Liz went into labor at 5:30am last Sunday morning. She graciously allowed me to sleep until 6:30am at which point I was awakened by a slight nudging and a smile-filled outburst of a whisper, “it’s happening!” We spent the next several hours hanging around the house (mostly in the bathroom, as Liz found it easiest to take contractions on the toilet – fun!), and contractions were happening every 3 to 6 minutes, with little aftershock contractions in between. Around 11am Rose, our doula, arrived at our house. She helped us get everything together, and we hopped in the car for a long and painful ride to The Birth Center in Bryn Mawr.

There was a sense of calming relief as we pulled into the parking lot. But that was soon followed by slight disappointment when the midwife checked Liz’s cervix and informed us that her body just wasn’t ready yet and to come back in a few hours. This wasn’t at all a surprise, and we had made plans to hang out at Liz’s parents’ house if this wound up being the case. 15 minutes and another painful car ride later, we arrived at the MacDonald residence. We were greeted with love and enthusiasm, but Liz didn’t make it more than 30 minutes without deciding that she needed to hang out in the bath tub. She, Rose and I all squeezed into the small bathroom, and I can only imagine the horror of her family (and the poor, poor neighbor who was outside doing yard work) in reaction to the ridiculous moans, grunts, and screams echoing throughout the house. It was one of the less pleasant times in my life (and I’m sure in Liz’s as well).

At about 3:30pm we were given the OK to return to The Birth Center. This good news helped to mask some of the pain, and we were back in the birthing suite in a jiffy. The midwife checked Liz’s cervix again, and she was dilated to 4cm and we were allowed to stay! The rest of the day is a bit of a haze. Liz quickly made her way to 7cm, and within a few hours hanging out in a jacuzzi tub she reached 9cm. Our families were waiting patiently in the lounge. We were so close, almost there, just 1cm to go! And then the progress stopped. Strong contractions were still happening in close, regular intervals, but the cervix just wouldn’t go past 9cm. Keep in mind there are NO pain medications or epidurals in natural child birth, so pain without progress it that much more painful. Everybody felt a bit deflated.

Fortunately Korben, our acupuncturist from Philadelphia Community Acupuncture in West Philly , was available to help out. After needling a few very specific points on Liz’s body, she quickly and amazingly reached 10cm. Hooray! Little did we know how much more time and effort would be required to bring Elzie into the world. Liz was an absolute champ. She didn’t let up for a minute, and at no point said, “I can’t do this!” or “where the pills at!?” By the end I was blown away by her determination. The head was partially out and her contractions started to become further apart. Instead of resting for 4 to 6 minutes between each contraction, she actually manually jumpstarted contractions every 1 to 2 minutes with nipple stimulation. It was really crazy. And it really worked.

Elzie was born at 1am on Monday, November 3rd – also my sister’s birthday. It was such an emotional and proud moment for me and for Liz. Our birth team at The Birth Center was absolutely phenomenal. The midwife and nurse, and our doula and acupuncturist all had integral roles, and I really don’t think we could have done it without any one of them.

The freedom and nurturing environment of The Birth Center is indescribable. The hospital is great for some people, but not for us. Birth is a miracle of life, not an in-patient procedure. The absence of beeping monitors, glaring overhead lights, tiny uncomfortable beds, rushed doctors, and that oh-so-awful hospital smell certainly were not missed, and really allowed for a calm, relaxed, natural and supportive environment. Elzie wasn’t whisked out of our arms 5 minutes after birth and taken to a bright and lonely incubation room. She was allowed to stay with us, comforted and loved the entire time, never once leaving our sight. And following the afterbirth, all of our family and friends were allowed to join us in our room with our beautiful little new addition. We finally got to go to bed around 4am, and fell asleep happily and promptly, with Elzie in between us in our very comfortable double bed.

Thank you to The Birth Center, our wonderful team, and all of our friends and family for all of your support! And now, some pictures!

There are also a few more pics on my Flickr page. Many more posts to come!

September marks the beginning of our birth classes.  Last week we endured our first.  From the get go, the instructor let us know it would be 2.5 hours of info and boy was she right.  By the end Jon and I just looked at each other like, really, did we just sit through some horrible college lecture.  We were promised however, that as the weeks went on the classes would get more interactive and we would learn very specific techniques for pain management.  We have a class tonight, so fingers crossed!  Last night we had the pleasure of attending a breast feeding class.  It was FANTASTIC.  Look, we got to practice nursing with these creepy dolls! They were surprisingly heavy too.

Here are some pics of insanely huge 35 week belly.  I just realized I have pregnancy face too.  How fun for me!

25 week heartbeat and some “neckfurters”

After our appointment we picked up Shelly and Rowan and went over to my parent’s house for a little bbq. To test our own parenting abilities, we found as many ways as possible to laugh uncontrollably at a toddler. Spinning turned out to work the best. Here are Jon and Shelly taking little nugget on a spinning adventure.

Here my dad got a little training of his own. Taking Rowan for a shoulder ride, he got a good taste of the next few summers. Rowan finally decides that the shoulder ride is no where near as exciting as spinning so he requests help on a dismount and spins again. This time I’m the spinner! Once Rowan realized how much we enjoyed a laugh at his expense he began to just walk and fall on his own. What a little ham.

On Saturday Jon’s oh so generous mom took me shopping for a whole new maternity wardrobe. I managed to get a whole bunch of items that will serve me well for the remainder of this pregnancy. Thanks Janet!!! Here you can see that Jon got a little taste of what it might be like to have a 6 month pregnant belly. I think he looks quite dashing…and lumpy!