The Big Day

Alice Elizabeth’s birth story 

I was almost 41 weeks along and becoming so weary. This was not a hard pregnancy overall, but the last month was physically difficult, as my round ligaments were stretched to the max and I had pubic symphisis dysfunction that made walking, standing, and even sitting extremely uncomfortable. By the end of the day, I’d have shooting pains up my hips/thighs if I had stood too long, or moved too quickly. I felt like a 90 year old woman. Maybe Sarah mother of Isaac felt like this in her time.

At 38 and a half weeks, I was to stand up in a wedding as a bridesmaid, so that 38 week mark had been in my head as the point to get through before going into labor. I gratefully saw that 38 week mark pass after some pre-term contractions had scared me a few weeks before.

Getting past that point, my excitement to meet Alice was strong. I had been patient for the birth of my other two, but my patience was drawn thin this time. Then I saw 39 weeks come and go, with a weekend of practice labor starting and stopping, just convincing enough for me to call my in-laws to get the kids, only to call them the next day and apologize for the false alarm. 

Prodromal labor is one annoying beast. I’d never had it before. My older two were both born quickly after the first signs of labor, without even a hint of Braxton Hicks to preamble the occasion. But this time, I had not one, but two long weekends in a row of consistent, long-lasting, mild contractions, that fizzled out. Hours of nothing in between hours of regular 60-90 second surges. I kept mistaking these regular contractions for the first stage of labor. But in the first stage of labor, contractions get stronger and closer together. These were almost like clockwork, every 5-7 minutes, but mild and easy. Prodromal labor. Such a mind game.

What a way to mess with a mama’s head. By 40 weeks 6 days, I was starting to believe I would stay pregnant forever and need a chemical induction or c-section at 43 weeks instead of my planned home birth. The anxieties of a desperately-exhausted expecting mother!

My midwife Sara came on Tuesday morning, the 28th of July, and heard my frustrations and offered me some options. I opted to do a membrane stretch and sweep, and got a recipe for a castor-oil concoction I could take the next morning if nothing resulted from the sweep. 

The sweep caused some mild soreness but no contractions. I went about my day. I gathered the supplies for the castor oil recipe, got an adjustment at the chiropractor, and came home with a plan to try the castor oil first thing the next morning.

I got a really good night’s sleep, and woke up at 7:30am the morning of the 29th, the start of my 41st week. Made myself a bacon tomato and cream cheese bagel for breakfast, with the first ripe tomato from my garden. Put on the floral dress I had mostly lived in the last few months, and took what I hoped would be my last bump photo.

At 9:30 I made myself “the milkshake” — 2 oz pure castor oil, a raw egg, and some Zanzibar dark chocolate ice cream, blended in a mason jar. I tried to take it with a straw first but it was too thick. I plugged my nose and chugged it down with my head tilted back. I only stopped to gag once when I thought about how much it tasted like I was chugging a milkshake made of lipstick. So. Gross.

If you’re unfamiliar with this old-school induction method, I’ll spare you the full explanation. Let’s just say this trick is tried and true, and has pretty consistent success inducing labor for full term women, within 48 hours of taking it. But some women hate it because the effects are potent. Some women vomit (I didn’t) but pretty much everyone experiences the strong laxative effects. It’s why this works. Glamorous, right?

I didn’t feel much effect for the first two hours. When I did, around 11:30, it wasn’t the dramatic bathroom event I’d expected, so I wondered if maybe it wasn’t going to work for me. (43 weeks of pregnancy coming back into my head!) 

Some mild contractions started. I didn’t pay them much attention because the last two weeks of prodromal labor had conditioned me to ignore them as insignificant. Around 12:30pm they started to get strong and I started to time them. Some definite progress was happening, as they increased in length and intensity, and were coming at 3-5 minutes apart already. 

I called my mother in law, who had her bag packed and was out the door five minutes later to come stay with us and be with my kids while I labored at home. She had an hour distance to cover, so I told the kids she was coming and she’d take them for a late lunch at Dairy Queen. They played nicely together in Roger’s room with their toy animals until she got here at 1:30 and took them out to lunch. They had spent a lot of time with her during my false alarms the previous weekends, so I don’t think they thought too much of being swept off by grandma again.

When they were gone, I started to focus more inwardly, walking and bouncing on the birth ball. I hadn’t called the midwife yet. She was just 20 minutes away and I didn’t want her to come until I knew for sure. I told my husband David to rest but be ready, he would need energy to help me later if this was the real deal and if it took all day and into the night. 

The first few contractions I had when I was alone were strong and I had to concentrate on relaxing my limbs and face through them. They were strong enough that I let myself take them in. I told myself, “I’m having a baby today,” almost more to make myself believe it, rather than as a declaration of what I already believed. I texted the midwife with the duration and time between contractions and she said she’d head over. That helped me believe this was real too.

