04/28/2016
Saturday, April 7th, 2012—1 AM.
Midwife and Doula were on their way…but their arrival seemed to take forever. I lit candles and essential oils, leaned Crys against the bedside and, with each contraction which Crys moaned through with primal fury, I pressed with equal fury on her hips to open her pelvis, just as I’d been taught. Contraction—moan—press. Contraction—moan—press. Over and over, again and again. Our team arrived and started their set-up. Our Doula waved tissues dabbed with peppermint oil in front of Crys to stave off nausea which had already gotten the best of her causing her to vomit more than once. She brought us both cool towels. Crys’s moans got louder and more exhausted the sharper and more intensely they came. Our Midwife continued her duties, unswerved by it all. Our Doula moved Crys into various positions to ease—if possible—the pain she felt.
It became evident—quickly—I’d forgotten to plug in the pump to raise the pool. Getting the pool ready—between a pump which would work and then run out of battery, and finding hot water from a water heater stretched vastly beyond its limits--that area of refuge for Crys would have to wait. Crys yearned for water terribly, so she was moved to the shower where, for the first time, she considered the idea that she’d have to give up…that this would get the best of her. I went to give her a supportive kiss and she batted me away. Our Doula was good enough—she knew enough—to know where I was needed was…away. I was sent downstairs to the kitchen to boil pot after pot of water to empty into the pool. I ate a Builder Bar and drank coconut water. The pressing on Crys’s hips had long drained me of the two hours of sleep I had had before being awakened. Our Midwife, who was with me downstairs; she didn’t stop to console me or hold my hand and let me know, “Andy, it’s all right sweetie.” No. She raised my strength with a look. That was all. And it was enough.
Crys drifted in and out of sleep between contractions, lying on our bed inhaling and exhaling the candle smoke and calming oils filling the room. Our Doula stood at her side, guiding and coaching, pressing and massaging, as each powerful pain pulsed through Crys’s weary body.
And then: “OH GOD HE DROPPED!” The scream, primal and nerve-racking, filled the house and was probably heard down the street.
Our son, in a swift motion during a contraction, moved into position for his final descent into the outside world. The sensation, I’m told, was both terrifying and electrifying for Crys; it felt, as she tells me, like a big "thunk." It was terribly sudden—signaling all of us that something was going to happen—fast.
5AM.
Crys was moved, for the first time, into our daughter’s room and she lowered herself with aid into the warm birthing pool--fueled only by adrenaline; weakened completely by the ordeal her body had long experienced for not only the last few hours but for the 2 weeks leading to this moment. Here, contractions came in new forms—waves which caused her to want to push with immediacy. But as each subsided, she would actually smile, even laugh. The soft music of the new-age group 2002 filled the room for a minute or so until a primal scream echoed off the walls and she bore down, pushing with every inch of her body to bring our son out from within.
The sight of a crowning head, my boy whom I had only "met" through kicks and nudges, and seen only through fuzzy ultrasounds, was not the horrifying, overwhlming visage I thought it would be. It stole my breath. It was the single-most amazing, beautifful, and utterly surreal thing I have ever seen. This life--a true life, not just a kick or nudge, not just a fuzzy image--was real, and emerging. Incredible puts it lightly.
At 5:30 AM, with a rush of blood, exhilaration, and indescribable beauty, relief, and intensity, our son greeted the water of the birthing pool and two sets of hands—our midwife’s and my own, before she moved him, immediately, to Crys’s bare chest. World’s away from our daughter’s birth—a brief showing over a blue curtain and then whisked away, he laid against his ecstatic mother, taking his first breaths of life in our own home. In his sister’s room. In Wellington, Colorado where there isn’t even a hospital. It was something out of old literature, old times, old dreams.
And as Crys held her baby boy, as is my usual fashion (cross-reference our proposal, our wedding), I cried at her side—at how beautiful he was, at how proud of my wife I was. At how humbled I was by our incredible team. Crys, on the other hand, was too enthralled to shed a tear. She tells me, "There was nothing but calm and peace."
Crys got out of the pool. My crying subsided. Our son remained attached to Crys for a good while thereafter. Within 30 minutes he was nursing. Slowly, we made it into our bedroom, lying on our bed, my boy snuggled skin-to-skin with his mommy. Even I held him, but couldn’t go far as the umbilical cord kept him not far from mommy at all times (yes, even an hour later, he was still connected to his mommy). We laid in bed and Crys’s placenta was examined. I asked if I might glove up and take a look myself. I joined in the exam, looking here and there, touching and feeling what gave life and sustenance to my little boy for the last 9 months. As I laid back down, our Doula brought part of her placenta downstairs to blend into a smoothie for Crys to drink, and for me to try. If no one had told me, I wouldn’t have known it was there at all—it tasted just like a regular day-to-day smoothie. This idea, I'm sure, is shocking to many, if not grotesque. Again, it couldn't be tasted, and the benefits of the hormones it added, Crys's very own hormones, especially oxytocin, would have immediate effects in helping her heal from labor, both physically and psychologically. But it would come into play even more thereafter. The rest of her placenta would be taken and dried, using a process long used in traditional Chinese medicine, and made into capsules for her to take to help with milk supply, postpartum depression, and the shrinking of her uterus. I was thoroughly fascinated by this whole idea and, oddly enough, didn't find it odd or grotesque in the least.
Our midwife brought in a small box—in the middle of which was a small candle. As opposed to cutting the cord which held son and mom together, it was burned, slowly. Memories passed through our minds of the previous 9 months. Hopes and wishes were dreamt. Our beautiful little boy, with whom all fears and trepidations I’d held over her pregnancy now were completely gone, lay nearby, sleeping or nursing. Skin to skin. Cuddling. After a good amount of time had passed, the tie between mommy and baby was severed.
