Birth story

A warning, if you’re uncomfortable with discussions of dilation and tailbones, you might want to skip this one. It’s Nora Lea’s birth story, and it’s long.

Every year on my birthday, at 8:36am, my mom calls me to tell me the details of my birth story. She starts with the part where I was breech and she needed to crawl on the ground to reverse my direction and continues through the part where my dad had been in the hospital for months before recovering from triple bypass surgery so she was alone, and she ends with the part where she cried, “She’s so beautiful, she’s so beautiful.”

Because knowing these details is our tradition, I wanted to share this with you, Nora Lea, before time and hormones completely erased your emergence from my memory.

A week before your arrival, we enjoyed a lot of whirlwind dates with each other. This was due to our five year wedding anniversary and the understanding that dates out of the house would be more tricky to manage after your arrival.

We went to fancy restaurants,
we went to movies,
we held hands and slowly walked in the Napa heat
wondering whether you were a boy or a girl,
wondering whether you’d cry a lot,
wondering what your favorite food would be.

Due to early contractions, your dad and I waited eagerly for two long days before you arrived.
Finally, I awoke at 1:00 am on Tuesday, July 1 with contractions strong.

Since our doula, the hospital and every birth book I consumed told me to stay at home as long as possible, I snuck downstairs to save your dad some sleep.

I plugged my iPod into my ears and listened to Marie Mongan’s Hypnobirthing relaxation. Sounds silly and so very Northern Californian of me, but you’ll find out that I believe strongly in the power of our brains to overcome all kinds of bodily mischief.

Over the next three hours, I breathed in relaxation, calmness and the belief that yours would be an easy birth, that this was the most natural thing in the world.

At four am, the contractions were so strong and coming every minute and a half. It was time to get your dad and head to St. Helena Hospital, a Seventh Day Adventist hospital in Angwin.

Our dog Pinot became nervous that something was up and she paced around the living room with me. It was good to have such a furry protector.

We had called Anna, our doula and she came all the way out here from San Francisco. I’d packed my bag the night before. Your dad packed the car and I packed some snacks.

We were so eager to meet you.
I called your grandma to let her know I was heading in.
She couldn’t wait to meet you either.

By six am, the doula arrived and we were in the throes of strong labor. I understand why they call it labor, because it is hard work.

You had a funny position, you were turned to come out of my body facing up — and this is called back labor. This means that the back of your head is pressing against my tailbone.

It’s a kind of labor that brings with every contraction a huge amount of back pressure. But your dad and I were committed to focusing on bringing you into the world with no pain medication. I hadn’t been living so clean for nine months just to dope you up before you came out.

Every contraction brought grunts and groans. We found that making sounds — really primal animal sounds — helped to bring you closer to arrival. Anna and your dad took turns helping me through each contraction with lots of noise.

I think all of this sound made the nurses and doctors uncomfortable because at 12:30pm, they sent a nurse in to tell me that all the nurses and my doctor recommended an epidural. I was only dilated to 4 centimeters — and after all this time, they wanted to give me some relief.

Well, if they were recommending it, and I was plum tired out, I agreed.

We’d have to wait a half hour for the anesthesiologist and I waited, totally disappointed in myself.
I’d prepared this Hypnobirthing program and here I just couldn’t wing it.
But I had your dad’s support — he didn’t like seeing me work so hard for so long.

The anesthesiologist arrived and prepared the epidural. They had to sit me up and hold me perfectly still to put the injection in my spine and the catheter in. But it was too difficult to sit up — the contractions were rolling in every minute and the back pressure was so much that I couldn’t curl over the way the doctor needed me to.

The anesthesiologist poked in my back and prodded and due to some anomaly in my physiology, couldn’t get it all together.

It didn’t matter because all of a sudden, at about one thirty, I yelled, “I NEED TO PUSH!”
We checked and I was 8 centimeters dilated!

I could hold on for another two centimeters! You were on your way!
Our doctor was on her way too, and since my water didn’t break, she was going to need to break it.
This brought nurses and monitors and all kinds of prodding that made me swat at people.

Minutes later, I was dilated to ten and just waiting for the doctor to arrive to break my water.
I wanted to push you out so much.

At this time I was on all fours, still trying to turn you around.
You were quite comfy in my pelvic girdle and weren’t moving anywhere.

And SPLASH!
My water broke, all over the place.
And at that minute, the doctor walked in, sat down and asked me quietly to focus to push you out.

I was quite overwhelmed at this point and was grateful for her intensity.

I pushed, bellowing with each effort.
I pushed with the help of my ancestors,
I pushed with the support of all women who have done this before me,
I pushed with the support of your father, I pushed you into this world, silent and smiling.

I’m crying now as I remember this moment.
So important, this arrival.

At one point, the doctor told me that she could see your head filled with hair. This confused me because I hadn’t visualized you with hair. For a moment, I thought, “Nope, that’s not my baby, my baby couldn’t have hair already. I think I’ll stop pushing now, because that’s not my baby.”

But you are my baby.
And you did have a head with hair,
a head full of light brown hair.

They pulled you from me and set you on my chest. They covered you with a blanket. You cried at first, your lungs filling with air, and then you were quiet, your hand near your head, you looked around with big eyes.

Your father and I asked, “what is it?!” meaning, what in the heck gender were you?
We’d waited so long for our surprise and no one let us know!

Infuriatingly, they said, “Let’s let Dad look.” and he had to go under the blanket to investigate.

“We have a daughter,” he said, “Nora Lea.”
And your father and I kissed and smiled and hugged.

We kissed you and smiled at you and hugged you.

They left you on my chest like that for some time.
And your father and I knew we had always known you
and knew we were just meeting you.

And we couldn’t love you more.

Tags: birth story, helenjane, noralea, st. helena hospital maternity

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