So I thought that I would write up my story and how I came to discover my passion for personal growth. I think that I've always been interested in improving myself but I feel like the real birth to this passion started with the birth of my second child, P.
I gave birth to P naturally (no pain medication). But this was unintentional. I had an epidural when I gave birth to L (my oldest) and I loved it. That was my plan for P's birth as well. My job was just to show up at the hospital and the medical staff would take care of the rest.
Well, P had other plans. P was due on February 21, 2012.
On February 7th, I thought that I was going into labor. So I went to the hospital. Labor stalled so I was sent home.
On February 14th, I again thought that I was going into labor. So I went to the hospital again. No progress so they sent me home.
On February 20th, I was having contractions again and this time I thought it was for sure the real deal. I went to the hospital. When I got there, I asked the resident doctor if they would be able to just induce me if my labor stalled again. This was my 3rd time at the hospital and I was getting tired of it. And I had an induction scheduled for 3 days later anyway. The resident doctor said that he couldn't say for sure, but he didn't think that they would let me stay if I didn't make any progress within 2 hours.
So I waited the 2 hours. When the doctor came back to check me, I had barely progressed. But not enough that I thought they would admit me. I was bummed, but then another doctor came in and said that I could stay. My real doctor (who was pretty high up) had told them that I could be admitted.
So the plan was for me to labor on my own throughout the night (it was late evening by this time) and if I needed some help then in the morning they would give me some pitocin. I was fine with that. As long as I got my epidural, I didn't really care how the rest played out (of course, I cared about the health of me and the baby the most though.)
I'll explain the rest of the story, but as an aside, a few months ago, it dawned on me that the tools and skills that I have acquired (and am continuing to acquire) through my passion with personal growth are not only to help me. Of course, I will use (and have already used) these tools for the benefit of my family and others around me, but it occurred to me that P's birth set off this chain reaction to help me discover the tools that I need in parenting and helping him. P is very deep and needs a lot of help with learning emotional intelligence and how to deal with his emotions in a healthy way. I feel that he has inherited some less desirable traits (less desirable only when channeled incorrectly) from certain family members and in a sense, I feel like these tools that I am learning and teaching him will help to cleanse and heal some of those wounds in our family line. And I have been realizing that the tools that I am learning are helping me to teach him how to handle and process his strong emotions in a healthy way. I am faaarrrr from perfect at this (I have to do my own emotions coaching work with myself as well), but I'm trying and I'm practicing and when I remember to use the tools, I see great benefits for both of us.
...
Fast forward to the summer of 2013. We were thinking about trying to get pregnant again. So naturally, I started to think about giving birth again. And I decided that I didn't want a repeat of Porter's birth experience. I didn't want to chance being caught unprepared again. So even though I still didn't want to give birth naturally, I felt that I should at least put some effort into preparing for it, just in case.
One day that summer I was reading a blog that I really like, written by Heather Farrell. On the side of her blog, she had a link to a book that she was one of the authors for called The Gift of Giving Life: Rediscovering the Divine Nature of Pregnancy and Birth. The title of this book interested me so I decided to buy it and read it. When it came in the mail a few days later, I spent pretty much all of my free time reading it. I loved what I was able to learn from that book. It was so inspiring. It is a compilation of birth stories and of essays about pregnancy and birth. The birth stories aren't all about unmedicated/natural births, but many of them were. As I read this book, I started to feel a desire grow in me. I started to feel that instead of preparing for a natural birth, just in case, I was seriously considering having a natural birth the next time on purpose.
It was also through this book that I was really introduced to meditation. Of course I had heard of meditation before, and I know that the scriptures mention meditation, but I had never really known how to meditate and I hadn't ever thought of doing a formal meditation practice before. I began to be fascinated with meditation though and felt really drawn to it. I started learning everything that I could about it, from the scriptures, from the prophets, and from other books and sources. I began my own meditation practice that has changed and improved over time since then.
A couple months later, I got pregnant with E. I had learned from The Gift of Giving Life book about a childbirth method called Hypnobabies and I felt really drawn to this method. So when I was a few months pregnant, I borrowed the Hypnobabies home study program from a friend and practiced the techniques and skills throughout the rest of my pregnancy. Throughout my experience with this program, I learned a lot more about affirmations and meditation and the mind/body connection. E's birth (May 2014) was an amazing experience. I was able to use the Hypnobabies skills to help me to have a very positive and spiritual unmedicated/natural birth. The skills that I learned even had a very positive effect on the end of my pregnancy with her and also on the postpartum period.
I gave birth to P naturally (no pain medication). But this was unintentional. I had an epidural when I gave birth to L (my oldest) and I loved it. That was my plan for P's birth as well. My job was just to show up at the hospital and the medical staff would take care of the rest.
Well, P had other plans. P was due on February 21, 2012.
On February 7th, I thought that I was going into labor. So I went to the hospital. Labor stalled so I was sent home.
On February 14th, I again thought that I was going into labor. So I went to the hospital again. No progress so they sent me home.
On February 20th, I was having contractions again and this time I thought it was for sure the real deal. I went to the hospital. When I got there, I asked the resident doctor if they would be able to just induce me if my labor stalled again. This was my 3rd time at the hospital and I was getting tired of it. And I had an induction scheduled for 3 days later anyway. The resident doctor said that he couldn't say for sure, but he didn't think that they would let me stay if I didn't make any progress within 2 hours.
