The decision to plan a home birth came about gradually, as I read books like Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth, and watched people’s births online. I had never met anyone who had given birth at home, but through the power of the internet, I was able to watch home births and see what the experience would be like. On social media, I followed midwives, home birth enthusiasts and other people who were sharing their home birth experiences. The idea of having autonomy in my own home for this rite of passage really appealed to me. I had heard enough hospital horror stories of mothers being undermined, having procedures or drugs without their consent, and generally feeling like they would have liked a different experience, that I decided steering clear of a hospital was the right choice for me.

I am happy that I can now add my home birth story to the many who came before me. If it wasn’t for women vulnerably sharing their stories, I wouldn’t have known that home birth is a safe and healthy option for bringing your baby into the world. I am especially grateful to be writing this story, because it almost didn’t happen…

THIS IS MY HOME BIRTH STORY

After a healthy pregnancy, my October 9, 2021 due date arrived, and there were no signs the baby would be making an appearance any time soon. By this time I had cleared my schedule thinking I would be taking care of a baby by now. The days following my due date I started learning new crafts to stay busy (needle felting is fun!) and soothed myself with rewatching Seinfeld reruns which just dropped on Netflix (just stay enterntained!). We had midwife appointments every few days: no progress. Scans to see what the baby was up to: all good, he’s just chillin. I followed the midwife’s orders and stayed active, begrudgingly taking walks in the woods with my still growing belly which comprised most of the 40 lbs my tiny frame had gained in pregnancy. I did all of the natural induction methods my midwife recommended, and every single one I could find on the internet.

At 42 weeks I had exhausted every single method of natural induction under the sun and was beginning to pack my bags to go to the hospital the next day when I would be going into my 43rd week. It was no longer advisable to remain pregnant, and I had absolutely no desire to be pregnant for a moment longer. If I was set on having a home birth at any cost, I probably could have convinced my midwife to let me wait another day or so before a hospital induction, but after a torturous two weeks overdue, I was ready to meet this baby even if it meant abandoning my home birth and having a hospital induction or c-section!

I was ready to try the last resort method recommended by my midwife: castor oil.

Friday, October 22, 2021 (13 days overdue)

10 am: MIDWIFE APPOINTMENT, NO PROGRESS

I had an appointment with the midwife the morning before we would have to go to the hospital, and I was still only 1 cm dilated (you need to be 10 cm dilated for the baby to be born). The baby also hadn’t “dropped” into my pelvis completely like most first time babies do at this point. She tried to hearten us by saying that all of the natural induction methods, and especially the massage and acupuncture, while they may not have worked yet, would help me have a better birth, however that may happen. She sent us on our way to buy castor oil and start the induction, telling us to keep her posted if and when things progressed.

11:30 am CASTOR OIL

On our way home we stopped at CVS and bought some castor oil. Castor oil inductions have not been studied (because there is no castor oil industry ready to profit), but anecdotally it has worked for many women who are at or beyond term, and a study from 2000 showed that 57.7% of the women studied who took castor oil went into labor within 24 hours. Castor oil is generally used as a laxative, and the thinking is that it will irritate the intestines, which are adjacent to the uterus, thus causing contractions. My midwife has a specific order of induction methods, and she leaves this until the very end as it is the most intense and benefits from all the other methods being administered first.

2 pm: FIRST DOSE

I took my first 4 tbsp dose of castor oil mixed with chocolate and mint chip ice cream. Far from the horror stories of castor oil, it was actually delightful and I hardly noticed the oil. People be out there mixing it with orange juice and that’s why they think it’s gross. Why would you mix an oil with orange juice? I digress. It also helps it digest better to eat it with something containing fat. I never felt ill. I then did something called The Miles Circuit recommended by my doula which involved walking with one foot on the curb and the other in the street. The neighbors probably thought I had lost my pregnant lady mind, which, if we’re being honest, I pretty much had.

