Around 6:30am, my midwife Kate showed up to help as I was in active labor. She was checking my vitals and checking the baby's heart rate often. Chris had my birth playlist of worship songs playing quietly and Drea offered me bites of food and sips of water. Then, eventually Kate told me it was time to get in the birth tub. I started getting the urge to push here and there in the tub. The warm water felt amazing, but unfortunately, after a while, my contractions started slowing down. So I had to get out and get into a different position to ramp things up again. Every position change brought intense pain. My other midwife, Michelle, was there by that point as well. Kate and Michelle were rockstars at lovingly encouraging me.

They had me try out some different positions to see if that would progress my labor - on my side on the bed, etc. I threw up a few times during this point in my labor, and Drea diffused some peppermint and had it on a rag for me to me to smell to help with the nausea. That helped, and was nice to smell. The contractions were so intense, and she was reminding me to soften, and that these were safe sensations, even though they were big. I tried to breathe and keep my any sounds I was making low in tone so that I didn't intensify my pain even more. I was making lots of sounds and yelling, too. I also had a cervical lop that my midwife had to physically move to help Bennet come down more.

My body was starting to push Bennett down around that point when I was on the bed. The midwives were constantly monitoring Bennett's heart rate, and they were noticing his heart rate going down slightly when I was pushing. They moved me to a birthing stool to push for a while to see if he would tolerate that position better. His rate continued decelerating while I pushed and the midwives were monitoring things very closely and told us that if his heart rate dropped again to a certain point, they would need to transfer me to the hospital for closer monitoring. I understood and we continued pushing. He wasn't handling the pushing well, and wasn't progressing through the pelvis. Their educated guess is that his hand was by his head, preventing him from progressing through the pelvis until he later figured out how to navigate through. My midwives called EMS (which thankfully is very, very close to our home), and they arrived quickly. I felt very calm and knew that this was just what we needed to do to keep Bennett and myself safe at this point. I was disappointed that it didn't go the way I planned, but I was at peace and knew I just needed to keep going. They rolled me out to the ambulance, got me in, and my midwife was able to join us on the drive to the hospital, which was typically about 30-35 minutes away. The prefer to transfer patients to that hospital when needed, and if possible, because they have a really great team of OB's and nurses who work well with home birth transfers and midwives.

I kept laboring in the ambulance and breathing out with lots of "shhhhh's" to not progress the pushing in the ambulance. The team in the ambulance was great and hooked me up to some fluids and such. We arrived at the hospital around 1pm, and they quickly took me to L&D. My doctor, Dr. Viocese, took over my care with her team of nurses.

My body kept pushing and they attached me to monitors, and put a monitor on his head inside of me to monitor his heart rate closely.

The doctor let me know what was going on, and that they may need to do a C section, give me an epidural, etc. I signed a bunch of papers giving them the consent to do so if needed, but I really didn't want those things. Bennett's heart rate kept going down while I was pushing, lower than before, but they were able to allow it to go lower than my midwives did at home, since the OR was right across the hall if we needed to do an emergency C section. Well, I kept pushing and I guess they saw I was giving up or slowing down. So they kept encouraging me in my pushing and put me in all sort of awkward, uncomfortable positions on the table/bed. It was so intense/painful. I definitely was screaming bloody murder at times. My doula and midwife, Kate, were there the whole time supporting me, as well as Chris by my side the whole time. I remember just internally praying that Bennett would come down and out with each push so that I could have him vaginally. At some point, whatever the issue with Bennett was (whether it was his hand blocking him from going further down or something else), he shifted and was able to come down. His head was crowning and they told me to put my hand down there to feel his head. It felt so small at the time, but it was because only a small part of his head was showing at that point.

The doctor stuck her hand inside of me at one point and moved Bennett a little. I continued to push. The nurses and doctor were so good at encouraging me, and I was not planning on slowing down anytime soon - I was determined to get him out of me and knew the only was through. Between each push, with Bennett's head partially out of me, I would try my best to relax and breathe.

