It's been a bit of a hard week for us, so much up and down and back again. After Gill said Friday that it seemed like we would have a baby 'this weekend' (now a week ago) we were so excited and nervous and there was a torrent of emotion going through our home. We scurried around cooking and cleaning and trying to get ready emotionally and physically for what was ahead...and we waited. And waited. And waited.
It was so difficult, just trying to be patient, every day we waited for the next midwife appointment to see how the sweeps were going and every time it seemed like we were making progress and then we just seemed to stall at 4 cm. We were doing everything we could, 9th month tea 3x a day, acupressure points, sweeps...um, etc...and we just weren't moving the way they kept expecting us to be. Tuesday's appointment wasn't until 5pm which seemed like an eternity of trying to distract ourselves and things were still looking so favourable that Gill said that she would be surprised if we hadn't had baby by Wednesday or Thursday, Friday at the latest. We did our homework, and almost right away things seemed to be moving, cramps, show, a lot of pressure - it was hard to sleep that night, I kept thinking 'this is it!' but when I woke up at 6am I felt like things had cooled off. I got up, restless, and cleaned and poked around as long as I could till we could go and get the herbal tinctures the midwife recommended (black and blue cohosh). It was its own little agony, just waiting continuously like that, like a plane circling an airport waiting to land. As they day progressed and we waited for the next visit to see how things were going, I was getting more and more anxious, particularly because it being the Easter weekend, two of the three midwives were going to be away - meaning that we would not be able to have our planned homebirth. For me, that was information that continued to spin through my already distracted brain like a virus and I was really feeling pressure, because if we couldn't finally tip this labour into gear by today, I would have to give up all the plans for a peaceful beautiful home waterbirth that I really wanted. I know that birth is malleable and dynamic and unpredictable and that it could happen anyway for other reasons, but to feel like that option was simply removed for the duration of the weekend was very upsetting for me and I was growing increasingly anxious about it. By the time Elika was able to come at about 2:30pm, I was really feeling vulnerable in so many ways and it is not surprising that I burst into tears only a minute or two into the exam. It was really distressing for me, and of course, for Ez, sitting there helplessly watching me go through that, knowing me, knowing how I am, how I react to things, how much I want to stay home. And I really did feel for Elika too, as she was really between two worlds - how do you comfort someone in that state? It was really tough. I think all that waiting and circling just finally got to be too much, the idea that it was 'now or not' was really trying and when the exam revealed that we hadn't moved forward at all from Tuesday I just really felt like it was time to pull back and not only let baby be, but let us just relax too. I couldn't help but feel that we could try the tinctures and try to push it through and it could simply start something that would manifest right at the 'wrong' time and I just didn't want to go through that. I felt like all those little things weren't pushing us past the tipping point and so I think baby just isn't ready to come for whatever reason, so I want to just try to respect that. So we are just trying to lay low, I'm trying to just lie down and be still as much as possible and just entice baby to stay put until Monday when Elika will be back and we can at least start out in the plan we have set out. I felt instantly relieved to be out of that mindset of trying to make it happen and I feel like if we can just relax we could get through these few more days and then it doesn't matter when. The hardest part is just trying to wrap my head around a hospital birth - you really see what you don't want when someone says that's the way it would be - I really saw very clearly that I wanted to try our best to have this baby in our home, where we feel safest and most at ease. So for me now, with my bad attitude and stubborn as a mule persona, it is hardest to try and allow other possibilities to not devastate me. If we have to go to the hospital this weekend, I have to find a way to make it be positive and not block myself and my labour. I am honest when I say I will be very upset and somewhat resentful - I don't want to be but I recognize my truth, good or bad. It will take that much more from me mentally to rise above those desires and stay focussed on birthing this baby in the best way possible and let go of what I want. But I had a good talk with baby and I told it that it only needs to stay for a few more sleeps and then it can come whenever it is ready, but since it seems to be happy inside, we'll take these days just for us, just momma and babe, warm, safe and well together.
We breathe, we rest, we cry a little and breathe some more. No matter what, baby is the most important thing and we will do whatever we need to make their entrance to the world beautiful and bright.
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