I started writing Eliana’s birth story about a month after she as born. Around the same time we noticed she was experiencing a lot of discomfort and skin issues. I then left the birth story, and so many other things, to the side. We didn’t know what is was at the time (spoiler alert: severe eczema) but spent the next six or seven months trying to figure it out and provide her some relief. A different story for a different day (coming soon). For now. Eliana’s birth story: part one.
I didn’t want a c-section. In fact, giving birth in a hospital was the absolute last thing I wanted.
We had it all planned out. Before I even got pregnant, I researched midwives and birth centers in my area. I knew I wanted a water birth and found a birth center less than fifteen minutes away. It was perfect.
I started my maternal care there at about 8 weeks. At 10 weeks, I had a bleeding scare. “Threatened miscarriage.” It was this birth center that took my call on a Sunday afternoon and welcomed me in. The midwife on call was gentle and kind as she told me that we may not be able to hear the heartbeat. It could mean an impending miscarriage but not to fret.
The sound of her heart beating is one I’ll never forget. It took a little bit to finally hear it, but the midwife took her time. When I finally heard my daughter’s beating heart, I cried. The midwife held my hand and looked me in the eyes and celebrated with me.
The weeks went by and my appointments were always wonderful. I felt like I was in good hands.
As soon as I was able to feel my daughter move, I wondered what position she was in. At our labor class at the birth center (taught by a nurse/doula), I asked the instructor if she would be able to tell what position the baby was in by feeling my belly. I felt hiccups down low and assumed that’s where her head was.
She confidently felt my belly and said “yes— her feet are here…this is her back…and her head is here.” (Exactly where I thought it was)
“Whoah! I would not have thought that this was her feet! It doesn’t feel like feet! I thought that was her butt!”
We laughed and I mentioned that her “feet” were always in the same position. She encouraged pelvic tilts and movement to get the baby kicking around more.
At my next midwife appointment I asked the same question. “Can you tell what position she’s in by just feeling my belly?”
My favorite midwife felt around and confirmed her head was down where I thought it was and her back/butt was where the other lady said her feet were. This made more sense to me and was in line with what I thought. I continuously felt hiccups very low so I was confident that she was head down. Every appointment I had confirmed this.
At my 36 week appointment (where I was almost 37 weeks), there was a bedside ultrasound machine in the room. I had only done two ultrasounds: a dating scan at around 12 weeks and a detailed ultrasound at 22 weeks.
“It’s so fun that I get to do this!” I told the midwife. She mentioned that they do this at 36 weeks mainly to show moms they know what they’re doing and to confirm the baby’s position.
She felt my belly and said “yep she’s definitely head down.” She got the machine ready and was explaining that they do this because if during birth they discover the baby is breech and the mom has to be transferred, they’ll know that the baby turned after they confirmed position and it wouldn’t be something they missed.
I had already began doing my labor prep exercises at this point, excited for all that was to come.
She’s gliding the ultrasound wand around my belly. She starts low, then slowly moves up. She chuckled softly, like a nervous laugh. “Oh, this baby is breech”
Shock. Confusion. “Wait, what?”
“She’s breech. This is her head”
All along, what we thought was her head was her butt and vise versa.
She put the wand down, wiped my belly, helped me up and immediately went into next steps.
“We’ll get you scheduled for an ECV at the hospital. You’ll need to go with a hospital bag prepped because you could go into labor and need an emergency c-section. That’s the worst case scenario and super rare”
She explains to me what an ECV is and I ask if there is anything else I can do to encourage her to flip before automatically doing this procedure. She directs me to spinning babies website and says we’d need to schedule the ECV sooner rather than later but gave me a few days to try to get her to flip.
I’m still processing that my baby is breech. We’re so close to the “finish” line.
She tells me that she’s been doing this for over thirty years and this is her first missed breech. “Wait til I tell the other midwives” she laughs.
I get home, cry, and immediately go on the spinning babies website. Time to get to work. I buy the breech baby e-book and prepare everything I need for the exercises.
I did all the exercises over and over again. No change in movement. We did it all.
The ECV didn’t sit well with me. This is when they manually flip the baby from outside the belly. I believe the typical success rate is 50%.
I didn’t want to do the ECV. My next appointment was with my favorite midwife and I told her that I didn’t want to do it. She asked me why and I explained my reasons and she encouraged me to follow my gut, but recommended I keep the appointment at least to consult with the doctor and see the ultrasound. She insisted I could just keep the appointment and decide then and there if I wanted to proceed or not.
I kept the appointment and Emerson came with me. At this point we were open to the ECV but really wanted to see what the situation looked like via ultrasound and see if we were even good candidates for this in the first place. The hospital was so beautiful and the nurse was so nice. I explained to her that I wasn’t sure that I wanted to even do the procedure.
The doctor came in and checked everything out via ultrasound. He couldn’t see the cord and confirmed there wasn’t much fluid to work with and that I wasn’t an ideal candidate but it was worth a try.
Emerson and I both had an unsettling feeling and agreed that it was not worth a try. So many people told me “don’t worry my baby flipped literally at the last moment”. I told him I didn’t want to proceed and would just continue trying to make room for her to flip naturally and if that didn’t happen then I’d come in for a c section. He said that we should get scheduled for the c section because the baby was not going to flip and recommend getting in the books for 40 weeks. His bedside manner left much to be desired but I actually had a feeling that she would indeed not flip.
I told him I wanted to wait to go into labor (as per my midwife’s recommendation) and he said “Why? Then we’re going to be doing your c-section at like 3 am.”
He then said I could just call and schedule myself.
Here I was about 2 weeks from my due date needing to come up with a different plan. My midwife recommended I wait until going into labor because contractions are what help expel fluid from the baby’s lungs. She told me that they couldn’t force me to schedule anything and couldn’t turn me away if I show up in labor.
The more I thought about it, while I wanted to go into labor naturally (literally was my plan from the beginning), I reasoned that if I was going to need surgery, I’d rather have it scheduled. This way, there’s a team of medical professionals who hopefully got a good night of rest and will be ready to tackle their day knowing they have a c-section on their schedule.
The back and forth to get it scheduled was a doozy but alas – on the books for January 22. 40 weeks and 2 days gestation.
January 22, 2024 was hands down the best day of my life. Far (very, very far) from what I envisioned/wanted my birth plan to be, but an absolutely incredible experience nonetheless.
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