Faye’s Birth Story

 The Birth of Faye Elizabeth 

 And they came to him, and awoke him, saying, Master, master, we perish. Then he arose, and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water: and they ceased, and there was a calm. And he said unto them, Where is your faith? -Luke 8:24-25

From the very beginning this pregnancy felt different from my others. Although I wasn’t sicker than my other pregnancies, I was sicker than I was during Sorrel’s pregnancy just two years before. And my sickness started much earlier and lasted much longer than any other pregnancy. I wondered several times if it was twins. Around 15 weeks the sickness finally subsided and at 17 weeks I finally had my first prenatal appointment with a midwife. At 20 weeks I had my anatomy scan and we saw one super healthy baby, measuring perfectly on track. 

After the sickness wore off, I felt really good. I felt like it was my healthiest pregnancy yet. I focused on a high protein diet and I swore off of sugar for several months of the pregnancy. I had perfect blood pressure, great amniotic fluid levels (I have struggled with polydramnios for most of my pregnancies), and practically no aches or pains. Throughout the pregnancy I had a very reassuring, calm feeling: everything is going to be fine. When the baby was breech from weeks 28-35, I felt that calming peace, everything is fine. And it was fine, baby flipped head down at 35 weeks.

My last picture pregnant with Faye, 41 weeks

Around 33 weeks I started to get a lot of braxton hicks contractions. Every week from week 33-37 they slowly picked up in frequency and intensity. Although I never thought it was real labor during this time, I thought it surely meant that the baby would come early. Then during week 38-39 I had several boughts of very believable false labor. There were times when contractions would be around 4- 7 minutes apart for a few hours. Again, I never called the midwives out thinking it was real labor, but there were MANY times that I thought, this could be the START of real labor and it really messed with my mind. 

Needless to say, the last month of pregnancy was very difficult. I asked Leland for two priesthood blessings during this time. In the first one at 38 weeks, the Lord told me, through Leland, that I needed to be patient, along with other things. When I finally reached my due date I felt a lot of relief. The baby would SURELY be here very soon now, right? No, the baby kept us waiting another week. Those seven days between weeks 40 and 41 felt like a lifetime. The kids were SO eager for the baby to come. All of us felt on edge just waiting, all of our plans and so many things hung up on “after the baby is here”.

 I tried to do fun things with the kids each day to keep us distracted, but I felt huge and so uncomfortable, it was hard to get around and do fun things. As easy as most of the pregnancy was, the last month was very uncomfortable. I could hardly sleep, I had to pee every 30 minutes, and I was so exhausted. The baby was so low, I often told Leland I felt like there was a bowling ball between my legs. I chalked it up to not having tons of extra fluid like I normally do, but I could feel the baby move SO much. I could feel the little shoulders digging into me right above my pelvis, and I had a sore spot on my belly where one foot would just kick and kick all day and night. 

At 40 weeks and 5 days I asked Leland for another blessing. I felt like I had been pregnant forever. Not knowing when the baby would come felt so hard. It could be another week or more and I didn’t know how I could cope with that. In the blessing he reassured me that my body was made to grow and birth a healthy baby, that I would be led to know what to do before and during the birth, and best of all, that the baby would be here soon. That was Friday night. I somehow made it through the weekend, and by Sunday afternoon I was having very consistent but mild contractions. I didn’t time them, in fact I tried to ignore them as much as possible, but there was a tiny bit of hope in the back of my mind that this was the real thing. As I tucked my big girls into bed I told them that maybe the baby would come tonight. 

I panic-cleaned the house a little. We had kept it pretty clean but there is always more cleaning to do. I went to bed around 10pm and slept for a little while. Around 11:30 Sorrel woke up and Leland got her and brought her to bed with us. Leland and Sorrel were sleeping but I was lying awake when right at 12:01am I felt my water break. This is the third time my water has broken at the beginning of labor, so I knew exactly what it was. I hopped up and ran to the toilet where it splashed all over. I remember checking and being relieved that it was clear. I got myself cleaned up, laid down some chux pads and tried to go to sleep. However the water just kept coming, soaking right through everything I had put down. Around this time Sorrel woke up again and threw up twice. I started to panic a little bit wondering how I was going to have a baby tonight if Sorrel was sick and probably would only want Leland or me. Leland took her to the couch to help her sleep while  I sat on the birth ball and started timing contractions. Around 12:30 they started coming on fast and strong so I texted my birth team. 

Around 1am Leland was able to leave Sorrel sleeping on the couch and came back. We set up the birth space in our bedroom. Around 1:30 my friend Alba arrived and I was definitely in active labor, breathing through contractions about 2-4 minutes apart. By 2am more of the birth team arrived and I was deep in labor, unable to talk to anyone. Contractions were painful and I was working through them by standing up with Leland and swaying and breathing.

