My daughter, Vida Lev, was born on May 20th, 2010 at 11:09 p.m.
She weighed 7 pounds, 12 oz and measured 55 cm.
Vida was born at home, in what will one day be her bedroom, in a birthing pool, lit only by beeswax candles. She was given to me while her umbilical cord was still attached and pulsing, and then, after he cut the cord, her father held her while I birthed the placenta.
In the first days after her birth, we found ourselves staring at her for hours on end. One of the most amazing things was to see her make the movements I had felt in my stomach. I recognized them, kind of like you recognize a stranger in a café as the person you’re supposed to be meeting: although I had never seen them before, my daughter’s movements were completely familiar. In fact, from the minute she was born, I felt as if I had known her forever.
Of course this story starts long before the day Vida was born – exactly one year ago today. It starts with one woman – me, her mother – and one man – DW, her father – and every single event and experience that shaped us into the people we are. Why do I say this? Because one of my first thoughts when I found out I was pregnant was: with all my emotional baggage, how in the world am I going to do this? And what, exactly, is “this”?
A wonderful yoga teacher kept reminding us that birth was just the beginning, and that, really, the important part comes afterwards. But we were obsessed and didn’t listen. Where would our child be born? Was labour really that painful? What if it all went horribly wrong? In hindsight, I can only compare Vida’s birth to my wedding day: we got so involved in planning the minutiae of the day itself, but really the celebration lies in being married -- or parenting.
DW was at a friend’s stag weekend when I found out that I was pregnant. I had been feeling pretty emotional and “PMSy” and craving bananas and peanut butter (two things I almost never ate at the time). My cycles were exceptionally long and so I would often take pregnancy tests – which is what I decided to do. It was such a habit by then that I barely glanced at the results before tossing the stick into the garbage. However, as I heard it clunk at the bottom of the bin, I thought something had looked different. So I retrieved the test and… well, it was positive.
I couldn’t believe it and immediately retested. The second one malfunctioned: it read “error.” So I ran out and bought more – I think I did the test four more times. They all said the same thing.
Part of me wanted to tell DW in person but I simply couldn’t wait two whole days. So I called him.
“Where are you?” I asked, “are you alone?”
He said he was standing at the top of a hill outside a yurt – the only non-drunk person there. And yes, he was on his own.
I breathed in deeply, unable to fully fill my lungs, and told him.
He was stunned but ecstatic.
Only when he got back did the panic descend: I had been told a year before that my progesterone levels were low and that miscarriage was pretty much inevitable. The only way to know whether the situation had changed was to get a scan. But although they said things were potentially looking good, it was too early to know for sure whether I was, in fact pregnant. They asked me to wait a week. Exactly seven days later, we confirmed that the little chickpea-shape in my uterus was the very beginning of a baby. The better news was that it seemed that in the 10 months since the last scan, my progesterone issue had been resolved.
We waited the requisite twelve weeks before we breathed a first, tentative, sigh of relief. Then came the hurdle of homebirth.
People ask me all the time how I decided to give birth at home. The truth is that I didn’t – the decision was simply there, already made. I guess it’s comparable to most women who assume they are going to give birth in the hospital – that’s just the way it is.
The rest of the world wasn’t as easily convinced. First came the hurdle of the GP. When I told her, she shook her head, “that could be very dangerous. Maybe with a second or third child,” she told me, “but we don’t recommend it for a first.” I returned home dejected but not discouraged.
My main challenge, however, was my husband. DW is a big believer in allopathic medicine and science. He was by no means ready to forego what he considered the safety of the hospital. In his mind choosing to have the baby at home entailed many more potentially dangerous and even fatal outcomes. Unfortunately, I didn’t yet have the knowledge to dissuade him of his fears.
Many people think home births are confined to a small percentage of the population – the same people who keep cows named Lenin for the milk, make their own shoes out of oats, and believe we are committing plant genocide when we eat salad. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth; and as DW and I started to read up on the subject, we discovered that there are people from all walks of life embarking on this most wonderful adventure.
More importantly, we found out that although we have been conditioned to fear birth outside the medicalized model, alternative places, ways and methods of bringing life into this world are no less dangerous than their interventionist counterparts. The more DW researched, clearer the choice became. In the end, he didn’t just come around to the idea of having a home birth – he became quite an outspoken advocate for it.
The first thing that surprised him were the statistics: numerous studies have shown that for low-risk pregnancies, giving birth at home is no more dangerous than being in a hospital. Secondly, his research made it clear that my chances of having a straightforward delivery would drastically increase if I was relaxed and at ease during labour.
(I’m not saying this is the right choice for everyone. It was for me.)
