|
 |
|
|
|
|
The Unassisted Birth of Elisabeth
Part 1 - How we chose unassisted birth:
Soon after her conception, while pondering a name in the Temple, I was told that the child I was carrying was indeed a girl, and that her name was to be Elisabeth. With this knowledge in my heart, I began to attempt to plan out her birth. We knew it had to be at home, just as my son Isaac had been born at home, and my two younger sisters had been born at home. Home was the right place and the only place, and short of a medical emergency, nowhere else would do. But how to go about hiring a midwife? Our financial situation had only gotten worse. We had moved, been sealed together in the Temple as a family, then my husband went through a two month period of unemployment, and I miscarried our son Abinadi at 12.5 weeks. 4 months later I was pregnant again. As we pondered the choices available to us, "let's wait and see" seemed to be the only available option. I continued to eat healthy and drink voluminous amounts of water, and I became more and more accepting of my lack of so called pre-natal care. I was healthy, I took my vitamins, and I'd had no problems (physically,) with our oldest son's birth or the miscarriage. So we waited. And waited.
Finally, at 5 months, things changed. A sister in our Branch, due at the same time, found a low lying placenta (completely covering the birth canal,) during her ultrasound and was scheduled for her fourth c-section. Another good LDS friend had planned a homebirth, but decided to get an ultrasound, which revealed Spina Bifida. The baby was scheduled for a cesarean. After the birth she was hospitalized, separated from her baby, and unable to nurse until 5 days after the "birth." I had had some very light spotting in the first month, and I began to feel overwhelmed by fear. What if I had a low lying placenta? What if I had a baby with a "birth-defect" and couldn't find a midwife? What if I had a baby that needed medical intervention? I decided to get government insurance (socialized medicine) so that we could get an ultrasound to confirm the safety of a homebirth. If everything looked ok, I reasoned, we could take the "earned income credit" on our taxes (income redistribution) and arrange to pay the midwife a few months after the birth. If everything wasn't ok, we'd know up front and be "covered." After a week of acting in fear, little progress had been made. It was more than just red tape; whenever I'd call, computers would be down, people would be out to lunch, running errands, etc. And my husband and I were fighting every night. I knew this wasn't the right path for us. I knew creeping socialism didn't hold the key to our daughters birth. So after church on Sunday, I took some quiet time and studied the Doctrine and Covenants, where the Lord talks about the law of the land. I finally felt at peace with the decision to let go of the birth. He would take care of us. He would let us know if something was wrong and we needed medical help.
Almost as soon as I told my husband of my decision to let the Lord take care of our birth, the subject of unassisted birth came up. It seemed crazy, but an option. We decided to call our local midwife, thinking that some miracle could happen and we might be able to pay her, at least get some "prenatal care." She said she'd be happy to work out a per visit price for prenatal care, but that she wasn't delivering babies around that time of year due to holiday and family obligations. Well! The idea of calling the midwives we'd used for our oldest son's birth, an hour and a half away, did not appeal to us. By this point I'd already decided that the minor perineal tear incurred during his birth could have been avoided by more hot towels, a less athletic delivery, and a more upright position. And after five months of no one checking my cervix, I didn't particularly want anyone to start now. I just don't like people having their hands up my yoni.
After the midwife turned us down, all the pieces fell into place. I realized that both the homebirths I'd witnessed, my two younger sisters, were unassisted births. The first was precipitous labor; the doctor and the midwife didn't make it to the planned homebirth. The second, the midwife refused to attend for legal reasons; she provided phone help during the birth but my dad and a few family friends provided all the medical expertise and support. I talked to my parents, who with no priesthood or Temple blessings and no faith in the Lord, had planned and carried out an unassisted homebirth. Certainly I, who had overcome fear through faith in the love of our savior Jesus Christ, could handle whatever He had planned for me! During that same visit to my parents home, I used their internet access to search for "unassisted birth" and was amazed at how much information I found! Two birth stories were obviously LDS parents and all the stories spoke such peace to my heart. Within a few days we went to the Temple and confirmed in our hearts that unassisted was what the Lord wanted us to do. With about two months of gestation left, I started to prepare.
Part 5:
Isaac and Tandem Nursing
Copyright © 2002 Christian UC All rights reserved.