I didn’t want a water birth this time and that made labor feel somewhat different. I got very nauseous and  I used peppermint essential oils to keep from throwing up. Pretty soon after the birth team got there, contractions intensified even more. I knew I was in transition and I told Leland to go wake up the kids. The kids were adamant that they wanted to be there and I didn’t want them to miss it.  

For many months, whenever  I would think about giving birth, I could picture myself giving birth kneeling by the side of the bed. However, I didn’t want to get into that position until it was time to push. I kept standing through contractions but I felt like I was coming to the end of my rope. “How much longer do you think this will take?” I asked everyone. I felt like I was in transition and must be close to fully dilated but in the past this had taken several hours. Before the birth I had decided upon no cervical exams. In past births they only served to discourage me and make everything feel longer. But this time, I felt like I NEEDED to know. If I was only dilated to a 7 or an 8 then I wanted to get in the shower or do something different because I really  felt that  I couldn’t go on much longer.

Shortly before 3am my midwife checked me and found me to be complete! I was so relieved. She did say that the baby was still high and would probably take a bit of laboring down before I was ready to push. I took that and told Heavenly Father, “OK, I can do 5 more contractions and then I’m pushing, that’s all I have left in me.” The contractions felt SO intense.Even between contractions my legs were aching and I was shaking. At this point I did a few contractions on the toilet and I stared to feel the urge to push. I would push gently at the peak of each contraction and I could feel the baby move down a bit with each push.

I then moved into position at the side of the bed. I was kneeling over the side of the bed just like I had envisioned. At this point contractions paused for a few minutes and  I was so grateful. I felt that I had a few minutes to prepare and catch my breath. I knew the baby was close but that the hardest part was still ahead of me. I couldn’t imagine how this big baby was going to come out of me. I told the kids to move up to the bed so they could see better. With each contraction I continued to push a bit at the peak. Pretty soon I could feel baby coming down quite a bit. The baby would come down, then slide up a bit in between contractions. This felt different from my other births. After Adele, my first vbac baby, my babies had always come out in one push or with the fetal ejection reflex and no pushing on my part. After 2 contractions of going down and up, I pushed through an entire contraction and felt the baby start to crown. I roared and groaned the baby down and my midwife reminded me to breathe the baby down. I took a breath and then with the next contraction I pushed for the entire contraction, I felt the baby’s head come out but instead of a pause like I am used to, I felt the urge to keep pushing so I did, and the rest of her body flew out.

Leland caught her with a little help from the midwife. She came out crying immediately. Leland passed her through my legs and I sat back and marveled at her. There is NO relief greater than the feeling of birthing a baby. For a few seconds relief was all I could feel and so much gladness that it was over, I did it! She was born at 3:17am. 

She was all covered in vernix, more so than any of our other babies, despite being 41 weeks. 

I had to wipe the vernix out of her eyes so that she could open them and see. It was Adele’s job to announce the gender so I called her over and we looked together. It’s a girl! The kids were all glad and excited. The placenta took a while to come out, the midwives gave me a few different tinctures to help, and eventually it came. We excused the kids for a while while I birthed the placenta and got cleaned up a bit. They came back in for Julian to cut the cord. After that the midwives cleaned up while baby and  I did skin to skin. She latched on right away and has been a great nurser so far. 

The kids all had assigned jobs for the birth. Moses’s job was to help weigh the baby. He was SO tired and really wanted to get his job done so he could go back to sleep. We let the midwives know we were ready for the newborn exam so the poor kids could go back to sleep. 

When we took our guesses for weight right before finding out we all thought she was a 9lb baby. She didn’t feel much bigger than Sorrel, who was 9lbs 2oz at birth. Well when they finally lifted her up to weigh her we were shocked! 11lbs 10oz! The midwife was using a digital scale and we all thought it might be faulty. She went to her car to grab a different scale and sure enough, 11lbs 10oz! I could not believe that I pushed out such a big baby, or that I grew one in the first place! Suddenly all the aches of the last month of pregnancy made sense, and other things seemed even more miraculous, like her being born with hardly a tear, and her flipping from breech to head down at 35 weeks, when she must have been quite large already. I knew that what Leland had told me in the blessing was true, I was guided by the Lord to know how to birth her and what to do. She was 22 inches long with a 15 inch head. 99th percentiles all around. 

After the newborn exam we tucked the kids back into bed, around 5am. Sorrel slept through the whole thing which felt like another miracle. She must have had some angel grandmas and grandpas keeping her asleep. Since then we’ve been resting together and soaking it all in. She is adored by all of us. I couldn’t be more grateful that she is here and all is well. We feel so blessed and we love her so, our Faye Elizabeth.