Labor Play by Play by Ryan

Just to preface this, I have not read Angie’s blog on the delivery yet. I didn’t want her version of the story to affect the telling of my version.

So without further ado…here’s how it happened.

4:30am  I’m waken up by Angie. She tells me that she’s just had three contractions. “These are different” she says, referring to the Braxton-Hicks contractions she’d been having on and off for the past week. “This is it, I think this is it.”

We sat in bed for a bit and talked about what we needed to do. I mentioned I was hungry and asked if she wanted a bowl of Lucky Charms. She did. I went downstairs, made us each a bowl and came back to bed. As we enjoyed out breakfast I thought things seemed to be going fairly smooth. She’d had a few more contractions, but nothing too major. She had an app on her iPhone for timing contractions and we knew we were supposed to wait until the contractions were 4 minutes apart, lasting for 1 minute for 1 hour before we would go to the Birth Center.

5:15am I got up and took a shower. By now Angie’s contractions were getting stronger and much closer together. They were about 10 minutes apart lasting 45-60 seconds. I still didn’t think much of it. During all the pre-natal classes and in all the books we had read, early labor was supposed to last hours- 6, 8, 10 hours perhaps. I thought we had plenty of time. Boy, was I wrong.

Angie's Birth Story

-From Prenatal Care to Delivery at

the Lisa Ross Birth Center-

Background and Prenatal Care

One of the questions I was frequently asked while I was pregnant was: Where are you delivering? It strikes me odd that people even asked this because most of them were pretty shocked to hear that I did not plan on delivering at a hospital, but rather a birth center. A lot of the reactions were "You're crazy!" "Don't you want an epidural?" and "So a home birth?" 

Delivering at a birth center is a lot like a home birth, but I would imagine quite a bit more safe and secure. They have all the same equipment as a hospital (warmers, crash carts, etc) and more, such as the option of a water tub to labor and deliver in and the helpful staff of Certified Nurse Midwives whose sole purpose is to deliver babies.

Before I even knew I was pregnant, I knew I wanted a water birth. Now with a water birth and any labor at a birth center, epidurals are not an option. You have to do it all natural. I was more than okay with option. I wanted to experience my birth. I wanted to earn my healthy baby and feel like I made the passage into motherhood the way nature intended me to, not with drugs. So when I discovered on May 7th, 2010 that I was carrying our baby, I called the Lisa Ross Birth Center and told them to sign me up! I was having my baby there!

I started my prenatal care and I'm pretty sure it was the same care given to any pregnant woman. I had regular check ups where they listened to baby's heart beat, took my blood pressure, measured my uterus, and recorded my weight. I joined a group called CenteringPregnancy where I met regularly with other women due around the same time as me and we learned how to be healthy in our pregnancies and what do to prepare for natural child birth. I really enjoyed the classes and thought the prenatal care was great.

During ninth month we made the decision to hire a doula. A doula is a labor and birth coach. She does not do anything medical, but rather is there for the emotional support of the mom (and in our case the dad too). Her name is Rachel Chandler and she is an angel. If you are reading this and plan to become pregnant, contact me so I can give you her information. She is the best decision I have ever made (after James that is!).


Delivery Day Finally Arrives!
(Some of this might be graphic, proceed with caution)

My due date came and went and the wait continued. Ryan and I were so anxious to meet our son! Two days after my due date, they did an exam and stripped my membranes: a procedure to help induce labor, and I was told that I was 3-4 dilated. The midwife was sure I wouldn't make it much longer without going into labor.

She was right! At 4:30 am on Friday morning, I awoke to a sharp cramp, my very first contraction. It wasn't as intense as what was to come so I laid there for a while longer. About 10 minutes later, along came another, and then 8 more minutes later there was another. This was enough to get me to wake Ryan. I told him I thought it was going to be the day and we slowly woke up and had a bowl a cereal and talked about what we needed to do before we headed to the center to deliver.

At 5:30, the contractions were getting closer together so I called Rachel and told her to get ready. She said she would meet me at my house and we hung up and I took a shower. By 6:15 the contractions were so close and so intense (about 3-5 minutes apart) that I was barely making it from one to the next. It was time to go the the center, I just knew it. Ryan called Rachel and rerouted her to the birth center and we shoved things in bags and raced out the door.

We arrived at the center at about 7 am and were greeted at the door by a nurse who promptly took me to an exam room and confirmed that I was now 7 cm dilated. Only 3 more to go! Even they were shocked at how fast I was progressing. Now the only bad thing was that upon arriving I discovered that there was another mom in the only water tub room. I wasn't going to get to have the water birth that I had planned on having for so long. Oh well though, there was no time to worry about that, because James certainly wasn't waiting around for them to get done in there!

I was escorted from the exam room to a birth room, and the nurses decided to try to make up for my lost tub by running me a bath in a regular bath tub so I could at least relax in some warm water for a while. It took them a while to get it full and they got me to walk to the bathroom and get in. As soon as I got my feet wet, I had a contraction that broke my water. The nurse saw it and we all turned around and went to the bed where I assumed a position on "all threes": my face and my knees. At this point I was pushing, which hurt, but felt way better than not pushing. That is until James started to crown. Holy Crap, did that ever hurt! I didn't think I was going to be able to finish, but with Ryan and Rachel by my side, I had the encouragement to get through it. I labored like this until 8:50 when sweet James Matthew finally emerged from my body. Feeling literally deflated, I rolled over and took my boy in my arms and said "Well that wasn't so bad!" and smiled at my staff of nurses.

Six hours later, after stitches, newborn and mommy check ups, a cheeseburger, breast-feeding consultation, and discharge education, we were allowed to go home. I labored, delivered and returned back to my bed at home all in under 12 hours. Pretty impressive, I think!

Today is the end of day four and I am absolutely loving motherhood. After 4 days of getting no longer than 3 hours of sleep at time, I am simply ecstatic to hold him, feed him, and snuggle him. It makes me cry like crazy to know that he's going to grow up and these days will be over before I know it.

So I'm signing off here so I can get back to staring my amazing little creation! Thanks for reading!

James Matthew 1-14-11

James Matthew is here!

Well, the big day finally came. Friday January 14, 2011 at 8:50am James Matthew Hardison was born. He came out 7lbs 15 oz and 21.5 inches long. Mom did a great job during the completely natural labor. Contractions started at 4:30am and less than four and half hours latter her little boy was in her arms.

Here he is just 5 minutes old on his Father's lap.

Here's our doula Rachel saying goodbye. She was awesome during the delivery.

And of course Grandma Tracy stopped by.

Giving birth at a Birth Center was great. Not counting the great job by midwifes, one of the best parts is only having to stay a minimum of 6 hours after the birth. James was born just before 9am and we were home before 4pm.

Doesn't Angie look great!  That's what a quick labor and no drugs does for you.

Here's some pictures of our little guy on day 2. Sleeping, dreaming, probably pooping his pants.

And here's one proud Father.

And a super happy Mom and two older brothers.

If we can find time over the next few days (which may be hard), Angie and I want to write a blog each, recounting our experiences during the delivery. I'm sure we both have very different perspectives.