FINALLY, his head popped through, and I through his body would take quite a while longer to push out. But a few seconds later, his whole body came out of me, and the feeling was shocking in the funniest of ways - the best way I can explain the feeling of his body coming out of me was like a squiggle, almost like a bunch of intestines exiting my body at once, but it was his body! It happened so quick, and I was so relieved it was over. He was born on June 23rd, 2024 at 3:02pm after about 13 hours of labor at 8 pounds, 13 ounces, and 20.5 inches long.

They wiped him off and put him on my chest. They kept his cord attached until it turned white, at my request. Chris and I thanked God out loud and told Bennett how much we loved him. Chris turned on "Peace" by Bethel Music, and the nurses and doctors gave us a few minutes to thank God and connect with Bennett. It was such a special moment, a beautiful moment. There were definitely some tears, and not just in our eyes - the hospital staff's, too. Around 10 minutes later, I birthed my placenta, where my baby boy lived and was nourished for the past 9 months, and it was pretty amazing to see. The doctor told me I may need Pitocin depending on how my bleeding was. I told her I really didn't want Pitocin, but that if I needed it, I would take it. They pushed me on my stomach to make sure all of the placenta had gotten out, and monitored my bleeding for a bit. Thankfully, my bleeding ended up not being excessive, and I didn't need Pitocin. I ended up having a level 2 tear, which isn't horrible thankfully, so they stitched me up.

They told me I was a champion pusher, and how well I did, and how amazed they were with me, which was super sweet and encouraging. I told the hospital staff how thankful I was for them, and how incredible they made my experience at the hospital, especially considering I wasn't planning on going to the hospital in the first place. There was lots of love going around. My midwife, Kate, and doula, Drea, told me how amazed there were with me. I was truly grateful for my entire birth team.

We stayed in that room for about an hour and a half with Bennett, and then they transferred us to another room where we would spend the night. The hospital staff checked on us constantly (which we could have had less of, lol), did tests as needed, and made sure we had what we needed and Bennett was healthy. We learned how to swaddle, practiced breast feeding, and tried to get some sleep which was almost impossible for me due to my adrenaline and all of the hormones rushing through my body. We pushed hard to get out of the hospital the next day, and thankfully, we were able to a little before 6pm. We all know how hospital bills are not cheap, and we did not want it to go up any more than it had to. Unfortunately, the hospital visit and EMS was not covered - the home birth was, so we are still working through trying to figure that out to see if any of it can be covered or not. If not, we have accepted that it is what it is, and we will deal with it over time.

We went home, and the first week I was definitely an emotional wreck, crying at least once or twice a day, just processing through everything - the birth and how shockingly painful it was, the transfer, the financial aspect of the transfer, etc. I also had some disappointment that I faced about Chris needing to work a couple of days after the birth. I was thankful we had work coming in, and we needed it, but wished he could have spent a couple of weeks with us to bond and adjust. Thankfully, I had Chris to talk through things with, and eventually talked through things with my midwife, too.

I also felt so grateful that I ended up not needing a C section, epidural, or Pitocin, and that Bennett was healthy and whole. It was one of those moments of tension of both existing - both sadness and disappointment, AND gratefulness and beauty. And that's ok. That is also motherhood/parenthood and life in general - there is good and bad, sad and happy, hard and beautiful, and that is ok. It's our human experience. Also, now that labor is in the past, it's one day of intensity and pain for a sweet, lovable little baby who your body created. It's funny how you go from "I never want to do that again" to "I think I could do that again."

Also, women's bodies are absolutely incredibly designed. We are so, so strong, capable, and amazing! Birth is such a wild and beautiful thing that God created us to be able to do. I definitely feel so powerful and so proud of myself after giving birth to Bennett. It was the hardest thing I've ever done. I feel like I could do anything now. Mom's are freakin' amazing!