Birth Story: Levi Thomas

I felt my second contractions ever a week before my due date. I’m a mama to two - both born via unwanted planned cesareans. My first was breech. My second was a planned vbac but when labor hadn’t started by 42wks my midwives instilled fear in me of baby’s safety (though he looked perfectly fine) and I reluctantly agreed to a repeat cesarean. I knew if we were to get pregnant again, I would want a homebirth. I just wanted someone to believe in me and my body’s ability to give birth. In my area, a VBA2C means homebirth or cesarean, so we went with the amazing Binah Birth team of Shoshanah and Jill!! 

Back to the contractions… feeling those first contractions was so exciting and I was grateful to experience my body do something labor-wise! At that point I thought baby could come at any time, even though I have a history of going “past due,” so I worked on getting our freezer stocked and the house prepared! When I felt cramps, I just rested. A couple of days later with no labor I readjusted my mentality back to the long-haul and tried to expect baby to stay in my tummy until 42wks. It took about a week but I finally felt I had the freezer in a good spot and the house ready. Little did we know, this baby would have us waiting well beyond 42 weeks. 

Fast forward through several weeks of intermittent and inconsistent contractions, blood pressure spikes, tons of pelvic pressure, and general heightened stress, my birth story truly begins with sickness. Not how you expected? Me either. 😅

On the evening of Wednesday March 19, I suddenly had terrible body aches, a bad headache and it felt like my heart was racing. I was up most of the night. 

Thursday, March 20, I couldn’t sleep and finally at 6am hopped in a warm Epsom salt bath. It dulled the pain a little but not fully. When I got out I had chills and gathered back under the covers. I felt completely out of it. My husband Trent made me eggs and coffee but I could only drink a few sips of the coffee. We took my blood pressure and it was low but my heart rate was 149. My incredible midwife Shoshanah got concerned and made the decision to come to me. I was really grateful. I ended up throwing up the eggs but I think that’s because I was trying to hydrate too much too fast. Then I couldn’t drink anything. I did end up eating two slices of sourdough with butter and salt but that’s all I could tolerate. When Shoshanah got here, she started me on an IV and I felt a little better. We hooked baby up to the NST to check and after some honey they moved really well. (This baby was our first surprise gender.)  I was also having some pretty strong contractions. She did red light therapy on my head and back, gave me a massage with arnica, had me take an Epsom salt bath and that is when I finally started to fall asleep. Only problem is I was leaning on my IV arm and almost got it wet! 😬 Once I got out of the tub, I asked for a pub sub and finally ate a decent meal. I also had some tea and Shoshanah gave me another bag of fluids. Baby was still sounding good. My wonderful mother-in-law drove up to watch our boys since I was sick so Trent brought them to meet her. Shoshanah left around 10:30 to go get some rest. I cannot explain how comforting it was to be mothered like that. To have the feeling of a mama taking care of me again was a wonderful treat, even though I felt really awful most of the time. 😂 I’m also just so thankful for her knowledge and that she kept me out of the hospital!!! I slept well at night even though I had to get up often to go to the bathroom per usual. 

Friday, March 21, I woke up feeling a thousand times better! My lowest heart rate was 100bpm. Significant improvement from yesterday’s 150! 😬 I weaned off of Genexa and took an Epsom salt bath with lavender. I went to the chiropractor and everyone was shocked to see me there at 42+3. Then poor Trent started feeling sick so we decided to not do a gentle induction as we had originally planned. 

Saturday, March 22 -  I had quite a few contractions throughout the day, Trent was still sick but better. His mom thankfully had the boys. My bloody show started slowly coming out when I went to the potty but it was very watery. Shoshanah came to check on us and then told me she was staying until baby was here since I was in labor!!! I was so excited that she said she would be here until the baby came. I didn’t really believe I was in labor since I’d had on & off contractions, but somehow Shoshanah knew. 

10pm my contractions became hard to cope with on my own, so I asked Shoshanah about it and she said I could call Madison, my doula. She arrived around 11ish. They tried to get me to rest with a peanut ball but the contractions were excruciating that way. It hurt my hip to have it up so high on the big peanut ball (I’m only 5ft tall - short people problems.) It had been several hours since I’d eaten two chicken tacos for dinner so Shoshanah said it was time for a snack. I had a piece of turkey, a cheese stick and fruit I think. 

