Clara's Birth Story

This is a long post, but for those who are interested I wrote out Clara's birth story from my perspective. Hopefully we can get Vinnie's perspective written down soon. Enjoy!

Since finding out we were pregnant on March 1, 2013 I was really hoping we wouldn’t have a Halloween baby. Who would want to have to have a costume party every single birthday?? All we knew is the due date was October 25 and first babies usually come late. But, as time went on we started to not care when she came, we just wanted her to be here, in our arms. October 25 came and went. The next day came and it went. I started having minor contractions that got worse and worse each day. With every day that passed I couldn’t help my thoughts go from, “Maybe today is the day!!” to “This baby is going to be in my womb forever.”

So, here we are on October 31. Halloween. My contractions are becoming more regular and not going away like they had been the past few days. That day I had an appointment at the birthing center so off we went. We got to hear Baby Girl’s heartbeat for 30 minutes, it would accelerate every time she heard her Daddy’s voice-we knew she was going to be a Daddy’s girl from day one. The midwife did an exam on me and told me I’m dilated to almost a 3. She also said she saw some clear fluid so she tested it to see if my bags of water were leaking. We left the birthing center thinking we still had a few more days until we would meet our baby. We felt discouraged, I felt uncomfortable, almost miserable.

As we were eating lunch after the appointment we get a call from the midwife on call that night saying, “Kimberly, after testing that fluid we found it was in fact amniotic fluid…your bags of water have broken. Now, we have 24-36 hours to get you into active labor.” I hung up the phone, looked at Vinnie with a smile and said, “This is it, it’s really happening today.”

As Halloween went on, so did my contractions. I rode each contraction like it was a wave, it started in my back, wrapped around to the front, and throbbed for 45 seconds. Then, I waited for the next wave to crash. I walked around the house, baked some frozen cookie dough, got on the exercise ball, and sat on the couch…nothing was relieving the pain, it was growing more and more intense. At about 6pm we hear a knock at the door, “TRICK OR TREAT!” We ignored the sweet kids and quickly turned off the porch lights. We called our doula (birth assistant), Ashre and told her she should come over.

At this point all I could think is, “This is it. We’re meeting our baby today. On Halloween. We could have a Halloween baby after all.”

I lost all sense of time, I was so focused on riding each wave. At one point our midwife called to check in and see how things were progressing. By that point I was in a lot of pain but could still listen and talk coherently. Vinnie hands me the phone and I hear the midwife say, “Well, how are things?” I start my sentence….”Oh, it’s definitely progressing but I’m still able to ta….” OW! This is the biggest contraction yet! I hand the phone back to Vinnie midsentence so I can ride through this giant wave. From that point on things progressed quickly.

All I could focus on was the wave. As I topped the crest of the wave I had to force my mind to think about the fact that with each wave I’m getting closer to landing on shore and meeting our sweet daughter. I hear Vinnie and my doula tell me over and over, “You can do this. Do it for your daughter. You’re doing great.” My doula suggested I get up and try walking around to see how I feel. I get up and within taking 2 steps I almost collapse due to the pain. Then I knew, it was time. We needed to get to the birthing center. This baby is coming soon.

I hear some hustle and bustle from Vinnie as he packs the car with our “go-bag”. My doula slips some PJ pants and socks on me and out the door we went. I don’t remember the car ride. I probably just had my eyes closed the whole time as I focused on the fact that we were meeting our daughter soon.

We get to the birthing center and the midwife met us at the door. She rushed me into the room and had me lay down. Five seconds later I hear, “Oh wow! You’re at a 9! This baby is coming soon!!” I was so relieved that all of this work, all of this swimming that felt like I was going against the tide wasn’t useless. My body was working so hard to get this baby out into the world.

I got in the bathtub because it was supposed to relieve the pain. As soon as I got in the water I started feeling the urge to push. No one told me to push, my body just desperately wanted to push. The midwife said, “You want to push? OK! PUSH!!” It was an amazing feeling to finally not try to just go with the wave but really ride it. I was able to swim with the wave through pushing.

As our daughter started descending I hear the midwife say, “Look, Dad! You can see her head! Her hair is black!” Then I hear Vinnie with a choked up voice say, “I see her, baby! I see our daughter! Her hair is black!!”

The midwife added, “Well, well…your water hadn’t broken after all! She’s still in her bags of water. We need to break your water so that she can come out.” All I asked was, “Will it make this go by faster?” After getting a “yes” I agreed and my water was broken.

That was all the motivation I needed. I needed to see this girl for myself. The next contraction came and I determined in my mind that this was it. With this wave we will land and I will meet our daughter. I sit up in the tub and push, push, push. The room erupted with yells, “PUSH! COME ON! PUSH! GIVE ME MORE! YOU CAN DO THIS!!!” With one push I felt her head crown. With the next push she came out, the midwife grabbed her and brought her right to my chest.

I looked down and there she was. Our daughter. She looked up at me, made eye contact, laid her head on my chest and started to cry. It was the sweetest sound in the world. I looked at Vinnie and saw the amazement, shock, excitement, and pure joy in his eyes. Our daughter, Clara Joy was born into the world at 1:25am on November 1, 2013.