Reflections on Elisha’s Birth

Here are my reflections from Elisha’s Birth:

1. If any of this was too much information for you, I apologize. I also meant to be open about the experience since I work as a doula now and want to be real about what happens, or at least can happen. I’m unashamed of the process and don’t want others to be either. I’m also expecting my main audience to be women who have gone through it before or will be soon.

2. For the whole preterm labor experience, did I need to go to the hospital in the end? Could it still have been pee in the bed? Would contractions have slowed on their own? Did going on short-term disability with work and taking off the rest of the time really have to happen? Did sitting in a chair that whole time really help?

I don’t know. I still don’t know. And it can still be hard sometimes not knowing if all of that was necessary. At the end of the day, I remind myself that it was better to play the safer side and do the best thing I could have to give my son the best chance to reach full term. If I hadn’t and he was born early, I would have always wondered the other way around. I don’t prefer that.

3. I was not as prepared as I should have been for the childbirth experience. With what I know now as a doula, I would have done things differently. It’s not that I regret my experience or look at it as a poor experience. In fact, I consider it an amazing, beautiful and indescribable experience. But in different ways, I do know it could have been even better.

a. I would have educated myself more, but I really didn’t know where to start nor did I have a ton of mental capacity to put the time and energy into doing the work true preparation required. I had a full-time job and pregnancy brain is a real thing. I needed some extra guidance to get me going, especially during my downtime those last seven weeks. My husband and I borrowed one book and talked with our friends for some pointers, but that’s all we did. It wasn’t enough for making a good birth plan. It wasn’t enough to know my true preferences and desires and hopes.

I considered Amber like my doula, but I really didn’t know what a doula truly was at that point. She helped me tremendously through the pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum experience. And simply as an awesome friend not expecting anything in return. I am forever grateful for her and her support.

Being a doula now, I can see how having one would have really helped prepare me more specifically on a lot of different topics because of the professional support, insight, information and resources they bring to the table while also keeping me, as their client, their primary focus and priority. This is unlike nurses, doctors and midwives who keep the medical health of the mom and baby as priority and who more often than not have more than one patient their looking after.

b. When I say it could have been better, I can’t guarantee that. But here are the specific ways I believe it possibly could have:

i. I would have picked a provider that did on call hours or at least had a higher chance of attending the birth.

ii. I would not have had my provider stir my membranes to get labor going and let nature take its course. What I was experiencing was prodromal labor (on and off) which can be totally normal. Knowing that, I hope would have prevented me from being so eager and anxious to have my baby born and not jump the gun as I feel I sort of did.

iii. I would have waited longer before going to the hospital. Yeah, labor was definitely getting more intense but it wasn’t nearly like it was later on. It was still definitely doable. This also would have hopefully allowed my water to break naturally and not have my pain jump basically from 0-10 almost immediately. And if I still had been in the hospital when I was, I would have tried some other more natural measures to get labor going again before breaking my water.

iv. I would have tried a lot of different comfort measures instead of staying in bed. I probably would have refused an IV (and even a saline lock) unless it was medically necessary, which I don’t think it was. I would have at least asked why I needed it.

v. I would have waited until I really felt the need to push instead of pushing as quickly and as hard as I could once I hit 10 cm. Waiting would have been spontaneous pushing instead of directed pushing every time a contraction hit. I may have even tried a different position for pushing. I think these measures at least could have prevented tearing as bad as I did. As well as needing physical therapy later on for incontinence problems.

Overall, I have learned the importance of being educated so that I can make the best decisions for me and my family. Without knowing at least the basics, it can be really easy to just let the caregivers and birth location take over with whatever happens and whether it’s the best thing for you or not. At the end of the day, everyone (the family, providers and other birth support team members) wants a healthy mom and healthy baby, which is awesome. But that can be pursued differently by a lot of different providers. And what is also incredibly important is having a good, empowering experience without trauma.