My Birth Story

<3 Your first breathe took ours away <3

Most woman make very different choices then what I choose to have... Since I can remember I have always said that I would have my babies at home. Most people may have thought it was only something I said and not something I would ever do. Thanks to my mommy and her being a midwife I have always been very educated about hospital births. That is what lead me to the decision of having a water birth at home.

My birth experience started with each prenatal I had. They lasted anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour. While I am super lucky to have my mother as my midwife she is still amazing (and not just because I have to say that).

On Tuesday Oct. 4th at 2:30 am my water broke... I of course thought I had peed myself and actually got up two times thinking I had peed TWICE! The third time though I knew my water broke because it didn't really stop! I woke Mike up by yelling that I needed a towel =)

We decided to call our midwife (mom) and she said to go to sleep until I started having contractions... SLEEP! Hello my water broke doesn't this mean baby soon... Yeah not in this case. 12 hours past and I got maybe another hour or two of sleep.

Finally at 2:30pm contractions started. The contractions were actually quite easy to start with. At this point I was only dilated to a 3. Mike and I went on a few walks around our complex. Around 11:00pm I was pretty tired so our midwife said to go ahead and lay down but that it could possibly slow me down. Needless to say the contractions felt worse and so I was sleeping for about 3-5 minutes between contractions.

I got into the tub to relax some. In between contractions our midwife, my boyfriend (Mike) and I were carrying on a conversation. The contractions were 3 minutes apart and were lasting up to a minute. I ended out of the tub and got checked... I was only at a 3 1/2!!!!

I went from the tub to the birthing tub to the bed all depending on what made me most comfortable. I honestly don't remember what time it was anymore but the contractions were very hard. Mike helped a ton with the pain by pushing in on my hips like our chiropractor had explained to do. I finally was to a 6 and it seemed like it went by really fast after that.

I started to get the urge to push and so when our midwife checked me I was almost to a 10. At 6:08am I was ready to push. My sister Danyl had to rush over. After pushing Abel Cody Hopper was born on Oct. 5th, 2011at 6:34am!

All of the work and pain was well worth it and happiness overwhelmed me as I held my baby boy. The second he came out he started making a sucking noise looking for food. =) We moved from the birthing tub to our bed. I held him the entire time. His cord wasn't cut until it didn't have a pulse anymore. For the first hour he was with me and his daddy. After about an hour he was weighted, measured and checked out. He weighted 8lbs. 4oz. and 20 inches long.

I was in labor for 16 hours and every second was worth it. Not only was it worth it because of my healthy baby boy but also for him to be born into a calm environment in his home and a birth experience that was exactly as I wanted it without interventions and without any medication. I also love that fact that we didn't have to go anywhere to have Abel and bring him back home. It was so nice to already be in our home and have everything we needed.

Thank you mom (our midwife) for being and doing what you do best! You were so supportive and I felt comfortable during everything! Thank you Mr. (Mike) for your love and support. You did everything I asked including pushing on my hips during just about every contraction. I am so glad I got to share this with you! Thank you sis (Danyl) for taking pictures of this unforgettable moment and being so supportive. Most of all Thank you God for blessing us with a beautiful healthy baby boy and for creating my body to have him.

I hope that after women read this they realize that they too can have a baby naturally and that our bodies were made to do it.