6 pm: SECOND DOSE

I wasn’t feeling much from the first dose and it’s recommended to take up to three “doses” of castor oil about 4 hours apart for inductions. This time I made a green smoothie and added the castor oil and again it was a pleasant gustatory experience. A little after the second dose I started to feel some light cramping at the bottom of my uterus and around what felt like my ovaries. I got in the bath and stayed there pretty much all night. The cramping came and went and wasn’t that severe (I’ve had horrible period cramps my whole life and ovarian cysts rupture, so my pain threshold is slightly skewed). This whole time I was getting advice from friends and followers on Instagram about hospital inductions, hearing positive hospital birth experiences, and I had gotten myself to a good place about having to go to the hospital the next day. I did not put that much stock in this final intervention working. Until it did...

10 pm: PAIN IN THE BATH

The low uterus cramping continued, and I was in enough pain and feeling enough intensity from the first two castor oil doses that I decided not to take a third. We called the midwife to let her know our progress and she told me to try and get some sleep. I don’t think my midwife or partner understood that the level of pain I was in was not something that could be slept through. But I took some benadryl (a pregnancy approved sleep aid) and got back in the bath. The pain was coming and going but was not contractions yet. I noticed a small amount of blood coming out but didn’t think much of it. The midwife said it could mean a cervical change. At this point I still wasn’t considering myself to be in labor and was mentally preparing myself for the hospital.

October 23, 2021 (Scorpio season begins)

Midnight: WATER BREAKS

While in the bath writhing in pain, dozing in and out of consciousness, I was jolted awake with a ‘pop’ and knew my water had broken! I called for Emory and stood up and caught some of the amniotic fluid in my hands to test. The midwife gave us pH strips so if anything came out that we thought was amniotic fluid, we could test it and if it was super alkaline, it means my water had broken. Indeed it tested a dark purple and we knew we were off to the races. Up until this point everything just felt crampy and painful but there were no definite signs of the baby coming. This was a clear sign! We called the midwife and she again said to try and get some sleep (eye roll). From everything I had read I knew there were usually many hours of labor after the water had broken, especially if there were no contractions yet. So Emory tried to rest up in bed and I stayed in the bath which was my life line with the amount of pain I was in.

2 am: FIRST CONTRACTION

A couple hours after my water broke, I was in and out of the bath/shower just dealing with the stabbing pain in my abdomen, and I experienced my first contraction in the shower. Along with it, an involuntary primal scream escaped my body and I called out for help. Emory came rushing in an I was in so much pain with each contraction that I didn’t know what to do but scream and ask for help. We went into another room and tried to do some of the Spinning Babies exercises like side lying and shifting the baby into place. This was recommended by the doula but did not feel fun or intuitive for me at the time. By this point I was in such a state that I was just running around the apartment completely naked dripping in bath water with a Mexican beach blanket thrown around my shoulders for warmth.

4 am: CALL THE DOULA

We finally made the call to tell the doula to come over. I think we held off on having our help come because everything we read, and were told, made it seem like we would be at this for a long time. And we wanted our midwife and doula to be well rested in case we were in this for the long haul.

5 am: LABORING

Our doula arrived. She helped time contractions and tried to get me to do some exercises that were advised for the stage of labor it seemed I was at. But everything was so painful that I ended up back in the bath writhing in pain. I was having, what the doula told me later I called “stabbing knife pains” in what felt like my ovaries, with each contraction. We still don’t know what caused this but the collective guess is that it was the baby hitting against scar tissue from endometriosis. This type of pain is not typically part of labor it seems. At this point everything was a haze. I was having Emory and the doula pull on my leg which seemed to help with the stabbing knife pains. They were also using a hot water bottle on my abdomen and I was having Emory put his hand there which also helped slightly.

7 am: CALL THE MIDWIFE

I had been having contractions for long enough, and was in enough pain, that we decided to call the midwife and have her come over.

8 am: FULLY DILATED, BABY IS COMING!