I went out to the backyard and walked around and stopped to notice my first zinnia was blooming in the flower bed. I thought, “Alice, you were born on the day of the first zinnia bloom, the day I ate the first ripe brandywine tomato from the garden.” Again, saying it in my head so as to will it to be true. 

A contraction came on and I swayed my hips through it, hands on my lower back, head tilted up in the sunlight and eyes closed, jaw slack and mouth open. It was strong and enduring. But it didn’t hurt. It felt real. It felt true. After it finished, I rubbed my belly and got swept up in hope and let some tears come to my eyes as I breathed a thankful prayer. Today is the day. Thank you, Jesus!

I went back into the house and saw my midwife pulling up the street in front of the house. I opened the door for her almost apologetically... I was sure I was in labor this time, but I had it in my head that it was going to be a very long day. I didn’t offer any assessment for Sara as to how far I was in the process, I just told her about my last contraction and she took my vitals and listened to the baby’s heartbeat. She left me to do my thing.

She and David started to fill the birth tub with water. I could hear David filling large pots and dumping them into the tub, which distracted me. “Why aren’t you using the hose?” I asked him. “Well, it didn’t fit the faucet,” he said. I was annoyed that he hadn’t checked it beforehand but I knew this would not be a fruitful point on which to dwell. I didn’t marry a planner. I married a “it’ll work out” problem solver. I let it go and thankfully he was able to fill up the tub pretty quickly with the fill-and-dump method. I wasn’t ready to get in yet anyway. I was trying to keep moving through contractions to keep them coming productively and to keep Alice moving down in the birth canal.

I swayed, bounced on the birth ball, walked, or balanced on hands and knees through contractions for the next hour or so, and had to use the bathroom a few times between. The castor oil was starting to move things along in my system, clearing it out VERY efficiently. Sorry if that’s TMI, but this is a birth story after all.

I wasn’t aware of the time, but maybe around 4:30, I felt the need for some relief and decided to get into the tub. I started a Spotify worship playlist and let it play softly in the background.

The water was lovely, and it felt nice to lean forward over the edge during contractions, but the water didn’t really take the edge off contractions as much as I was expecting it too. Sara applied some counter pressure through a few contractions as I began to vocalize more. Even though these contractions truly took my attention, and I felt like each break between required me to deliberately rest, I was inwardly wondering if I had called Sara too soon; if there would be hours and hours more of this; if my mother-in-law and kids would come back and interrupt the progress at bedtime and I’d be halted until they were settled in their beds, only to get to transition some time in the middle of the night. 

I had to use the bathroom again. I got up and went to the bathroom and some really intense intestinal distress hit me like a ton of bricks. Like, Montezuma’s revenge. Wow. Worse than the labor contractions. Just awful. Castor oil, your reputation precedes you with full accuracy! But once I completed “the purge”, I felt a lot of relief. I got back into the tub thankful that didn’t happen in the nice clean water. 

Contractions got very strong now. The assisting midwife, Karen, had arrived while I was in the bathroom. We had spoken on the phone in the early stages of my search for a midwife and I was so happy she was the one who got to come assist, as she had been my favorite besides Sara. I greeted her as I got back in the water, but another contraction took me away into myself. I could hear Sara and Karen whispering together beside the pool but didn’t know or care what they were saying. I was riding on the waves. 

I was visualizing my uterus squeezing Alice and pushing her down into my wide open cervix. I was moaning deeply through the crest of each surge, and blowing raspberries through my lips as they came down from the peak. 

I felt like I was close to pushing, but I also didn’t want to get my hopes up if there was a lot of work to do still. I decided to try the bathroom again. More explosive results followed. I felt sure that I had nothing left in my system after that.

I asked Sara to check me before I got back into the water, and she said I was at a 7-8, still more work to do. I felt a little discouraged by that, thinking maybe the pressure I was feeling was all intestinal distress from the castor oil, and not as much labor progress as I hoped. “I can’t keep doing this for hours and hours” I thought and was upset with myself. I let some tears out through the next strong contraction in the water, while the words of a worship song filled my ears and came into my heart. I don’t even remember what they were, but they were affirming that Jesus is faithful, and He is with me, and I don’t have to save myself. He’s got me. It was Transition. I was experiencing a beautiful transition to stage 3 of labor, and I didn’t even know I was going through it, though thinking over it now it makes sense. I had hit the “I can’t do this anymore” stage, but instead of voicing that doubt, the worship filling the room filled me and gave me strength. The Holy Spirit was present as The Comforter. I took courage. 

I got through one last strong, long-lasting contraction and felt some intense pressure. “I think I have to go to the bathroom again, but stay close”, I told Sara. I left the bathroom door ajar because I wasn’t sure if this was going to be more bowel explosions or if I was about to have my baby over a toilet! Once there, the bowel explosions did begin (oh Castor oil, you old scoundrel!) but they were happening simultaneously with heavy, unreal back labor. I felt like my entire digestive system was going to fall out of my body. I wiped up during a break between, but then another contraction hit and I was overpowered by it. I was getting loud. I could hear myself crying out.

