Henry James: A Birth Story

It's been 2 weeks since the labour and delivery that brought us our beautiful, chubby, snuggly chunk of baby on the morning of August 14th. About time that I tell his birth story.

At almost a week overdue, I was starting to lose my sanity.  I was drinking copious quantities of raspberry leaf tea and doing squats and lunges in front of the TV with no results, so I decided to step things up a bit.  Our doula, who is also a registered acupuncturist, had been doing some preparatory acupuncture, and at this point, she agreed it was time to get serious. So at six days overdue, I had induction acupuncture and was told to stay active that day.  I headed to the gym for some elliptical action and barely sat down all day.  I also saw my doc and had a membrane sweep.  I was fairly confident that all of these efforts, combined, would soon bring me my baby boy.

Sure enough, at 2:30 am, I woke up with mild contractions and a sense of anticipation and crossed my fingers that it wasn't all in my head.  By 3:30 I was sure, and woke up the Hubs, who started timing.  By 6:30, Lilah's grandparents had arrived to feed her breakfast and take her to daycare, and our doula walked in the door around the same time.  By 7:30, my contractions were about three minutes apart and were lasting about a minute. It was time to head to the hospital.

The car ride to the hospital seemed to take forever, and I remember hitting a few bumps in the road while I was mid-contraction.  So painful.  We made it to the hospital and checked in around 8.  Apparently, it was a very busy Tuesday morning, and I lucked out and got the very last room.  The woman who delivered her baby half an hour after me had to do it in an assessment room with only a curtain separating her from the rest of the room.  Word to the wise: don't be afraid to moan and groan your way through contractions while checking in at the hospital.  The squeaky wheel gets the grease.  I was ushered directly into that last delivery room based on the noises coming from deep within me.

Luck was definitely on our side this time.  Things just went so... smoothly.  Doors opened for us, elevators were ready and waiting, and things lined up just the way they were supposed to.  Such a different experience from the one I had with Lilah.

This time, I got my natural, unmedicated, uncomplicated labour and delivery and the whole thing took just seven hours from start to finish.  Henry was born at 9:30 am, just an hour and a half after we arrived at the hospital, and the whole affair was just so beautiful and messy and uninhibited.  As a naturally reserved person, I surprised myself, and if I hadn't been in the midst of it; if I had been just a bystander walking down the hallway of the maternity wing around 9 that morning, I would have thought to myself, "Who's the screamer in room 15?"  The only word to describe it is primal.  And for me, that was perfect.  Just like the beautiful baby boy who was deposited into my arms at the end of it all.

Perfection in a tiny package.

That's 9lbs, 7.7 oz, by the way!

Big sister Lilah thinks he's pretty great too: