Overdue Joy

Wyatt’s birth story starts 2 weeks before his birthday. He was due August 30th and I was so sure he’d come early that once his due date was less than a week away, I had decided I was done waiting. On Friday the 24th I took two doses of castor oil and waited to go into labor. After the castor oil cramps wore off I had about an hour of quiet and then some real contractions began. I was so excited that this was IT!

My mom and dad were staying at my grandma’s house, so they came out to our house about 9:30pm. My doula, Nicki, came out too. We called Ben’s mom and she was going to keep in touch and get on the road as well. We paced the house and timed the contractions, but about 1:30am, they completely quit. We stayed up until 2:30am and decided they weren’t going to start again, so we all gave up and went to bed.

The week previous I’d become so uncomfortable with the pregnancy that I couldn’t imagine waiting until my due date. The baby’s head was right on my bladder giving me lots of pain and lots of trips to the bathroom. After the "night of labor that went nowhere," I discovered his head had moved from off my bladder and I was considerably more comfortable. Little did I know that was good since I’d be waiting for over two more weeks!

Fast forward two more Fridays and I finally went in to the hospital's Women's Center, a week past my due date, and had a checkup with the CNM there. She said everything looked fine and it was just time to have a baby. By that point I was worn out. I was tired of being pregnant. I was tired of people asking me if there was any change. I was tired of waiting! We’d tried all kinds of things to start labor and nothing had worked. I must say we giggled a lot though while eating oregano and cayenne powder mixed with cream cheese on crackers. Other people had suggested spicy food and I did get a few contractions from eating 5 jalapeño poppers. I tried Mexican food, Chinese food, Italian food… everything. By the weekend of the 8th I was just done with trying; I decided to wait and be patient to see what the Lord would bring.

On the morning of Monday the 10th (11 days post-dates), I awoke at 4am. I wasn’t in labor, but I was wide awake. I just knew that this was going to be the day. I did a little nipple stimulation which usually brings a contraction or two, but mostly I just sat in bed and prayed. I’d been praying for weeks for patience and the Lord’s timing, but that morning I was bold and just asked outright. “Lord, can today be the day?”

Out of the blue at 4:30, one contraction. One good one. Then one more. Praising the Lord for each one coming after the last, I got up and paced. I cleaned in my kitchen and timed them out. By 6:30 I’d had two hours of regular contractions: every 3 minutes but only lasting about 20-30 seconds. But I didn’t wonder, I knew, this was the day. We called Ben’s mom at 6 a.m. and soon she was on her way across the state to be here. I called my mom at 6:30 and she said she’d be over by 7:30 but was too excited and arrived at 7 a.m. My doula, Nicki was going to be there by 8 or 8:30 after dropping her kids off at school but was also too excited to wait and arrived at 7:30 after finding someone to take her kids for her. So we settled into a good pattern of labor and waited. Midmorning the kids went to Ben’s sister’s house. Then in the peace and quiet I took a nice long bath, which really lives up to its nickname of the “midwives’ epidural.” After getting out of the tub things began to pick up. I needed to use the birth ball a lot. We finally found that if I knelt and leaned on the ball with my mom in front of me helping me focus, Ben giving me a double hip squeeze, and Nicki rubbing my back we could really effectively deal with the contractions. It seemed to take all the pressure off of my back and put it right on my cervix. Ben’s mom arrived at 12:15 and by then my mom was convinced we were pretty close to time. I wasn’t as convinced because, with the labor support and the contractions still 5 minutes apart, I wasn’t nearly as overwhelmed as I usually am near the end of labor. I guessed when she checked me that I’d be about 5cm, but when we did check, there I was… complete!

Ben was with me in our room when I had a contraction that I couldn’t deal with even with his help and I knew… I had to push. He helped me onto the bed and everyone was quickly getting ready for baby. I wasn’t going to wait for anyone though. I pushed through one contraction, and then we waited for the next one since they were still quite far apart. With the next contraction I pushed Wyatt right out into Ben’s waiting hands. I was even able to get my hands on Wyatt as he came out and that was an amazing connection for me. Right up onto my tummy he went and he was so perfect! It was 12:46pm. We nursed a little as we waited for the cord to finish pulsing, which took nearly 20 minutes. Then Ben cut the cord and mom delivered the placenta and we began to clean up and snuggle in.

It was amazing to me how smoothly it went and how complete my birth felt. It was awesome to have both of our moms and my doula there coaching and encouraging and to have Ben deliver the baby. I felt like he was more hands on with this labor than any of the ones before. There was never any moment of frustration or desperation. Nicki went and got the kids immediately and they were able to be a part of our joyful afternoon.

By that evening I was nestled in a pile of pillows on the couch and enjoying a few visitors and some good food provided by a neighbor. At one time I couldn’t find Ben and I went looking for him. There he was in the bedroom just adoring little Wyatt Reid. We both enjoyed a quiet moment alone with the baby in our room as happy sounds drifted in, the chatter of our kids, family, and friends in the living room. We then spent a time in prayer just thanking God for our new son and putting his future in the Lord’s good hands.

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