Natural birth at birth center

This is long.

My first child was born in a hospital. 36 hours of labor and I was very unhappy with the whole experience.. I had an episiotomy and cord clamped way to soon and against my wishes.. pressured into other things as well. It was an overall stressful experience.

Fast forward 15 months to when my daughter was born. I was a day shy of 42 weeks. Labor was 36 hours again, BUT it was amazing. I was in early labor for two nights, but it was totally manageable and I went about my day as I normally would. April 12, around 7am I knew that once I got out of bed things were going to pick up. I went down stairs and ate a bowl of oatmeal with dates to help things along. I immediately went up to shower and by the time I was out my contractions were 5 min apart. It took me 2 hours to get ready because I was now having to stop during each one.

By 9am my contractions were consistently 2 minutes apart and lasting a minute so I texted my doula and midwife to meet me. We beat them to the birth center so my husband and I “walked” around the park for about 30 min. At this point I could barely move and had to stop and hold on to my husband with each wave as things intensified. It was a seriously gorgeous day and I felt very at peace with what was happening.

Soon enough my birth team arrived and we went inside and up the stairs to the room I had chosen. I briefly sat on a birth ball while my midwife checked on baby and my doula coached me through breathing which helped tremendously.

My midwife suggested I move to the tub and it was surprisingly ultra relaxing. From 11-12 things progressed steadily and my midwife encouraged me to switch positions which I wasn’t exactly happy about.

Around 12:30 things hit another level. Back to back contractions and I was suddenly in my own little world of pain, but I was managing it very well.

At 12:50 my midwife offered to check me for the first time and I was reluctant because I didn’t want to be discouraged, but it turned out that I was 8cm. My midwife told me I needed to go sit on the toilet backwards to get baby moving down. It was THE WORST. As soon as I sat down my body took over and started pushing against my will. When my birth team realized what was happening they pulled me off of the toilet and walked me back to the tub. I was not a happy camper.

I pushed for 30 min and when he head came out they realized she had her hand up by her head. That wasn’t so pleasant. After her head came out I was still having trouble pushing her shoulders out. They were stuck. Everyone pushed me back from my squatting position and my midwife manually got my daughters shoulders out.

9 lb 10 oz and 21 inches long. I’m small naturally so that’s a big baby for me! I had a small first degree tear only because of her hand being by her head when she came out. I bled quite a bit and my placenta took about 30 min to come out so they gave some pitocin to manage the bleeding.

We waited until the cord turned white before we cut it. No vaccines. No eye goop. Just a perfectly healthy and precious baby girl. They stitched me up, fed me some soup. Family came in and I nursed my baby. They sent us home a couple hours later and that was that. We were home by 5pm!

It was the perfect birth experience and words cannot describe the high after giving birth naturally. Almost 4 weeks later and I still feel so empowered. This was my second birth, but this one changed me. And I would do it again in a heart beat♥️