My preference was to be in my own environment, making choices based solely on my needs. I wanted nothing to do with others’ beliefs, shifts, schedules or political agendas during the birth of my child. I wanted no bright lights, no metal instruments, no internal examinations, no bleached gowns that showed my backside – in fact, my preference was to be naked, and that would have been impossible had I been surrounded by strangers. Lastly, I felt it was important that I be allowed to eat whatever and whenever I wanted, that I be able to move around freely and that the only people present be those I knew and trusted.
While we were still considering our options, we decided to explore the independent midwife route. Enter Elke. At the routine prenatal check-ups at the hospital, DW had been relegated to a corner of the room. Nobody had addressed him, or involved him in any way. When we met Elke, she asked both of us what we wanted, paying the same amount of attention to DW’s wishes and desires as she did to mine. When she left, we both felt comfortable enough to hug this lovely woman. Still, I found it strange: you have a cup of tea with a person and then decide whether they will help bring your child into the world (“Do you take milk? And when do you clamp the cord?”).
Birth is an instinctual process: from your choice of mate, to the actual creation of the child, to the decisions about delivery, everything happens in the gut. And so we hired Elke and never looked back.
Over the coming months, we got to know our midwives – Elke and Sandesh, they work in teams of two – and they got to know us to the point where they knew when to take my worries seriously and when I was simply a first-time mother-to-be sending herself into unnecessary panic.
My pregnancy was pretty smooth. Cravings were few but I did want French fries and mayonnaise on a regular basis (in case you’re wondering, yes, I did eat – and love – them!). Stranger yet were the foods that became unpalatable. Two usual favourites, hummus and coconut, were banned – I couldn’t even look at them without feeling queasy. Until one day, about five months in, standing at a local favourite deli, I simply HAD to have some of their hummus. And it needed to be with sugarless blueberry jam on a brown rice cracker. It was my very own pregnancy-induced version of PB&J – luckily for DW, the craving hit at 3 in the afternoon, not the middle of the night!
As my due date approached, we tested out the birth pool, purchased the essential oils, and other necessities and waited… Our biggest fear was that I would be overdue to the point where I would need to be induced, thereby ruling out a home birth. I tried not to stress about it, having read enough to know that there was little I could do (pineapple and curry were staples in my diet throughout my pregnancy, so those wouldn’t have worked anyway.)
The due date was May 23rd (coincidentally also the date on which DW had asked me to marry him three years prior). I took my time getting things ready as everybody had assured me that the vast, vast majority of first babies arrive late. On Tuesday, May 18th, I finished the first draft of a novel I had been working on for a few years. On Wednesday the 19th, I put on the earrings I had worn on my wedding day.
DW had read up on ways in which he would be able to tell if I was in labour and kept pestering me with questions like “do you have diarrhoea?” to know whether I had, in fact, started the process. But my answers were consistent: “NO” and “leave me alone!”
On Wednesday, May 19th, Sandesh, came for a scheduled visit. We spoke at length about what we could expect if the pregnancy ended up going beyond the forty-two weeks allowed by the National Health Service. It was important to find out how long we would have before an induction would be recommended, and what we could do to help bring on labour ourselves if need be. Sandesh was very calm and reassuring – unlike us. One woman, she told us, had safely delivered after having carried her child for almost 44 weeks.
It’s funny how your own past starts to play a strong role. I was induced and feel it has affected me throughout my life – something I was never really aware of until I became pregnant myself. DW was six weeks late (no that is not a typo). He also wasn’t too into the idea of induction unless it was medically necessary. They say that the risk of complications doubles when a pregnancy goes over a certain number of weeks. However, what they don’t specify is that in the case of those statistics, “double” means from 0.2 to 0.4% or something like that. Also, they don’t know how many of those complications were pre-existing or would have happened anyway… Precise data is murky to say the least. Still, it doesn’t stop “well meaning” medical staff from using it as a scaremongering tactic.
In the end, we didn’t need all that information: at 2:30 in the morning on that very same night, I woke up feeling the need to pee. By that point, I was so enormous and constantly needing the loo anyway, that it didn’t strike me as extraordinary. Until I felt some liquid trickle between my legs. I was horrified! Had I peed in my bed? Then I thought maybe it wasn’t urine… maybe it was… was I in labour??? I got up as quickly as my massive belly would allow and made my way to the bathroom, trailing liquid behind me. The test was whether I could stop it from leaking out of me by flexing my internal muscles (do your kegels, ladies!). I quickly discovered that I could not – labour had started.
I tried to wake DW quietly – my voice sounded bizarre, much calmer than I felt.
“I think my waters just broke.”
He made me laugh when he shot out of bed as if it had caught fire. We had been preparing for this moment for months and months and yet we were completely unprepared.
DW quickly dialled Elke who very calmly, patiently and kindly – especially seeing as it was three in the morning -- told him to rest up. There was a long road ahead and we should get as much sleep as we could.
I’ll never forget the look on his face as he stood on the landing just outside the bedroom and beamed. “Here we go, sweetheart,” he said, his voice full.
Though DW was able to sleep for another couple of hours, I lay awake feeling each contraction as it came and went. The sensation was strange, new and while it wasn’t necessarily a comfortable sensation, it wasn’t painful either. I listened to my husband’s deep breathing and realized, maybe for the first time, that it wasn’t going to be the two of us anymore.
In the morning, we got up at 8:30 and started going about our day. Everything seemed normal except that every so often, when the onset of a contraction, I would stop, bend over and breathe deeply.
Also, instead of my usual superfood breakfast smoothie, I asked DW for a full English (minus the meat bits -- bacon, black pudding, etc). Again, DW beamed. He happily went about preparing the beans, eggs and tomatoes and toasting the freshly baked gluten free bread. We talked schedules, did the dishes. We called Elke again who asked whether she should come over to check on my progress. I said I didn’t think it was necessary; I might still have a long way to go.
In the end, although it seemed strange to have such a massive breakfast, having exactly what I desired was a great thing as it powered me through most of the next 15 hours.
We had bought the DVD box set of Fawlty Towers for the occasion, but I had no desire to be anywhere near a television. My preference would have been to be out in nature, and I kept saying I wanted to go for a walk on Hampstead Heath. But the twenty minutes it would have taken to get there were too much, so I sat in our little garden instead, drawing with oil pastels, something I hadn’t done in months.
DW kept asking me whether I wanted him to fill the birth pool. He had been religiously timing the contractions until Elke told him it wasn’t necessary at this stage. So he tried – unsuccessfully – to distract himself.
At about 4:30, we called Elke again. This time, however, when she asked whether I wanted her to come, I said I did.
“Would 6 be OK?” she asked.
“That’ll be fine.” I said.
About an hour later I asked DW to start filling the pool.
When I told the story a year ago, people kept wondering how I knew. The answer is, I didn’t consciously know anything. But some part of me, deep down was acutely aware of what was about to happen.
I am also often asked whether I was scared. The true answer is that during these early stages of labour, I wasn’t the least bit afraid. The same part of me that knew what was about to happen knew that I was born to do this. And I was in my own home, surrounded by my things and accompanied by my husband and the midwives whom I had grown to trust -- fear didn’t occur to me. That came later, and it had little to do with where I was or who was with me.
The gears started to shift around 5:30 in the evening. By the time Elke arrived at about 6:30, the contractions had intensified and I had gone deeper into myself. The first thing I said to her was “you’re not going anywhere tonight” quickly followed by “can I get into the pool now?”
I think I was in there before Elke had finished nodding!
Being in the birth pool was wonderful -- feeling the water flow over and around my belly with every contraction was incredible. In between surges, we chatted a little, although they were getting stronger and closer together.
DW kept inquiring whether I wanted to eat anything. We had stocked up on favourites like coconut water, bananas and almond butter. I had made popsicles with fresh fruit and honey, having heard that they could be very helpful during labour. But the last thing I wanted was food and every time he asked, I was overcome with nausea. Finally, I told him I would let him know if and when I needed anything.
With every surge, I would focus on my breathing and try to keep my exhalations longer than my inhalations (a tip DW had picked up from a development executive at one of his work meetings in the previous months J).
Every time I thought it couldn’t get worse, it did, though only for a split second after which the pain would disappear completely (note: this is why I prefer the term “surges” rather than “contractions”).
I tried to focus on the fact that each surge was bringing my baby closer to me, but that only brought home the enormity of what was happening more powerfully.
When I opened my eyes, I had a need to see DW. At some point, he left for a few moments to make himself a snack. I panicked. “What is he doing?” I demanded, “making himself a gourmet meal for one?” Though I didn’t want to speak to him – and there was a funny moment when I asked him to get into the pool and massage my back only to yell “don’t touch me!” the second his knee touched the water -- knowing he was there made me feel safe.
Suddenly, after having been in the pool for a good long time, I needed to get out. Elke recommended I kneel by the bed but it wasn’t comfortable and after a few attempts, I lay down on it instead. This only exacerbated the pain (how women give birth lying on their backs is a mystery). Apparently, I announced “I can’t do this.” I don’t remember that now – in my recollection, the most difficult moments came later. What I do know is how strong the urge was to lie down, if only for a moment, to gather my strength. When I got up again, I felt more energized. I paced through the hall, climbed up and down the stairs, I danced my hips in a figure eight motion.
It had gotten dark by then. Someone had lit the four big beeswax candles we had bought for the occasion – the only light I could tolerate, and even then, from a distance. Sandesh had arrived although she remained quietly on the stairs.
Elke stayed with me. She recommended I try sitting on the toilet – a position that is apparently very conducive to the birth process. Not mine. Staying still was not an option for me, and sitting there made the pain unbearable. So instead, I clung to a drying rack we have in the bathroom and when a surge arrived, I would drop into a squat. I know now that labour and birthing is about movement. Looking back, I am grateful for all the long walks and the yoga that kept me in fantastic shape. I was on the move for hours and hours – dancing, pacing, dropping into squats, getting the baby and my body into the right position for everything to go smoothly.
But the physical journey is only part of it. There is a whole other aspect of giving birth that transcends the tangible. All I can say is that my belief system has profoundly shifted since I giving birth. Later on, I told DW I had gone to retrieve our child from the place where fairy tales live. I will try to explain it a little bit here, but am very aware of the shortcomings of my words even as I write them.
As a result of the abuse I endured in my own childhood, I was convinced that I would not be able to birth a life. I was terrified that my baby would be stillborn. During transition, that fear resurfaced. Even though Elke was monitoring the strong and beautiful heartbeat, I didn’t believe the child would survive its passage through my birth canal.
I read somewhere that a woman must face her demons in order to give birth. That is exactly what happened. My lack of faith in my own capacity had a profound effect on my labour: I suddenly got stuck. Part of me didn’t want to progress as that would surely mean the child inside me would die.
Chronology is lost at this point, but two things helped thrust me past this: The first one was a simple phrase that DW uttered. “Let go,” he said, “let go.” I repeated it over and over like a mantra. “Let go. Let go.” And slowly, I did. Secondly, I asked Elke to stop monitoring the baby’s heartbeat. Not hearing that beautiful and terrifying sound for a few minutes somehow removed a huge pressure. If I couldn’t hear it, then I wouldn’t hear it stop. I was able to forget my fears and focus on other things – like pushing the baby out. I had gone to a deep, dark place, a heavily wooded area filled with shadows and monsters. When I arrived at a clearing, our baby was waiting for me in a patch of magnificent light. I can still see her there when I look down at her sleeping face as I write this. How can I explain this without sounding completely bonkers? I knew the second she arrived in my womb, physically too tiny to be seen in a scan yet she was already the person she is today. And so too when I found her at the end of my battle through the darkest corners of labour-land.
A pure, intense clarity came over me followed by the urge to push. I told them that I needed to get back into the pool. Sandesh urged me to sip some warm water with honey she had prepared, which gave me an extra boost.
Our daughter was born soon after that. A few good, hard pushes, some long, loud cries (and other strange sounds), an intense burning sensation, and out she came. I don’t remember what I said to DW, only that I knew her already, that it wasn’t the first time we had met. I held her close and she latched on immediately. Again, words fail me.
I spent the next few hours – the next few days – in a state of bliss, ecstasy, serenity like nothing I have ever known. Though life has more or less returned to “normal”, with it’s ups and downs, its everyday irritations and joys and crap, that feeling still lingers. And when the world around me quiets down for just a minute, when I take a moment to breathe, I can still see the tingly, shimmery shadows of it.
Our daughter was examined and cleaned. I showered. We all got into bed. I held her as she suckled and squirmed and slept.
At about two in the morning, the midwives offered to bring us up some food.
“Be careful what you ask for,” Elke warned, “you will remember it for the rest of your life.”
She was right. Never has gluten free toast with almond butter and prune jam tasted so incredible. It was worthy of Michelin stars. DW and I munched on our meal, staring at the magical little being between us, completely, totally, madly in love. Finally, he fell asleep. I stayed awake, watching my new little family until the first rays of sun appeared.
I came out of my birth experience transformed. No longer do the chains of my childhood have as strong a hold on me. The difficulties of the past make me sad, but it’s almost as if it happened to someone else, or in a book I read – the kind that is so well written that you can almost imagine it being real. My past is no longer a trauma like it used to be. Instead, it has become a learning experience that I embrace as my guide for the kind of parent I want to be.
We decided to call her Vida (which means Life in Spanish) Lev (Heart in Hebrew) – and never has a child been more aptly named. As my own mother says, there is me before Vida and me since Vida was born.
Happy birthday to my beautiful, magical, incredible baby girl. Thank you for the best, most powerful, terrifying, electrifying, inspiring, difficult, tiring, energizing, challenging, wonderful, fun, joyful, year of my life.
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