So I waited the 2 hours. When the doctor came back to check me, I had barely progressed. But not enough that I thought they would admit me. I was bummed, but then another doctor came in and said that I could stay. My real doctor (who was pretty high up) had told them that I could be admitted.
So the plan was for me to labor on my own throughout the night (it was late evening by this time) and if I needed some help then in the morning they would give me some pitocin. I was fine with that. As long as I got my epidural, I didn't really care how the rest played out (of course, I cared about the health of me and the baby the most though.)
So I labored all night, with little progress. I was still only dilated to 3 cm.
At about 7:30, they got me hooked up to pitocin and it started to increase the frequency and intensity of my contractions. They definitely got to the point where I had to breath through them and they were pretty uncomfortable. But it felt good to feel like I might actually start progressing and have my baby sometime soon.
Around 8:00, my nurse came in and was talking to me. I was asking her what the plan was for my next cervix check and we were talking about when I would be able to get an epidural. She said that they would probably check me soon and I could ask about an epidural then if I wanted to. She also said that they might consider breaking my water sometime and if I wanted an epidural then I should probably ask for one before they did that since contractions can get more intense after your water breaks.
A couple minutes after we got done talking, I heard/felt a big pop and a gush. My water broke. It was 8:20 am. I went into panic mode in my head and said to the nurse "umm... my water just broke. Can I get an epidural as soon as possible?" The nurse went to go see if the anesthesiologist was available and my contractions immediately started getting VERY intense and close together. She came back in a few minutes later and said that the anesthesiologist was doing a C-section and wouldn't be available at the moment. They paged my doctor but while he was on his way over, they pulled in a nurse/midwife and she checked me. I was dilated to a 7, 100% effaced, and zero station.
My contractions continued to get more and more intense and I didn't really know what to do. I wasn't planning on a natural birth. The nurse/midwife had me turn on my side a few times to help the baby's heart rate and a couple minutes later, I blurted out "he's coming out!" I could feel that the baby's head was about to come out and I could not control the urge to push. They quickly moved me onto my back and I started pushing...and making all of those dramatic noises that you imagine pregnant women making when they are giving birth. Yes, the screaming and all. I was squeezing J's hand pretty hard and I kept thinking/saying "I can't do this!" The nurse/midwife was really good though and tried to help me breath through my contractions. They had to put an oxygen mask on me because I was breathing so fast and hard. I just wanted to get the baby out of me. It happened really fast though and I only pushed for a couple of minutes before he was born. My doctor didn't even make it. The nurse/midwife delivered the baby. He was born at 8:41 am - 21 minutes after my water broke.
I remember that right after I had P, the nurse midwife tried to hand him to me, but I could barely hold him. I couldn't even open my eyes for what felt like several minutes because I was still in shock and feeling the intensity of what had just happened. I was finally able to calm down and hold my baby and my thoughts were "That was miserable. I never want to give birth naturally, ever again."
"I can't believe I just survived that."
...
Fast forward to the summer of 2013. We were thinking about trying to get pregnant again. So naturally, I started to think about giving birth again. And I decided that I didn't want a repeat of Porter's birth experience. I didn't want to chance being caught unprepared again. So even though I still didn't want to give birth naturally, I felt that I should at least put some effort into preparing for it, just in case.
One day that summer I was reading a blog that I really like, written by Heather Farrell. On the side of her blog, she had a link to a book that she was one of the authors for called The Gift of Giving Life: Rediscovering the Divine Nature of Pregnancy and Birth. The title of this book interested me so I decided to buy it and read it. When it came in the mail a few days later, I spent pretty much all of my free time reading it. I loved what I was able to learn from that book. It was so inspiring. It is a compilation of birth stories and of essays about pregnancy and birth. The birth stories aren't all about unmedicated/natural births, but many of them were. As I read this book, I started to feel a desire grow in me. I started to feel that instead of preparing for a natural birth, just in case, I was seriously considering having a natural birth the next time on purpose.
It was also through this book that I was really introduced to meditation. Of course I had heard of meditation before, and I know that the scriptures mention meditation, but I had never really known how to meditate and I hadn't ever thought of doing a formal meditation practice before. I began to be fascinated with meditation though and felt really drawn to it. I started learning everything that I could about it, from the scriptures, from the prophets, and from other books and sources. I began my own meditation practice that has changed and improved over time since then.
A couple months later, I got pregnant with E. I had learned from The Gift of Giving Life book about a childbirth method called Hypnobabies and I felt really drawn to this method. So when I was a few months pregnant, I borrowed the Hypnobabies home study program from a friend and practiced the techniques and skills throughout the rest of my pregnancy. Throughout my experience with this program, I learned a lot more about affirmations and meditation and the mind/body connection. E's birth (May 2014) was an amazing experience. I was able to use the Hypnobabies skills to help me to have a very positive and spiritual unmedicated/natural birth. The skills that I learned even had a very positive effect on the end of my pregnancy with her and also on the postpartum period.
This post is already long enough, so I'll continue the rest of my discovery of my passion for personal growth on the next post...
No comments:
Post a Comment