Declan’s birth story

A pregnancy that ends at the beginning of the year feels very very long. And for my third baby, with a due date only a few days after the new year, time moved so slowly.

In my womb, my precious baby boy took slowness to heart. He hardly ever kicked me. He just slowly stretched his legs and arms. I’d feel the pressing against my belly. As I got closer to my due date. I’d rock my daughter before bed each night, and she’d feel him moving. “Baby brother?” she’d say before kissing my belly. Oh, the sweetness of time moving slowly.

This first month postpartum has moved slowly too. And yet it has gone by in a blur of baby cries and diapers, stolen snuggles with the older two toddlers, and nights dimly lit by a tiny lamp. I am writing this while nursing my third baby (no small feat), savoring another slow moment within the blur of being a mom of three.

Once we made it past Christmas and New Year’s Day I felt pretty ready to meet our newest addition. His due date was January 4th, and I thought it would be really sweet if he was born either on the 12th day of Christmas or epiphany. But I was prepared for him to come later. I don’t like getting my hopes up for a timely baby because I don’t want to get too antsy if they’re “late.”

On Sunday, the due date, we skipped church and worshipped at home. We took the kids on a walk at a local park, as I tried to get some exercise in case it helped labor get going. I had no real hopes of going into labor that day, but you never know!

That night I texted my sister and mother that “nothing was happening.” I planned on grocery shopping with my sister the next morning. But Declan had other plans. I went to bed close to eleven pm and after about an hour I’d had a few contractions. They felt stronger than the Braxton hicks ones I’d felt for the last week but were still very far apart. I texted my sister at midnight that I might not make it to our grocery shopping outing. But that my plan was to sleep it off because “I am not ready for this baby to come yet.”

I truly did not feel mentally prepared for him to come that day. But as time went on I realized the contractions were not going to go away. I still hadn’t gotten any sleep, and they were getting more frequent and more intense. By 2am I was convinced, so I woke my husband and asked him to time a couple for me. They were about six minutes apart, but were strong, and since my previous two labors were six hours and three and a half hours… my husband insisted we call the midwife and start making our way to the hospital.

On the way to the hospital my three year old son couldn’t stop talking about how he was going to go to a sleepover at grandma and grandpa’s house.

“They have two many beds!” he told his sister. (He says “two many” whenever there are two of something)My parents met us there, and took our kids for the long awaited sleepover.

I felt pretty chipper in between contractions. They were strong but they weren’t hard to manage, and the hospital was quick to get us admitted. When we got to the delivery room, we met our nurse, a lovely lady named Katie, who remarked about how I seemed in good spirits. And I was! So far the pain was very manageable. She got me hooked up to the monitor so we could check baby’s heart rate, which meant I had to stay on or near the bed for a bit. My midwife came and checked me and I was about 4-5 cm dilated, which was about where I expected. My husband and I had tried to get to the hospital BEFORE I was too close to transition this time, so I was glad we’d accomplished that. It was nice to get settled into the hospital room before labor really ramped up.

It ramped up pretty quickly, but Declan was not behaving for the monitor so I was hooked up to it for almost an hour. His heart rate was fine, he was just sleeping!! Can you believe that? It cracks me up to think about it now because he really is the chillest baby. Nothing really phases him. Not even a contracting uterus apparently. They brought me some cold juice to help get him to stir a bit. After a while they felt comfortable with his readings and let me walk around the room and labor how I wanted.

I’ll be honest, the whole time up to this point everything really felt surreal. I had so much space between contractions that I was thinking “is it really going to be this easy?” My midwife probably noticed me dissociating because she asked me what I was thinking about. I told her I wasn’t sure anything was happening. She laughed and said that based on how intense my contractions were getting, she was certain this was “the real deal.” I still felt like the whole thing was so surreal. I was also exhausted from not having gotten any sleep beforehand, so that definitely was contributing to my mental state.

After a little while longer of stronger more painful contractions, my midwife began to fill the tub for me. I chose this hospital because they allowed a water birth, but wasn’t sure if I wanted to actually give birth in the tub. I wanted to play it by ear. When she asked if I wanted to get in, I was torn. I wanted the relief of the tub, but was worried it would slow down my progress.

