Birth Unassisted

A few weeks ago, one of my dearest friends gave birth to her third child. I had the honor to witness the birth and support Kelly and her husband Shawn through the process. The journey that they took for this pregnancy and birth has had a profound impact on me. Kelly chose to have an unassisted birth- no medical care providers present, relying instead on her intuition and the emotional and physical support of Shawn and me to bring her baby into the outside world.

To process through that powerful night, I wrote out their birth story. A story of labor from the perspective of my role as their doula. I shared it with the family, and they have given permission for me to share it here. I share it to shed light on one of many options families have when considering where and how to birth their babies. The journey of a wild pregnancy and an unassisted birth was the perfect journey for Kelly and Shawn.

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Kelly called me at 11:35pm on Thursday August 6th. I had stayed up too late that evening, and only got in bed around 11:20. Interestingly enough, I had been working on things for Kelly while up that night- details about her meal train, and ordering a book I wanted her to have as a gift. We had also spent much of the day together, fairly unaware what the night had in store. 

I had just fallen asleep when I heard my phone ring. I knew exactly who to expect as I sat up and reached over to answer. My mind was groggy, but I heard Kelly say that her water broke. In my half-awake stupor, I asked her what she wanted me to do, and the consensus was to just get to her place as soon as I was able to. She reminded me to bring our bathroom scale. I remember being very thankful for that reminder, because it was the last thing on my mind. It was also a good tell about where Kelly was in labor- early enough to be very alert, enough to remember that she needed the scale.

I cobbled together a change of clothes in my dark bedroom, and made way too much noise looking for a bag to put my things in. I hadn’t yet prepared to leave the apartment at a moment’s notice, but thankfully I didn’t need much. I said goodbye to Jeremy, handed him Dylan’s water bottle, and told him “good luck.” It was about to be Dylan’s first overnight away from me, and only one of a small handful of nights that Harrison was away from me. Jer and I briefly talked about how I was going to have our car for an undetermined amount of time, but he was okay with that (another detail we hadn’t yet gotten around to fully figuring out). My cats were super confused about what was going on when I was rummaging around in the living room. I bid them goodbye and walked to the car by 11:50. 

When I arrived at Kelly’s, she was in good spirits. Shawn had already gotten together everything that they needed and the birth tub was ready to go. Kelly worked through a few rushes in between chatting excitedly about how she couldn’t believe she was in labor. She was alert, and the rushes required some focus but nothing that took her breath away. She had to go to the bathroom, and after saying she wanted me to be in there with her, she quickly realized she changed her mind. It was a good progression of labor, her body was showing all the signs of continuing labor.

For a little while, the rushes were straightforward and Kelly was happy and laughing and in shock all in one. She was getting tired, simply due to the late hour, and so I left her and Shawn to rest and I spent some time in the living room. I meant to get some sleep, but it didn’t happen. It was interesting- I knew I was tired, but I didn’t actually feel tired. 

Their 3-year-old, Lyla, woke up and ran into her parent’s room shortly after I walked down the hall to the living room. I remember being so concerned that I was the one who woke her up. In hindsight, and with a clear mind, it wasn’t me- there was no way she would have heard anything with her loud noise machine- I was just concerned due to my tiredness and not thinking as clearly as I usually would.

After maybe an hour (or less) of resting in the living room, Shawn came to get me, since Lyla was way too excited to go back to sleep and the three of them were just awake together in the bedroom. Kelly was working through the rushes on her own; she didn’t want any hands-on support at that time- just the presence of the people she trusted.

Shawn and Lyla left the room to get a snack, and Kelly and I sat on the floor together while she read her birth vision out loud. 

Kelly got in to the tub shortly after- the rushes were starting to feel stronger- and Lyla joined her. They had some really sweet moments together, hugging and snuggling and kissing. There were a few times that Kelly worked through a wave while Lyla happily played with the duck thermometer- swimming it back and forth in the pool with a big smile on her face. The contrast between Kelly and Lyla in those moments was almost comical, while also being very adorable.

Kelly started to get more uncomfortable with each passing wave, and eventually decided to get out of the tub. (The amount of time that passed here was lost on me, I don’t remember.) She wanted to sit on the toilet to work through the next part of labor. After a few rushes, with Lyla very present in the bathroom with Kelly and Shawn, at someone’s request I took Lyla into the living room with me. 