Sara came in at my outburst. She gave me one look, and asked if I wanted to have my baby over the toilet. The question took me by surprise. “Wait. Is she crowning!?” I asked, as soon as I could speak. Yes, this was intense, but seriously? I was only at 7cm five minutes before! 

“She will be here whenever you’re ready to push.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond. I called out to David, and Sara opened the door and my husband came in with Karen. There were the four of us huddled around the toilet in our tiny parsonage bathroom, Sara on my right, David in front of me, Karen off to the left with some towels ready. I felt the force of a pushing contraction coming and reached my arms up to grab David, standing up and putting my arms around his shoulders for support as her head started to come down.

“I can’t stop pushing. Help me slow her down!” I begged. Sara told me to pant and coached my panting breaths to ease her down without tearing me open on the way out. I copied her example and panted in short bursts that slowed my baby’s descent enough that she came gradually out with the next contraction, which was a doozy, and through which I called out “Jesus!” in my utter vulnerability and powerlessness. 

Her head was out, Sara was at my feet attending to her head, and I was in shock and disbelief. This is almost over! There was quick discussion about where I wanted to finish pushing. Please not over the toilet!

They helped me to my hands and knees on the floor of the bathroom and I had a few seconds to prepare myself to finish pushing. The endorphins were rushing through me. My emotional floodgates were opening. I was so surprised and overjoyed that what I had thought would take me hours upon hours more, was just about to be finished. I didn’t really feel the next contraction, but Sara encouraged me to give a push and so I took a breath and bore down in one long effort and felt her sharp shoulders and elbows as they slid out and she was placed gently beneath me on her tummy on a towel. 

I picked her up and pulled her to my chest and the five of us squeezed out of that tiny bathroom and back into the birth room, where they helped me onto the bed to check her vitals while I stared at her open eyes and started to speak my soft greetings to my third born child. “Hi Alice, I’m your mama. You’re here! So soon!” I was crying and laughing and my husband got a photo of the moment, and Alice’s vernix-covered head and arms. 

All was well. Bliss. Euphoria. 

The midwives marveled at the thickness of her cord. Robust.

I helped her latch and she immediately started to suckle, which gave me my first taste of the after pains I’d be enduring for the next few days. The oxytocin of breastfeeding was effective both to remind me that recovery was going to be painful, and to detach my placenta. Sara said she thought it looked like my placenta was almost going to fall right out and asked if I could give a little push. Out it came and she said it looked beautifully healthy. Then she checked me for tearing and said I had a very minor lesion, no need for stitches. Music to my ears.

Next that dreaded fundal massage. But what, this can’t be!? Why doesn’t it hurt!? Like, worse-than-labor level hurt!? If I remembered anything from my two previous births, it was how AWFUL the “gentle” fundal massage felt when the hospital nurses inflicted this “gentle” agony upon me. Not sure if it was because of the ease of my placenta delivery, or what, but this time the fundal massage was truly painless. Glorious mercy upon mercy had attended my home birth, but this one was the most surprising of all.

Karen started to empty the pool and clean up supplies while Sara weighed and measured Alice. The time of birth was recorded for the birth certificate: 6:35pm. Six hours from when I first started to time contractions in early labor, not aware they were the real thing. 

Oh castor oil, you wily minx.

It was about 7pm, and David knew his mom and the children were waiting to hear from him instructions for returning home without disturbing my labor. He loves to surprise his mom, especially when it’s a good surprise and tears are expected. He texted her some vague instructions about coming back to put the kids to bed, and how to do so without disturbing me, and that they should come in quietly, but they could come home at 8pm. No mention of the birth of her granddaughter. He called his dad who was still an hour away so he could come too, and they could all arrive at the house around the same time. He told his dad about the baby, but not to say a word to grandma.

David Thomassen, you wily minx.

I took a shower—amazing. Put on my bathrobe and went to the couch, where David was holding Alice, and we awaited the family’s arrival. The kids came in with Grandma behind them whispering instructions to go straight upstairs, and they almost ran past us but I stopped them and bid them come over to the couch. The kids came over and didn’t see what Dad was holding at first, but when they did, they both started laughing like it was Christmas and huddled around to see their new sister. Grandma was saying something as she walked over but stopped mid-sentence as she realized David’s trick and saw that the baby was here. She just started crying. David was highly amused. 

Grandpa arrived soon after, and the midwives finished cleaning everything up and checked to make sure we were all good before they left.

I would give my first home birth, as compared to the hospital, a 10/10 rating. Hospitals can’t even compete. This experience was hands down one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.

I would give castor oil a 1/10 rating for quality of experience, but a 10/10 for effectiveness!