Time then became a blur. We labored through the night but I had no idea how quickly the night was passing. My doula Madison supported me and I was so grateful because Trent was asleep downstairs - still dealing with a fever. I got in the shower a few times which sped up my contractions. I rolled on the ball a lot. I surprisingly did not like counter pressure. 

Sunday, March 23 - Trent was feeling better and he came to labor with me. We tried resting in the bed but I could only lay there if he was spooning me. It was nice to have those breaks in contractions together and I was grateful for his presence. I did a lot better with him there because even though I had support before, I felt alone. Especially when I was left to labor & rest in bed and I was actually alone. 😅  At some point in the day my other amazing midwife Jill arrived and relieved Shoshanah and Madison so they could rest. Jill’s mom JoJo also came and she was such a sweet presence. She held my hand through contractions and talked with me. I also got to get in the pool at this point and I was soo excited! I’d been looking forward to the pool and I also thought it meant we were getting close since it is typically saved as a last resort comfort measure. I was wrong about that though.

Madison gave me a labor comb and it helped so much! We did WALCHERS (all caps to communicate my complete disdain for this move) which was literally the worst thing ever. But it apparently helped baby get under the pubic bone I think? I had to lay at the end of the bed with my butt on a wedge and my legs dangling off the bed for several contractions. It was very hard to not tense up and hard to cope when I couldn’t move. Shoshanah, Jill and Madison were all with me for this and they kept telling me to “melt into the bed” through the contractions. I tried but I just felt so tense down there. I kept trying to get my back to flatten against the bed but it just wouldn’t. I felt pretty helpless here and wanted to be done every second. I was grateful to be told how many contractions we were going to stay there for.. but I’m pretty sure I was asked to stay there one extra contraction. Trent was behind me now and holding my hands. I was also holding the birth comb and would not let that thing go, so Trent had to hold one hand with my comb. 😂 Once baby was in a good position, Jill and Madison wrapped me up in the rebozo super tight to keep the baby from flopping forward again. Then they had me hold onto Trent or Jill and do a low hanging squat during contractions but my legs quickly got tired. I also felt bad for hanging so much of my weight off of them - Trent stuck with it for a while but I felt his arms shaking. Then I used the birth sling and it was pretty excruciating too 😅 I sat in it like an actual swing and couldn’t believe how uncomfortable it was. It was so funny though - Jill wanted to check on baby’s heartbeat so all of a sudden her face was below my knees and she was trying to pull up the rebozo wrapped around my belly to get a heartbeat. 😂 I couldn’t laugh about it in the moment but I was laughing in my head. Jill got called away to another birth around this time. I kept wondering just how long it could be. The uncertainty of how much longer I had to go was really hard for me.

At some point I got to rest in the pool again but started feeling very pushy. I was reclining on my back and also leaned over the side in a squat. I think I alternated with one leg up - it was hard not to push. Shoshanah wanted to check me so I got back on the bed and heard I had a cervical lip. I was also super drained and hasn’t eaten anything in a while. Shoshanah knew I needed more energy so she gave me an IV with sugar. The IV was pumping while Shoshanah worked on my cervical lip. She put some arnica in there and gave me some orally. With her fingers holding the lip I had to go through a few contractions and push slightly to get the lip past baby’s head. The pain was unreal. She also found another bubble of my water and she broke that super easily. Once that happened, it was time to push! Since it had taken so long to get to this point, I was thinking I had a long time of pushing ahead. Thankfully I was pleasantly surprised!