Lyla and I read a little bit together, and briefly played with some magnatiles that were still set up. We were not in the living room for very long- she decided she wanted to go back to her parent’s room, and no amount of gentle conversation could convince her otherwise.

When we got back to the bedroom, it was clear that Kelly had moved into a different headspace. I think that laboring on the toilet, and being alone with Shawn without the distraction of Lyla, helped her to progress a bit more quickly. She came back in to the bedroom shortly after Lyla and I came back, and she worked through a few waves on the floor and sitting in bed. I held her feet and sent some Reiki through one rush, because she seemed a little out of body in an unhelpful way and I wanted to help her stay grounded. Soon after, labor picked up even more and Kelly wanted to get back into the tub.

Lyla was getting very tired and harder for any of us to manage at that point, and Shawn set her up with a movie on the tablet while I kept an eye on Kelly in the birth tub. She still didn’t want any hands-on support, so I sat there and held space for her. She was starting to get a little bit wild, in a good way. When working through a rush, her eyes were strikingly different- wild is the only word I can find for how they looked- and they would dart back and forth at different things in the room. I tried to make eye contact with her as often as possible in an effort to bring her back in to herself. She was starting to make a lot more noise at this point also, though she was still aware enough to be concerned about the noise she was making, and requested a towel to moan in to. She often looked at the affirmations and artwork she had hanging around her. Shawn read some of the affirmations out loud to her throughout the process.

Shawn and I were sitting on the bed while Kelly was working through labor in the tub, and Lyla was slowly falling asleep behind us while watching her movie. Kelly asked Shawn to stand behind her and hold her while she worked through the waves. She was very good at asking for exactly what she wanted. Shawn got into the tub shortly before transition started. I remember at 4:47 Kelly told Shawn something along the lines of “I can’t do this anymore.” I knew then that she was in the final stretch. Shawn was an amazing support for Kelly throughout the whole process. It was so clear how much she trusted him and needed him. He was very present with her and in tune with her needs. She worked through all of transition in his arms, either cuddling with him or asking him to hold her up from behind so she could float while going through another wave. She kept telling him to not let go of her. He was her rock.

Kelly was getting very loud in a very primal way while working through transition. At one point, from my perspective on the bed, Kelly’s head was next to one of her drawings she had hung on the wall of a lion. And she let out a roar not unlike a mama lioness. It was beautiful.

Kelly was also very quiet between the waves. Often times she looked asleep. She was getting a minute or so in between them and seemed to be making the most of the breaks. She was also getting weepy in those quiet moments. She wanted it to be over. She talked to her baby often, telling baby it was okay to come out now, she wanted baby to come out.

I continued to sit on the bed, in front of her, and hold space- that was what she needed from me. She started to seem like she was trying to escape the rushes, and I made eye contact with her and assured her how well she was doing and affirmed the process. Shawn did the same. She was able to settle back into the rushes and work with them instead of against them. She was also starting to make noises a bit higher in her throat, and I, just loudly enough, made some noises with her that were lower. She heard me and mimicked what I was doing- one more connection back into the rushes rather than trying to avoid them. 

She asked for a towel again, and I was perplexed at how she was still alert enough to be self-conscious about the noise she was making- but the towel didn’t end up being for noise. With the next wave, Kelly took the towel in her teeth and bit down as hard as she could. And for a few waves after that she continued to lash out at anything around her... including Shawn, and at one point the tub liner, which thankfully didn’t get torn off, but it did move around quite a bit.

Lyla seemed to wake up towards the end of transition, and Shawn and I were both a bit bewildered about what to do. I'm fairly certain Kelly was the one to mention giving Lyla the tablet again. That, in hindsight, is so comical and so telling- even towards the end of a very trying labor, when she was working through some of the most physically and mentally difficult moments of her life, Kelly came back down to be present with Lyla for a moment. Moms never stop Mom-ing. I got Shawn to unlock the tablet and turned around to give it to Lyla… who had fallen back asleep while we were sorting everything out. Which was perfect, because Kelly needed all of us in those final moments.