The midwife arrives and gives an internal exam to see how dilated I was. To everyone’s surprise, I was completely dilated! Emory remembers her saying, “Your cervix is gone!” I remember her saying, “Oh honey, you are 10 centimeters! We’re having a baby this morning!” There was then a flurry of activity that felt like a scene from Call The Midwife. “Boil the water!” “Get the rags!” I remember the midwife immediately calling the nurse assistant and giving her our address in a calm but ”get here ASAP” tone. The next thing I knew, my bed was covered in towels and plastic, and I was laboring on my back surrounded by my partner, doula, midwife and nurse assistant. There was no time to prepare the birth pool, whose warm, soothing waters were going to be my one pain management tool…

8 am to 12 pm: PUSHING

For the next few hours I labored with intense, but inconsistently spaced contractions. The midwife had me in several different positions to try and “corkscrew” the baby down. She said he (his head turned out to be big) was needing to get underneath the pubic bone. I was mostly on my back, but she also had me squatting holding onto the nurse assistant’s arms, on the toilet, and on hands and knees. After every contraction they were listening to the baby’s heartbeat. Aside from one contraction when I was on my side, he sounded strong and even the whole time. From the time the midwife arrived, I was later told I was in the “pushing phase.” 4+ hours is a long time to be pushing, and I think this was due to the baby’s big head making its way under my petite pubic bone. There was never a question of safety or if he was going to come out, it just took a little longer and some maneuvering. I felt safe and in good hands the entire time. The whole time I was pushing, the doula was beside the bed making hot compresses for my perineum and handing them to the midwife to hold on me. She was also pouring what Emory later described as “entire cups” of olive oil inside me to help ease the baby out. I didn’t tear and the midwife said it is likely due to how long the baby took to come out. It also helped that I had three women administering TLC in the form of compresses and oil. THIS you will not find in a hospital birth, and I feel lucky to have had such peaceful and loving energy helping my body through this rough transition, and helping my baby into the world.

12:13 pm: BABY BOY IS BORN!

After many hours of pushing and intense pain, I birthed our 8.2 lb sweet baby boy in bed at home with nothing more than a washcloth and some olive oil to ease the pain (aka nothing to ease the pain). Only in retrospect, and in relaying my story to others, do I realize that it is out of the ordinary to have a completely unmedicated birth in this day and age. I drank that natural birth cool aid so hard that I never questioned it. Only after experiencing the pain of it first hand, did I realize that I had been a little brainwashed by all the quiet, peaceful, painless seeming home birth videos I watched. That shit was painful! I will be the first one to say it. Though it wouldn’t have changed my mind, there should be more screaming and yelling videos mixed into the portrayals of natural birth, because let’s be honest, most people aren’t sighing their babies out.

Most of the morning is a blur in my memory, but I will never forget the intense pain of his shoulders and body finally coming out of me. The assistant actually took a photo at that moment and the primal scream I am making is priceless. I followed so many accounts while I was pregnant with names like “pain free birth” and when I asked my midwife about pain reduction in one of our appointments, she basically said that as long as I was not fearful, the pain could be minimized, and then handed me this book from 1942. All I can say is that I was not fearful about birth in any way, but nonetheless, it was excruciatingly painful. All of that said, I have no regrets about any part of my birth process. I am so grateful I was able to experience the wonder, and the pain, of birth in the comfort of my own home. Being able to recover in my own bed in those sweet and anxious first days was just what I wanted to experience. I feel grateful to live in a time and place where I have options, and to have a partner who supports my decisions about where and how I want to birth my baby.

Even though I just had a baby, I know that I want to have more kids, and for future births, I don’t rule out a hospital experience, epidurals or drugs. I feel like I learned so much from my home birth pregnancy and birth journey, and if I decided on a hospital birth, I would be well equipped with knowledge and empowerment to navigate some of the pitfalls of the hospital experience. I’ve never heard of anyone doing a home birth first, and then a hospital birth. It’s usually the other way around. But I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

In the meantime, I think I hear the baby crying.