This was shared with permission from a beautiful Birthing Tree family!
Warning: This post contains mentions of birthing a child, medical interventions, and strong emotions.
This post is likely going to be long winded, but it’s just some journaling I feel like I need to do. I will likely never share my full birth story online as 1) I don’t feel social media is the place to do that, and 2) It was an insanely intimate experience between my husband, my son, my care team, and myself….. All caveats aside, let me begin:
My mother-in-law has been here all week waiting with us for baby Harrison to make his appearance. While listening (see eavesdropping) in on her teaching her 3rd grade class I was reminded of the importance of a good thesis statement. In honor of Mrs. Joachim’s excellent ability to teach, I have formulated a thesis statement for this post:
If you are pregnant and plan to birth the baby, hire a doula.
I don’t care what your birth plan is. I don’t care if you are planning on getting an epidural or going natural. I don’t care if you’re birthing your first child or your 10th. I don’t care if you have the best doctors around. Hire. A. Doula. Let me tell you why by going through the thought process that led Cam and I to choosing to hire a doula, the regrets and fears I felt during the decision and after, and how, despite nothing going the way I had planned, I credit my doula for saving my birthing journey.
Once we moved to Florida, Cam and I talked about what we wanted for this pregnancy. I wanted to try and give birth naturally and began looking into hiring a doula to help support me in that goal. We met with the birth designer at the hospital and were so excited to use their new rooms and have supportive staff who cared about our birth plan and didn’t want to push any interventions during birth. At 30 weeks I began investing 2 hours a day learning hypnosis to prepare for birthing our baby and was excited to find a doula to really tie it all together.
Cam and I interviewed four doulas. If this person was going to be staring at my Yoni and watching me shit myself, I needed someone I clicked with and I was hoping the interview process would give me that reassurance. I also wanted someone who Cam clicked with as I felt he would need some support through all of this as well. I narrowed down my search to two and I will be honest. There was one I really clicked with, but the price scared me, and one that was okay, but the price was half what the other charged.
Cam immediately said go with who you gel with, the money will all be worth it. I wasn’t so sure. My birth was going to be easy. I had my hypnosis training, I was stronger now that I was when I gave birth before, and it was only one day. I opened my email to write the ½ price doula only to find she had emailed me 5 min before saying she had just booked my date. Cam spent the next few hours convincing me that that was a sign to say, “screw the money” and go with what I felt. That night, I reluctantly e-mailed saying we were so excited to proceed in using Holly Heller at Birthing Tree, LLC for our birth experience. I’ll be honest, “so excited” was more like super apprehensive for me at the moment. But once the decision was made, we signed a contract, and we were in it.
We did our two prenatal appointments, went over what interventions I wanted and didn’t want, what I wanted to have happen if things had to change, and going over what the expectations were for the hypnosis portion of birth. I left feeling like I had someone educated in her field and that I liked as a person, but I was still worried if the juice was worth the squeeze.
5 days after his due date, Harrison decided it was time. I reached out to the doula as we were in triage and she told me to let her know when I was in active labor. We found out I couldn’t use the low intervention suites (apparently due to being overdue), I wasn’t progressing, and I couldn’t get into hypnosis. I was contracting every 3 minutes and I couldn’t get on top of it. I made the decision to get an epidural.
The night progressed. I, however, did not. I stalled at 3cm. Then suddenly, within 15 min, I was 9cm. I asked if that meant I should call my doula and have her come to which the nurse responded “if you want her to be here when you give birth….. then yeah.” So, I reached out and my doula was on her way.
The perceived immanence of my baby’s arrival should have had me elated and in a way it did. However, I also felt, I don’t know, cheated maybe? I hired this doula for all this money to help me through hours of a natural active labor and here I was with an epidural and my baby coming what sounded like it would be within minutes of her arrival. I felt regret. I was so mad I let Cam talk me into spending all that money for nothing.
My doula arrived and I was checked; still 9cm. An hour went by, still 9cm. More and more hours went by. No progress. We tried repositioning multiple times all while my doula addressed my swollen legs, the amniotic fluid-soaked socks on my feet, and relieved the extreme pain in my ribs from my baby pressing against them.
6 hours I stalled. The nurse came in with Pitocin and said they were going to start it. Having my doula there gave me the courage to ask for time to talk to my husband about that decision instead of just rolling with it. That was the first time all night I really felt empowered.
Then things went haywire. Again, this is not a post about my birth story, so I’ll spare the details. I will say, I was terrified, and I felt like the only person who knew what was going on AND was on my team, was my doula. My husband was on my team but was as scared and lost as I was. The doctors and nurses knew what was going on but weren’t there to be on my team. My doula was in it. She helped the nurses with positioning and monitoring mine and my baby’s vitals. She balanced my needs with the medical team with such finesse, it was like a well perfected dance.
Even with all of this, it looked like a c-section was imminent. I don’t remember who asked if I could try and push anyway but I do remember the hospital staff saying I could, but no one seemed hopeful it would work, except my doula. She told me I was going to have to push like hell, but that I could do it. When it seemed no one else believed in me, she did, and that was all I needed. After three sets of three pushes, coached by her while she also held one of my legs, my wonderful baby boy came into this world, without a c-section.
When I went in to making a birth plan, I started at A: I’m pregnant and having this baby, had all these plans in between (natural birth, hypnosis, etc), and ended at Z: having a happy healthy baby. All that B through Y in between didn’t go as planned for me. However, that end result of a happy healthy baby and a happy healthy me are due in large part to having a doula there. I truly believe having a doula there saved me from narcotics that would have been transferred to my baby, possibly saved my baby with how quickly things changed and how busy everyone was, and kept me from a c-section. That, to me, was undoubtedly worth every last dollar we spent in hiring her.
So, let me finish by saying this: I don’t care what your plan is for giving birth. Every birth story is different and sometimes everything goes according to plan, and other times nothing goes as planned. Either way, the benefits of having a doula on your team when you are birthing at home, in the hospital, a birth center, wherever else you may be, are priceless.
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