I heard the distinct change in the noises Kelly was making around 5:40. She had made it through transition and started pushing. And then around 5:49 she started letting out the LOUDEST yells. It was clear that baby was crowning. I turned around to look at Lyla on the bed behind me, and she was still fast asleep. Nothing was waking her at that point! Shawn briefly asked me to take a picture of Lyla, and Kelly heard him and said “No!” She needed us to be present with her. I took a quick moment to snap the picture anyway, but I waited until Kelly was resting in between pushes.

Baby’s head was visible at 5:50 or 5:51. Kelly got on her knees and put her hands on Shawn’s legs so that she was essentially on hands and knees. She had a break between the pushing waves, and it was in that brief moment that I experienced the only personal moment of hesitation throughout the whole process- baby’s head was out, and I was wondering why the rest of baby hadn’t come out with the next wave. I wasn’t highly concerned, but it gave me room to pause and wonder for a moment. Then I brushed that out of my mind and watched Kelly work with her instincts to get the rest of baby out. She moved around so much, she knew exactly what her body needed from her to get the rest of baby out and onto her chest. She went from hands and knees to sitting in a reclined position, and somewhere in that process, between 5:53-5:54, baby was fully out, and in her arms right at 5:54. 

Within a minute, Shawn said the word “baby” out loud and Lyla woke up in a flash, saying “I want to see the baby!” She didn’t wake up to the primal yells of her mama pushing out her younger sibling, but she woke up when she knew that baby was present in the outside world. I helped Lyla get into the tub and the family enjoyed many minutes of pure bliss. They sat in shock and happiness after realizing their new baby was a girl- baby Lotus.

I went to the kid’s bedroom and gently woke Liam up around 6:15. His first words upon seeing me were “Is the baby coming today?” I told him that his mom and dad and sister were in his parent’s bedroom and they had something to show him. He ran into the room and joined the happiness of the rest of his family.

Kelly moved to the bed at this point, thinking she was about to birth her placenta, but it ended up being a large blood clot instead. She was able to get Lotus to latch quickly and easily. We had a brief conversation just before 6:30 about what to do since her placenta hadn’t been birthed yet, and she was very ready to have it out. Thankfully, within a minute or two after that, right at 6:30, her placenta easily came out, whole and perfect. Kelly said she immediately felt better and was happy to have it out.

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Witnessing this birth has given me a newfound awe for birthing women. What an amazing process. What amazing bodies we have. What amazing stamina we have. 

Kelly seemed almost broken throughout parts of the labor. Not in a bad way. She was being broken open to be reborn into her new self. Motherhood the third time around. She dug deep and used every part of her fiber to bring Lotus earthside. She laughed, she yelled, she moaned, she cried, she sighed, she breathed. She wasn’t just giving birth, she WAS birth.

Elimination Communication

Dirty diapers are supposed to be a fact of life with a baby. And we have our fair share, kind of. Plenty of diapers filled with pee, thrown in the wet bag, and washed every other day (more on cloth diapers another time. *edit, here is my post on cloth diapering) But dirty as in poop? Please no. I can't remember the last time I changed a poopy diaper, and for that I am grateful. But how? I promise you my little guy is healthy and normal and regular. It's just that he knows that poop goes in the potty, and so that's where he takes care of it. This is the stuff of Elimination Communication!

I can't remember where I first heard of EC, but I know that I learned of it either before or during my pregnancy. The general concept is that babies are born with an awareness of doing their business, and instinctually they'd much rather not dirty a diaper- but the faster-paced society we live in now, coupled with the convenience of disposable diapers, has made us essentially train our children to make dirty diapers. With EC, you learn your baby's signs for needing to go potty, and you give them the opportunity to do so on the toilet when they need to. You can start this as early as the day they are born. What's great is that EC can look different for everyone; there is not one single standard approach. Some families EC full time, and they may have their babies in underwear by one-year-old. Some EC only during the day, some only when they are at home, etc.
Much like you and your baby learn how to communicate about his hunger, or sleepiness, or happiness, or discomfort, overstimulation, you can learn how to communicate about his needs to relieve himself. EC was alluring to Jeremy and me because of that communication, we liked the idea of having one more way to connect with Harrison. We also prefer the language used in the EC community. Peeing in a diaper or any other undesirable location is not an "accident"- rather, it is a "miss." That simple rephrasing suits our gentle parenting hearts well. Additionally, "catching" it on the toilet is not meant to be some big celebration, it is instead just a fact of how things are meant to go, and is treated as such.
We started very casually EC-ing when Harrison was four months. In the early days, I gave him a lot of diaper free time on absorbent blankets and puddle pads, and spent that time observing him and looking for cues. Anytime he did go, I made a sound to associate with the action- "psssss" for pee, and a sort of grunting for poop. I also took note of how long he took to pee after he nursed. When he was in a diaper, I tried to change it every hour (and/or 20 minutes after nursing), in an effort to find a dry one and offer him the toilet (or the sink, initially.) I offered him the potty during every diaper change, regardless of it being wet or dry. When we were on the toilet, I cued him with the sounds for pee and poop as well as verbally asking him if he needed to go potty.
There was certainly a transitional time of missing almost everything as Harrison and I both tried to figure out what was going on, but after a short few weeks we sort of had it figured out, and we were noticeably going through less diapers.
Our casual EC-ing has remained casual, and evolved into simply offering the toilet with every diaper change (which is at most every two hours due to the cloth diapers.) I also offer him the toilet during transitional times- immediately after getting home, or waking up, or getting out of the carrier- as I've learned he is more prone to going at those times. We don't EC at night because Harrison is rarely fully awake throughout the night, and we didn't want to sacrifice that. This casual take on EC has led us to catching a handful of pees throughout the day; some days are better than others. Harrison truly understands the concept, but we never did work hard enough to get him to communicate a need to pee, and he is perfectly happy to go in his diaper if I don't happen to catch it.
But the glorious ease at catching poops will never be lost on me. He has always made it fairly obvious when he needs to do it, and I estimate that we've caught 80-90% on the toilet since he was six months old or so. And as a bonus (as is meant to be the general nature of EC), since he's been mobile, Harrison will come and get my attention when he needs to go- he will often crawl or walk up to me and tell me in his own way what he needs to do, and I bring him to the toilet to take care of it.
Though we never jumped in to EC full-time, I am hopeful that since Harrison has maintained his awareness of these important body functions, he will be fully diaper free long before it is the societal norm to start standard potty training. I'm in just as much uncharted territory as anyone else with a one-year-old, but I am hopeful that the past eight months of EC-ing will be beneficial in transitioning Harrison to be diaper free and potty independent sometime in the next six months. (And then say goodbye to washing all those diapers!)
(The book "The Diaper Free Baby" by Christine Gross-Loh was very helpful when we first started, and it was a simple and straightforward read. I was able to get it at the library- though I had to put it on hold and wait a few weeks ... I need to meet these other EC-ing families!)

My Soapbox

The other day I did something that I purposefully make a habit of not doing- I initiated and engaged in discussion of a hotly debated subject in an online community of Moms.

Three of my stronger personality traits are being quiet, reserved, and avoiding conflict. An instigator I am not. Argumentative?- Nope. Do I enjoy a healthy debate? I'd rather observe.

But I have passions. Ooooh do I have passions. And these passions invoke in me a wild animal persona that could chew your head off. Well, in my mind that is what I want to do. Outwardly that wild animal shows itself in the form of respectful conversation, careful questions, and information presented with a combination of research-based knowledge and heart. Lots of heart.

(Jeremy gets to hear it all unfiltered, and he definitely knows a side of me that doesn't get presented to the world.)

Catch me at the right moment, with the right side story, either positive or negative, about one of my passions, and I will engage with you for hours and likely still have more to say.

So back to the other day ...

I've made it no secret that our family bed shares. (I used to think I wanted to keep quiet about it, but, passions.) Harrison knows nothing different then sleeping every night in between Jeremy and me, and taking his naps in the middle of our mattress (or in the baby carrier.)

I am a new mom, but at this point not a brand new mom, and when I see newer families struggling with the adjustment of a newborn in their lives, I like to offer to them what works for us. Often those offerings are in the form of mentioning bed sharing. I don't like to tell people what to do, but I do like to share my viewpoint because far too often I only see very one-sided (i.e. mainstream) advice. Jeremy and I have found ourselves parenting in a way that is very different from mainstream, so I like to give my insights on the off-chance that they could be helpful for another family.

