This sweet birth story was full of all kinds of lessons for new mama, Maggie — from working through frustration, to learning to be in the present moment. Amazing (and difficult) lessons for all of us!

Congratulations, Maggie, and welcome to the world, baby Kit!

Love,

Alisa, Sarah & the women of Blooma

__

My maternity leave began on a Monday, one week before my due date, due to sporadic contractions that continually tricked me into thinking “this is it!” This wouldn’t have been bad, but day after day, we had no baby!

Luckily, that week provided me with inner crisis, struggle, preparation time, a bit of rest, and good advice from great people around me about letting go of control and taking this time to rest and relax. This was a challenge for me! … A foreshadowing of the challenge ahead??

Finally, on Thursday, I attended Sarah’s prenatal yoga class and took her advice about being in the present moment. Wow! Yoga has really centered me over the years and especially at that moment! Just be. I was having a great pregnancy, and I just needed to let go of trying to be in control and let my body and the baby work. What a lesson!

Friday evening, while out with some friends, I started to feel contractions…these are different, more intense. I didn’t get much sleep that night because I lost my mucus plug and my water broke around 2 a.m. Saturday.

Saturday morning, we called Dawn, our doula, and told her about the progress. HOWEVER… now the contractions had stopped. Ugh!

We talked with Dawn about the decision we had to make… when do we go to the hospital if contractions don’t start on their own?

This was not what I had envisioned! My labor was supposed to start. I was supposed to labor at home with Brent and Dawn as long as I could, then go to the hospital and push this baby out without interventions or drugs.

We decided to give my body 24 hours to start contractions on its own, and get one more night of sleep in our own bed. If nothing started, we would go into the hospital bright and early Sunday morning. So, we got all packed and ready to go, hoping things would start on their own!

Nothing started on its own. So, we packed up our car at 6 a.m. Sunday morning and off we went to the hospital. Knowing that our OB would have wanted us to come in within 6 hours of my water breaking, we told a little fib. We said my water broke at 2 a.m. Sunday morning instead of Saturday morning. As we expected, they wanted to start me on pitocin to get my contractions started. So, here we go! An intervention. Our plan had already taken a turn, but I was determined to do my best to have the birth we planned.

After making a couple of special requests, we finally got on the same page as our nurse to make this birth happen our way!

We started pitocin at 10:30 a.m. Dawn joined us at about noon and became my “personal trainer.” We started working the room and trying to get contractions to form a regular pattern. They started their regular, hard pattern around 1:30 p.m.

Dawn and Brent helped me work through my contractions, as we changed positions every 20 minutes or so. Dawn was excellent and amazingly helpful, but the best part about Dawn was how helpful she made Brent. She was able to give him cues and guide him in helping me. It was extra special having my husband right by my side giving me exactly what I needed! It really made the birth ours.

When the nurse checked my cervix at 4 p.m., and asked if I wanted to know the number, I asked her to just tell Dawn. I had been working so hard; I didn’t want to be disappointed by a number. Dawn announced, “Yes! You want to know that you’re already dilated to 7 ½ or 8!”

I didn’t know how much longer I could take this hard work, but Dawn gave me a short pep talk about how I had made it through some of the hardest labor and was now transitioning to push.

Okay, things were changing… I can do this! Yes, they were changing, but that didn’t mean they were getting easier. It was a different kind of challenge!

After a couple more cervix checks (and a little help from the nurse to get rid of the last part—push it over the baby’s head), I got to start pushing. I started pushing around 5:15 p.m. and our sweet baby girl Kathryn (“Kit”) was born at 5:46 p.m., Sunday, March 4th.

Wow! Amazing! WE DID IT! …even with the Pitocin change of plan right off the bat! We were a great team—all 4 of us! Baby Kit cooperated throughout the whole process. And, I couldn’t have done it without Brent and Dawn!

Our beautiful, alert, 7lb, 8oz Kit arrived and started nursing right away!

I want to thank Sarah and Blooma and all they provide to mamas, not only the yoga but also the inspiration and education! I would have never been so empowered to have the birth my husband and I wanted for our baby without Blooma and the Childbirth Collective. You gave us the knowledge and the confidence to go into the hospital and make it our birth, not just another birth that needed to follow their checklist and protocol. Thank you so much! I look forward to bringing Kit to BYOB yoga very soon!!

— Maggie

*{A little note from Blooma: We joyfully share birth stories sent to us by Blooma families, however, Blooma does not claim responsibility for and does not endorse individual choices made by families or their care providers. We seek to share any array of birth stories to showcase a wide range of experiences.}