The birth of Cameron Aiden Casson
September 13 2012
My
water started leaking at approx. 3am on Wednesday September 11. Ihad ctx
starting by 5:30am which were very mild,approx ½ hour apart. I was bothered a
bit about the fact that this labour was starting almost the same way that
Colin’s had. He is my firstborn and I ended up with a caesarean section after
going in because my water broke. I would stress on it for a bit, let a few
tears out and then be over it. This repeated a few times until I realized that
my water wasn’t going to break completely and the ctx were picking up a bit. I
had a nap with the boys at 1:30pm, woke up about 3:30pm and the ctx had slowed
down some. I started making hamburger soup and waited to have the ctx pick up
again. They were still a ½ hour apart at this point, but starting to have a bit
more zing to them. Throughout the evening they started to slowly get closer
together but I still had a ways to go before he would be born. I went to bed
and was able to doze a bit while contracting about every 10-15 minutes with
them lasting about 30-45 seconds. Then, finally about 3:30am on Thursday
September 13, the contractions had finally gotten into a good rhythm at 10 min
apart and lasting for about a min to a min and a half long. I got out of bed
and decided to sit on the birth ball and surf facebook. ;D The ball didn’t do
too much for me so I went back to standing and making figure 8 motions with my
hips during the ctx.
About
4:30am I went back to bed and the ctx started slowing slightly, just enough to
give me a bit of a break for a couple hours. I got out of bed at 6am and went
out to the living room to chill out with my oldestwho had woken up just a few
minutes before. I went about getting my son and myself something to eat and the
contractions tapered right off for about a half hour. By 7am my hubby and my
youngest had woken up and also come out of the bedroom. I made my youngest up a
bowl of yoghurt and granola and decided to have some myself. I had to stand up
and swivel my hips through about 3 or 4 contractions while eating. When I was
done I decided to go back to bed for a bit and lie down. I went to the washroom
before lying down, time is fuzzy from this point on but I think it was just
before 9am. While sitting on the toilet, I got hit by one monster of a
contraction that told me it was definitely game time. ;D I would just like to
say that I give kudos to the women that can labour while sitting on a toilet. I
am NOT one of them lol. From this point on I only had about 10 ctx before
Cameron was born!
Ray
decided that he should get the water going into the pool. I had gotten a $30
pool for birthing in from Jysk in Medicine Hat, no fishies and it looked a lot
like the La Bassine pools. Well, when I got through 2 or 3 more ctx and the
water was only up about an inch in the pool, I knew that I wouldn’t be able to
have a waterbirth. The ctx at this point were coming very strong and I had
pushing sensations with each one that kept getting stronger. Thinking back now,
I believe this is where Cameron did his moving down in my pelvis and getting
into position to be born. I found it hard to work with these ctx and got very
vocal before remembering to breathe with each one. I wandered between the two bedrooms in our
house leaning(hanging on for dear life lol) to the dressers that were tall enough
to stand with for a bit before I decided on staying in our bedroom. We got the
plastic sheets that I had ordered underneath me along with chux pads and I
tried to stay in sync with the ctx that were coming fast and furious. I have to
admit that these ctx took me by surprise as they were so different than the
ones that I had with Connor. When I had Connor I was lying in the labour bed
pretty much on my back, with these ones I was upright and they were quite a bit
stronger than the ones I had in the hospital with Connor. I laboured standing
up for a few more contractions and then decided that my undies had better come
off because Cameron felt very close to being born. I had to get lower as I knew
that I couldn’t or didn’t want to give birth standing upright. I remember
turning around and saying “What do I want? What do I want?” I decided to kneel
down at the end of our bed and it was the perfect height to rest my arms on. I
held onto my head lots and roared through the rest of the ctx, trying to
remember to breathe as well so I didn’t tear. I remember feeling his head move
down with ctx and then coming back a bit each time, which was actually really
cool to me. I also remember feeling his head for the first time and that was
awesome. One more ctx and his head was out, then I lifted my left leg and was
able to push out his shoulders and the rest of his body. In all I believe it
wasn’t more than an hour between that first pushy ctx on the toilet and when he
was born. I actually think it might have been a bit less than an hour. He was
born at 9:27 in the morning. He was only out for a couple seconds and he was
already screaming his head off lol. I think he liked the swiftness of his birth
about as much as I did! It is amazing though, I forgot all about how difficult
it was in about 5 minutes of him being in my arms
Now
for a little back story on why we chose to birth at home, even knowing that
there couldn’t be a midwife present. When I found out I was pregnant I knew
that I wanted to be under the care of the midwives here in town. I have had two
pregnancies with the care of doctors and two hospital births. The first ended
in a caesarean that I know was unnecessary and the second was a hospital VBAC. I
am wholly supportive of having doctors/OBs as your care provider if you are
high risk, but I know now that when you are low risk having a care provider
that understands natural birth is a much better option. I have done a ton of
research on natural birth, talked to many women and read many, many birth
stories since those two births. I also took a course to become a doula in the
year after Connor(my second) was born. I knew that I would be more comfortable
with midwives attending me and was hoping that I would be able to have this
baby at home, with our whole family present. I attended the meet and greet the
hospital runs each month for the midwives and their prospective clients and
there found out I would be seeing Arian. We talked a little bit and I felt very
comfortable right off the bat and realized that she shared many of the same
ideals of birth that I had. She was hopeful that home birth would be an option
in the near future for the community. As my pregnancy progressed the option of
homebirth was put on hold indefinitely and I realized that I would have to make
a very difficult decision. I decided that I was not going to give up my dream
of having this baby at home with his dad and siblings present. It was one that
I went back and forth on a few times and shed many tears over. I knew in my
heart that birth was about as safe as life gets and everything would likely
turn out fine. I was honest with myself and also know that there can be things
that go wrong, but with no interventions and a mama that is comfortable and
feeling safe in her surroundings birth is extremely safe. I joined a few
unassisted birthing groups and talked to a couple other moms that I knew had
birthed at home with just their partners for support. Near the end of my pregnancy
the health region hired a new manager for the midwifery program. Arian has
talked with him and he is open to new ideas and helping in any way that he can
to make homebirth an option for this region.
I am very happy with this news and
am already reaping the benefits as Arian is able to come out to our house for
home visits/baby wellness checks. While I am very sad and feel like I missed
out on an opportunity to work with an amazing lady for my birth, I am again
hopeful for the future of birthing mamas in our area.