So in the case of online communities, I offer my insight and that's usually the end of it.

The other day after I replied to a Mom struggling with lack of sleep and asking for advice, of course I gave her encouragement and told her about our nighttime routine.

And there came a response directly after mine, a response from a pediatrician that said, in so many words, "Do not take that advice because it is dangerous, don't do it don't do it don't do it it's wrong and bad." The response also gave information about sleeping habits and gave a terribly unrealistic age (in terms of biological norms) that a baby should be sleeping through the night.

I read that and my heart fell, and then I felt an anger inside of me that I don't often feel. The wild animal was being unleashed, seriously. I don't care about someone offering a different opinion, but it really drives me crazy how mainstream parenting has become a set of rules, and if you deviate from them you are doing something wrong. After ruminating on it for a little while, I realized I couldn't stay quiet.

I respectfully responded with research-based information and throughout the day looked back to the thread and had a short, kind conversation that clearly had two very differing points of view, but we were able to each have our say. It was a pleasant enough conversation, and that was the end of the discussion.

But inwardly, I have not been able to shake it. That discussion has stayed with me for the past few days. Because I hate seeing parents being told what they can and can't do, I hate seeing alternative points of view passed off as reckless parenting, and I hate seeing babies posed as manipulating, trainable beings.

I often feel like modern parenting ideas have actually made parenting a baby more difficult than it already is. The general guidelines for mainstream parenting feel very frustrating and I believe they contribute to parents having all these questions about what babies "should" and "shouldn't" do, rather than reassuring that parenting with instinct is the best way.

Babies need to be close to their parents, they need to be fed, they need cuddles, and they need these things around the clock. I feel this is all instinctual if you take away the insecurities that can come up when you're trying to follow the "rules"- rules that are generally designed to try and make our babies less dependent on us. Our infant children are the most innocent and beautifully needy and dependent beings that we will ever know. They communicate and express their needs through their little (or loud) cries. It doesn't matter the time of day, or the circumstance, or the location. I have fully experienced the maternal instinct that is to tend to my baby when I hear him cry, as he is clearly expressing a need that I can and should meet- as his mother, as one of his parents, as a caregiver.

So why is there such a deeply ingrained idea in our society that the most vulnerable and needy among us should not be taken care of when it is inconvenient for the parent? Why are we told, time and time again, that our babies who can't even tell night from day are manipulating us to tend to them in the middle of the night and that their cries, their needs, should be ignored? I'm not trying to harp on any one type of parenting idea, but rather voice frustration that the common information given to inexperienced, malleable parents is information that has them parenting against their instincts. Who in their right mind- a mind free of fear, free of exhaustion, free of depression, free of other people's ideas stated as fact- would instinctually ignore a baby with a need?

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So yes, one part of parenting instinctively in our household means bed sharing. This is the best set up we've found to meet Harrison's needs as they arise throughout the night. But here's a confession: on a few occasions, I have had a more difficult night's sleep, because the idea of bed sharing worried me on those particular nights. There is a common thread that links these nights- they happen after I've read an article, or blog post, or friendly discussion, or heated debate about the (un)safety of bed sharing. I second-guess my clear maternal instincts and the set up that has worked wonderfully for our family anytime I see someone mention something bad about it. I'm not even one to care about other people's opinions, but the switch can flip that quickly for me anyway. Something about that is so wrong- how can an anecdote that someone else mentions bring me to such a state of fear that I worry about the way that I am parenting my child? I'm thankful I'm always able to quickly find my bearings again and go back to fearless, instinctive parenting.

Everyone from trained professionals to our next-door neighbors to the strangers we pass on the streets needs to STOP offering fear-based parenting techniques. In fact, next-door neighbors and strangers can stop offering unsolicited advice altogether, and my heart will sing the day that the trained professionals we trust with our children offer balanced viewpoints, rather than a checklist of "do's" and "don'ts." As parents, we know our babies better than anyone else, and it is our duty to care for our children the best we can- instinctively and fearlessly.