My midwife offered to break my waters if I wanted to be guaranteed a quick labor in the tub, but the idea of speeding things up also didn’t sound appealing. I was still hesitant about having this baby. I could feel a mental block about transitioning to the pushing stage, like I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to do it. I tried to focus on being present, but I still felt a bit disconnected. After another strong contraction I got in the tub for some relief. The water was perfect and it did help a bit, but mostly when paired with counter pressure. My husband played some worship music for me, which was very soothing. I labored in the tub for several contractions, but told the nurse and my midwife that I didn’t feel like I was progressing much. I joked that Declan was too comfy and not interested in coming out. I did a few more contractions in the tub, feeling a lot more pressure but still knowing I needed something else to help my body progress to transition. My midwife and the nurse helped me out of the tub. I was very sad to get out.

My midwife is the best ever. She’s incredible at what she does, and is such a calm presence during labor and always knows what needs to be done. But I was not happy about heeding her advice. When I got out of the tub, she said I should come sit on the birth stool to help get the baby lower.

I knew what the birth stool meant. It meant relaxing completely, allowing the baby to descend. It meant accepting that he was going to arrive whether I liked it or not. It meant the hard work of pushing a baby out. When she suggested the stool, I wanted to cry. But I did what she suggested because I knew she was right.

If you’ve never sat on a birth stool near the end stages of labor I really don’t know how to describe the feeling. When I sat down, I felt the most intense pressure I’d felt so far. I tried to relax my body, and told my midwife I wasn’t very happy with her idea. Then came the contractions. They were so intense. I was having a hard time relaxing my body and calming my mind during them. At this point I was so exhausted as well, so between contractions I was just wishing for more rest.

During one really intense contraction I told my birthing team that I wasn’t sure I could do this. My midwife again suggested she could break my water so this could all be over LOL. I told her I didn’t feel comfortable and she suggested checking my progress and then I could decide. I had another big contraction in which I lost my composure and began to panic. Then my midwife counseled me to let her check my progress. She said that knowing how close I was to pushing would help me mentally. If it was close, I’d probably feel relieved. If it was far off, then I’d need to get a grip (my words, not hers). I let her check me and I was almost ten centimeters.

Suddenly my panic made sense. That’s just part of transition. My husband asked what I needed and I told them I felt trapped on this stupid birth stool, so they helped move me to the bed. I felt excited at the prospect of being so close to pushing. I was exhausted and I wanted it to be over. On the bed I could feel the baby descending, and felt the urge to push with my contractions, but it felt like I was going nowhere. I could feel the baby’s head descend as I pushed, but it was like all progress was lost as each contraction ended. I got really frustrated and asked, “is he ever going to come out??”

My midwife felt for his head and showed me how far he was from crowning and I tried one more contraction on the bed. For some reason, pushing was not working for me there, so I asked to move to the birth stool again.

Once I sat on that terrible purple stool, I pushed Declan out in two contractions. About five minutes. My midwife caught him while my husband held my hand. She passed him to me and he didn’t cry right away, so she took him back for a second to get him to yell. Then I held him to my chest and he settled on me. Once I got over the initial shock they moved me to the bed. There I got to cuddle my sweet newborn boy.

As it came time for my husband to cut the cord my midwife noticed that the cord was tied in a true knot. A very rare occurrence that thankfully caused no issues for our sweetie boy. It was at that moment that I knew for sure we would name him Declan. The name means man of prayer. For some reason during our pregnancy, my husband had prayed every night over mine and the baby’s health, specifically the umbilical cord. The true knot felt like a reminder that God listens to our prayers.

My midwife laughed as she noted the time that he was born. “I bet you feel like that was a long labor,” she said. “You got to the room at four am. He was born at 6:20.”

I laughed and said “no way! That felt like five hours at least.” She told me that if I’d waited much longer to come to the hospital I probably would have been in transition in the car. My husband gave me an I-told-you-so smirk.

At this point, our sweet Declan didn’t have a name, so I snuggled him and we tried out our small list of names on him. We wouldn’t officially decide on Declan until the next day. We took our time and enjoyed that first precious day with our son. He behaved like an angel. A sleepy angel swaddled in cotton.

I felt really shocked after giving birth that I had panicked the way I did during transition. Like somehow I’d failed a test. But the recovery after his birth has been the easiest so far. No stitches, my milk came in with no trouble or extra pumping needed, etc. I didn’t expect to feel so good after going through something so hard. But even though I lost control for a minute during the hardest part of labor, God still provided for me.

I mean, just look at this perfect baby, born on the morning of the twelfth day of Christmas: