APPOINTMENT DATE: OCT. 6

Ever since I was 6 months pregnant with Jack-Evan, I have wanted to use a mid-wife - specifically one at a Christian Birthing Center about 4 miles away from my home. My heart was set on it.

I had such a terrible experience with prenatal care with my 1st pregnancy that I felt there must be something better out there, right??

I’m not really into the homebirth, all natural, endure the pain aspect of childbirth, especially after enduring horrendous “crowning” pain even with an epidural last time. So my plan was to use the birthing center for prenatal care, and then have the midwife join me at our local hospital up the road from the center. After all, their website had said, “Whether home birth, birth at our center, or hospital birth….”

Seemed simple enough.

So on Oct. 6, at 4:00 pm, my parents loaded up with me in the car to head to my scheduled tour at the birthing center. Dad would watch the baby, while mom went on the tour with me. Kevin wanted to be there so badly, but he couldn’t get off of work.

Walking in the center, I was comforted by the sights, smell, and homey charm of the place. Surely this was the place for me!

After filling out the paperwork, the main midwife joined me.  Her plan was to catch me up with the current tour already in session.  We began talking, and I mentioned I would be having a hospital birth.

And that’s when she dropped the bombshell on me.

They have “no jurisdiction to perform a birth at the hospital”.   WHAT??   In other words, if I used the birthing center midwife for prenatal care, and then gave birth at the hospital like I wanted, she would not be able to attend the birth.

Now, if you can imagine, think about what it feels like to be a child wanting an ice cream cone.  You picture that ice cream cone all day long.  Your parents promise you an ice cream cone all day.  You hear the bells of the ice cream truck coming past your home.  Running outside with your money, all hot and sweaty from playing, you ask for a strawberry ice cream cone.

“Sorry, we’re fresh out of ice cream,” says he.

Imagine the shock.  Imagine the disappointment.  An ice cream truck with no ice cream??

A MIDWIFE WHO COULDN’T ATTEND A HOSPITAL BIRTH?

I was devastated.  I had psyched myself up for using this birthing center for over 2 years.  I had promised myself, during my prenatal visits with Jack-Evan that ONE day, some day, I would be able to use that wonderful, homey looking, Christian birthing center.

And now I was hearing that I couldn’t unless I went all-natural and gave birth IN the center itself.

So right there in the hallway, I began to cry.  I couldn’t help it, emotional pregnant hormonal lady that I was.  How embarrassing!  But I couldn’t stop.  In between heaves, she pulled me into the examining room and coaxed my history out of me, and the story behind why I wanted to use them.  I told her of all the mistakes the other doctor’s office had made in my first pregnancy prenatal care.  I told her of how they had blamed me when they forgot the 20 week anatomy scan (and didn’t discover the error until I was 30 weeks).  I told her how I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes after failing the hour test by only 4 points and then vomiting within 10 minutes of the 3 hour test.  And how I was given absolutely no support after this diagnosis and simply told “not to worry about it”.  I also explained how at 32 weeks, I went in for a required “stress test” because of the gestational diabetes and forced to stay for 4 days in the hospital on a medicinal drip, being told I was going into premature labor.  I did not dilate any during this time and felt absolutely no contractions.  I knew the baby wasn’t coming!  Yet because the monitor detected “faint” contractions, they decided what was best.  I also told her how, after the 4 day hospital stay, the on-call doctor (the same one who eventually attended my birth at 40 weeks) reviewed my charts and said I should NOT have been diagnosed with full gestational diabetes.

I then explained to the midwife how at 10 pm the night I gave birth the on-call doctor walked in the room and TOLD me they were now starting pitocin drip.    I said absolutely NOT!   I was already 8 cm’s dilated at that time (I progressed a little under a CM each hour).  I was progressing just fine by myself, thankyouverymuch.

He just shrugged, while he and the nurse exchanged annoyed looks, and said “I’ll be back at midnight and we’ll decide then.”

HELLO!  Over here!!  Angry laboring lady here in the bed…I SAID I do NOT want pitocin!  I’ve heard way too many horror stories (and known of 2 personally) where the effects of pitocin were terrible and many have resulted in a C-Section.  There was absolutely no medical reason for me to have that dripping in my poor laboring body.  I was progressing just fine in all aspects and even with the epidural in me, I could feel the pressure of each contraction just fine.

I was fully dilated within 2 hours (by 12:15 am) and gave birth to Jack at 2:04 am (May 4, 2008).  Yet to this day I do not know if they started the pitocin without me being aware of it.  They could have put anything into that IV drip if they had so desired, especially since they acted all night as if I had no right to choose how my birth progressed

I also told the midwife how excruciatingly painful the actual crowning and birth was, even considering I had an epidural.  It was such horrendous pain that I felt as if I had exited this world and entered the pits of hell itself.  Surely if childbirth hurt that bad WITH an epidural, how could I endure a non-medicated childbirth?

Then the midwife started in on how childbirth is “pressure” and not really “pain” and it’s all in perception.

And I could have slapped her.  Really.  I know the difference between pressure and pain.  It was pain.  There’s no way around it….knife stabbing, fire burning, skin tearing, gut wrenching, haul your heart to Davy Jones Locker kinda of pain.

After about 40 minutes of standing there explaining my story to the midwife, I felt somewhat better.  I wanted to use this center for prenatal care so badly, and the midwife was far more comforting and pleasant than any other medical professional I had encountered.  So, I continued with the rest of the tour.

The center was beautiful.  There were two appointment rooms that looked like a regular OBGYN appointment room.  Then there were 2 birthing suites that were just gorgeous.  The first had a lovely kingsize bed, couch, mood lighting, stereo hookups for your ipod, gripp bar for laboring when standing, and a soothing water fountain.  In the attached bathroom was a huge jetted mood-light jacuzzi for birthing.  The 2nd Queen size room had all of the same amenities, but was even more beautiful!

Down the hall was a gorgeous restroom for family, a main kitchen, a library stocked with educational birthing materials (books, videos, etc.) you could check out for free, as well as a large conference room for the various educational classes they held.

After the tour, Kevin arrived for the main consultation, while my Mom & Dad took Jack-Evan back to their house.  During the consultation, the midwife spent over 60 minutes reviewing center rules, standards, menu recommendations, appointment layout, pricing, and other various little tidbits, including some samples of raspberry flavored Vitamin C powder.   I also took a few moments to show Kevin around the center as well.

Upon paying our $50 consultation fee, I was given 2 recommendation sheets for other clinics because the birthing center outsourced all ultrasounds and labwork.  The birthing center fees, as I just found out, did not cover the outsourced fees.  Those would need to be paid directly to the other clinics out of pocket, and a few days later I would need to have an ultrasound for dating purposes since I could not remember when my LMP was.  I would also have to have full blood work done as well.

Finally everything was completed and we said our goodbyes to the midwife.

Kevin & I left the center that night around 7 pm, full of excitement about using such a wonderful, caring place for our 2nd pregnancy.  I even psyched myself up into a state where I began to think I could endure a non-medicated waterbirth considering all of the amenities I would have at my disposal - not to mention the wonderful midwife we had just bonded with.  After all, I would have 9 months to practice the different techniques, calm my nerves, and instill in myself a sense of confidence that my body could do what it was designed to do.  Perhaps, after 9 months of wonderful caring prenatal care, I would be fully capable of having that really cool water birth.  Perhaps, just perhaps, after 9 months of getting to know the same woman and knowing that in all likely hood she would be at the birth as well (something I didn’t experience with my first pregnancy as I had a different person for every visit), that I would be capable of having the waterbirth.

I could definitely do this.

Or could I?