By Jessica Morgan

It was a dark and stormy night…well, it was a dark night anyway. I had gone downstairs to sleep on the couch, because that was where I was most comfortable for most of my pregnancy. I woke up at 2:30 AM with a pain in my abdomen. At this point in the pregnancy, if Ella kicked while I had a full bladder, I experienced a similar pain, so I simply got up and used the bathroom. Meanwhile, I had another pain…and then another, and I knew it was labor.

Once again, my labor started with contractions five minutes apart and, after two babies, I have never had any issue differentiating between Braxton Hicks and true contractions since they are so different (at least for me). After an hour of timing my contractions, I called the birth center. Due to my long drive and previous history (me arriving in labor with my oldest, Judah, and him being born 4 hours later) the midwife on call gave me the green light to go ahead and come in.

By this time it was close to 4:30 AM. I called my parents so that they could come to the house and be with Judah, and then I went to wake up my husband, Josh. If you’ve never had the pleasure of waking someone out of a deep sleep to tell them you’re in labor, it’s quite comical. This is how it went:
Me, walking into the bedroom fully dressed and showered: “I’m sorry honey, but it’s time.”
Josh, sleepily turning over: “What? Are you having contractions?”
Me: “Um, yes.”
Josh: “Did you call the birth center?”
“Yes.”
“Do they want you to come in?”
“Yes.” (This would, in fact, be the reason I am waking you up)
“Have you called your parents? Do I have time to take a shower? Do you need a shower?”
“Please go take a shower, honey, I need you to be a little more with it before you get behind the wheel.”
We made the uneventful drive to Chapel Hill, and this time around it was much easier since I hadn’t waited until I was in transition to start the trip. Although we did still have to stop at Sheetz so I could pee (and Josh could get coffee).

By the time we arrived at the birth center and got checked in, around 7 AM, my contractions were pretty uncomfortable but still manageable. At this point I was also really starting to dread the later part of labor. With every contraction I was reminded that it was only going to get worse from there. That’s the definite downside of being a second time mom – the first time around, you’re blissfully ignorant of what’s coming.

I labored almost exclusively in the tub. At some point I even ate a cheese stick, sitting in the tub, having contractions. I told Josh that getting to do that was worth the two hour drive.  I felt so much better in the tub that for the first hour or so, I had to tell Josh when I was having a contraction so we could make sure they weren’t slowing down.

Around 10 AM, I actually asked for the midwife to check me. Judah’s labor was so short that I had no parameters to go by mentally for how far I might have progressed. When she did, I thought I was going to pull a Spiderman and climb straight up the walls with the contraction that followed…and every contraction after that. I was only 4 CM dilated but I was fully effaced. Josh said he heard them taking bets out at the nurses’ station about how much longer before I was pushing or before the baby was born.

It was probably only 15 – 30 minutes later that the midwife, Jessica, came back in and told me that if I wanted to “have this baby on land, it’s time to get out.” Aaaaand this is where I knew I was in transition (at least subconsciously) because the walk from the tub to the bed was, as I said repeatedly, “awful. This is the worst. This is horrible.”

Once I was on the bed, Jessica said I still had a little bit of cervix to go before I could start pushing, which was the worst news ever. After a contraction on my hands and knees, wishing I could die, she said she could give me some nitrous oxide to “take the edge off until it’s time to start pushing” which I agreed to immediately. Then she said something about it being not covered by insurance and therefore we’d have to pay for it out of pocket, and Josh said he could tell by my face that I was thinking something like, “aw heck no!” and the next contraction, I started pushing anyway.

Throughout this part of the labor and pushing I had Josh pressing on my back. For some reason it was the only thing that felt good, so he says he had to work this time too :-). With Judah I didn’t want anyone near me or touching me. This time, during the pushing phase, Josh was using all his might to push on my hip and back and hold a leg, Jess was holding my other leg and letting me pull on her arm, and Laura, the midwife student, and Emily, the nurse, were ready to catch. This is also where I kept saying, “this is awful. This is awful. Just cut her out of me.”

I also remember hearing myself say with absolute seriousness, “I’m done. I’m done now. Nope. No. I’m done.” Which is ridiculous, because I have no idea how I planned to stop it. I finally pushed her out at 11:31 AM (for those that can’t do math, that’s about a half hour longer than Judah’s labor). She was born in the sac, just like Judah, which is pretty rare, and now both my babies have done it which I think is really cool. She apparently came out with her hand by her face and my midwife said it was a good thing she was so small with that particular entrance! I cried as I held her for the first time and kept saying, “I didn’t think you’d ever get here!”

I struggled a lot with fear this pregnancy. After a friend lost her baby at full term, I constantly worried that Ella would die too. I don’t think I realized how much that affected me until I was holding her in my arms with tears running down my face, because I really believed something was going to happen and I’d never get to meet her. Even now, when she sleeps in her crib for longer periods of time, I worry that she’s died and sneak in to check on her. I also have “survivor’s guilt” of sorts – when I get to hold her, or nurse her, or have her smile at me I wonder how I am so blessed and my friend had to suffer so much (hers was a little girl as well).

After Ella was born, the midwife checked us both out and got us settled and then – this is another reason the birth center is great – left us alone. Ty and Kasey (my brother and sister in law who live in Durham) brought us pizza, smoothies and champagne, and we got to hang out. I took a shower, Josh and Ella took a nap.

It was truly such a wonderful birth, as much as natural childbirth is wonderful. And when it goes well, you really do get that insane natural high. Ella wasn’t even a few hours old and I thought to myself, “I could totally do this again. Not right now, but definitely again.”