nearly two hours, I could tell that these contractions weren't stopping, and this could be "the real thing". I went to the bathroom, and instead of taking care of business in the dark, like I usually did during my many middle-of-the-night pregnancy potty breaks, I turned on the light. I went to the bathroom and saw a tint of pink blood on the toilet paper.
IT'S HAPPENING! I was incredibly excited. I'd birthed a baby at home before. I was confident beyond question I could do it again. There was no fear. Just excitement. Just pure joy that I'd be meeting my baby soon.
This is when Patrick woke up. He saw the bathroom door closed and the light on. He knew something was up.
I came out of the bathroom and sat on the side of the bed. Patrick said something like "what's up?" And I must have said something like "it's happening." Or "I think it's the real thing." Because we were suddenly both wide awake and ready to go. And my contractions were, too. Everything was invigorated. My body kicked into high gear.
Around 3:45am, I went to the kitchen to make PB & J toast. This is when I remember labor getting extremely intense extremely quickly. Standing next to the toaster in the dark and going through the familiar motions of making my diet staple, I was forced to cope with the intensity. My first labor groans were in the kitchen.
This is when I had my first contractions where I had to stop what I was doing and lean on the counter for support. This is when I started feeling chills and put on my mom's fleece jacket that was hanging up by the door. This is when I took a screenshot of my contraction timer app because I could no longer be in charge of keeping track. At this point, all I had to do was surrender to my body.
And finally, this is when I had the sudden urge to go sit on the toilet. That's when I knew we needed to call the Midwife.
At 4am, Patrick texted our amazing Midwife, Carol. I was in the throws of intense contractions and the emptying of my bowels in the bathroom. I don't know how else to say it, but in both of my labors, my body seems to need to completely empty itself of everything before having a baby. The upside of this is that I don't have messy births. The downside is that I have birth pictures on the toilet. I will not be including those here.
There's a picture of me on the toilet that's timestamped 4:04am, and I remember this being when the contractions started getting close to overwhelming in their intensity. It turns out that my body could withstand much more.
At 4:30am I had moved to our bedroom's bathroom and Carol had arrived. This is where the most intense part of my labor took place. I moved between sitting on the toilet (and pooping) and being on hands and knees. Maybe I threw up? I don't remember. But what I'll never forget is getting contractions so intense that I felt like I might pass out, or even die. I didn't know how I could keep going like that much longer. I know now that those were clearly my "transition" contractions.
When Carol arrived, I was on my hands and knees. I was groaning my animal groans, and chanting "oooooopen" to keep my mouth and body relaxed. I was in the throws of the most intense part of my labor.
I told Carol I didn't want to leave the bathroom because "I feel like I still need to poop." Carol offered calmly, "I think that's the baby coming."
I replied, "I sure as hell hope so."
Around 5am, I crawled to the floor beside our bed. Getting up on the bed was too much for me, so Patrick quickly moved Scout's large memory foam dog bed (yep, I gave birth on a dog bed) over, and placed our designated homebirth comforter blanket and absorbant birth pad over it so that I could lay down. He grabbed the pillows from our bed and formed a soft nest around me. I was perfectly comfortable.
Around 5:10am the intensity relaxed, my contractions spaced out, and I had the undeniable urge to push.
At 5:25am, I could feel our baby boy's head ready to emerge.
At 5:30am, his head was crowning. Like in my first birth, Carol coached me magnificently to push against the stretching and burning "ring of fire", but not "bust through it." This is how I managed to have two births without any tearing whatsoever.
At 5:33am on Saturday, May 19th, 2018, I simply could not fight the urge to give one last big and powerful push. Baby boy's head and shoulders emerged, and Patrick delivered him onto my chest. Our baby boy was born! I was in a state of intense joy. We were so happy to meet our little one. He was small, warm, covered in vernix, and I can still feel his little bum in my hand. He didn't cry at all, but I could hear his newborn grunts and feel him breathing on my chest. I knew he was healthy and happy, and so was I.
By 5:45, I had delivered my placenta, and our son had crawled his way to my breast to start nursing. I was given as much time as I wanted to luxuriate under my layer of blankets and towels, with my newborn son nursing, my husband playing guitar and our dog at my feet. It was pure love, joy, and happiness there on the floor of our bedroom. And I'll never forget it.
At 6:50am we burned the umbilical cord in a lovely bonding ceremony that allowed me to give thanks to the placenta and our baby to get as many health benefits from the cord and placenta as possible.
At 7:00am, baby boy was weighed and measured -- coming in at exactly 7lbs and 19-3/4" long.
At 7:30am, after snuggling with daddy, baby boy went back to nursing and met his big brother, Aldo.
At some point that morning, we settled on the name Ari Benjamin. Ari means a great many things in a great many languages and cultures. Patrick read them all out to me: "sun-like," "eagle or great bird," "brave," and of course, Ari is Hebrew for "lion." Patrick landed with great weight on "dew on the trees," and looked at me with big eyes—Ari was born on a rare wet and rainy morning in Colorado. However, now that I'm looking up the name again, I can't find that meaning anywhere. Perhaps he added a kicker to make me finally agree so we could get on with it? I'm not sure where he got that last one, but it made me swoon and we agreed on our baby boy's name.
His middle name, Benjamin, is a family name on my mother's side. It's a tribute to my late grandfather, Earl, and his father (my great grandfather), Earl Benjamin.