Shoshanah directed me on where to push by pressing down on my perineum and kept saying “yess Kristen!! A little more, a little more” trying to see if I could push through the contractions a little longer. She and Madison said I was a great pusher! It was very encouraging. They told me they could see baby’s head and I was amazed!! I felt down and could feel baby’s head just inside the opening. The next few contractions I was directed to push again and baby bobbed up and seemed to go back. I was on my back or side the most of the pushing time. I did get on hands and knees for a few contractions to push but that didn’t seem to get us as far as on my back/side. Maybe because I had so little energy left. It’s really unbelievable how drained I was - I’ve never been so tired in my life. I couldn’t help thinking a cesarean sounded pretty good in the moment. If I could have talked more, I might have even asked to be done and go to the hospital. I understood then why maternal exhaustion is the biggest reason for home birth transfers. After a few more pushes baby’s head was really starting to come out. I felt my perinium and top of my labia stretching during pushing and it burned so so bad. Shoshanah had me reach and feel the head come out during one contraction and it was amazing. It felt so squishy that I was kinda confused. I didn’t expect it to feel squishy. I felt Sho check baby’s heart rate and at the next contraction she told me we needed to get baby out. I pushed as hard as I possibly could and just kept pushing. So far past what I thought I could do. I think it was the next contractions of pushes that baby’s head was out!!!!!!! Amazing! I felt down and could not believe it! I’d felt like I could hardly go on but once I felt his head I was instantly encouraged. I heard Shoshanah say he had a nuchal cord which I’m sure she quickly slipped off. The next contraction baby’s whole body was born in one big swoosh. I’m surprised it was so much easier than pushing out the head!  Shoshanah helped wiggle baby out and placed baby on my chest. It all felt so surreal. While she was moving baby Trent said “it’s another boy!” He was born at 3:15am after 31 hours of labor and 1 hour of pushing. I was completely in awe and also shocked. It didn’t seem real. This baby literally came out of my body? I really did it? Without pain medication? Without surgery? My body actually did it? And we get this precious baby?! I truly was also in shock of all we had endured too. All of the pain and struggle. I couldn’t believe it was actually over and he was actually here. I felt a swarm of gratitude for our team, for Trent who let me have a home birth, to God for our safety. 

Now came the post birth fun. My placenta came out maybe 10 minutes later and that started a lot of bleeding. Shoshanah pushed on my belly and I felt gushes of blood and clots. She gave me a shot of pitocin. The bleeding continued pretty bad so she checked the placenta to see if it was missing pieces - it wasn’t thankfully. Then she had to stick her hand inside to go get clots to see if that would fix it. It seemed to help.. she gave me other things to get the bleeding to slow and it eventually did. It was rough. Then it was time to assess the tearing.. Shoshanah called Jill to get her to come stitch me up. I’m still laying flat on my back all this time and very uncomfortable. I got ice in a glove up [you know where] while we waited on Jill. They put my back/butt on a cookie sheet and Jill got to stitching. I was so ready for it to be over. Finally she was done and I rolled over to have the sheets changed out and then I was helped to sit back in the bed with baby Levi. 🥰 I also had a catheter so I didn’t have to worry about getting up to pee. I was given an ice pack too. My tearing ended up being 2nd degree but I was told it wasn’t that bad of a 2nd degree. Levi loved nursing and cuddles. I got to eat my leftover CFA wrap from Saturday and some fruit. I was given some care instructions while everyone also cleaned up. Finally Trent and I got to lay down and sleep at 8am. I had Levi on his side against me. Everyone went to bed for a bit. I think Shoshanah came in around 10am and checked on me. Trent made me a sandwich then I tried getting up and it went well. I got to take a shower after Sho removed the catheter and the IV line. The shower felt wonderful. I got to wash my crazy mop of hair. Then got to tuck back into bed. Shoshanah stayed a good bit longer and then happened to be here with Trent’s mom came with the boys. They were so sweet and excited. They each got a turn holding Levi too. 🥰 and that was it! I’d only slept 3 hours since Friday at that point so I was already ready to rest again. I’m so thankful everything turned out well. It was not the birth I dreamed. It was significantly harder and more challenging. But we made it despite sickness and lack of nourishment (my own fault 😅). 32 hours from first continual contraction to birth. I’m so proud, happy and grateful!

My recovery has honestly been more limiting immediately following birth than my other two cesarean births due to pelvic organ prolapse. I was able to “do more” after my cesareans but I probably shouldn’t have then. This postpartum has been a lesson in humility, patience, and leaning on God and others. I’ve had to scale way back on activity to originally help my tear heal and now to help my prolapse heal, but it’s such a gift to not feel yet another scar slowly healing across my belly again. That is a different kind of pain - a different kind of healing. My day-to-day life is different right now but that’s okay. I’m just so grateful to have had a trusted & knowledgeable team that believed in me and supported my desire for a natural birth. 

“Children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb, a reward.” Psalm 127:3