the birth of sam

He's here! After a much awaited arrival little Samuel Fenimore Ahl has made his appearance and he is one BIG kid. He came last night at 9:16 p.m. weighing 9 lbs 13 oz and 20 1/2 inches long. The most impressive part, he has a 14 inch head. That was fun to push out.

Here's how the day progressed.

Our plan was to start some herbs 10 a.m. Around 8:30 a.m. I started to go into labor naturally. It was slow but at least I knew we wouldn't have to work at making it start which gave me some relief.

Ellie checked me at 10:30 and my fore bag of waters had broken and I was already 6 cm. I hadn't even had any real contractions at this point so I felt encouraged that this labor would progress quickly.

Around 11 everyone started to arrive. I had an amazing group of women that I'll call the "birth team". My midwives, Ellie and Heather, the apprentice Jenny, my friend Angela and my mom. Dave of course is part of this team too but my husband doesn't do well watching me in pain. In fact at one point during pushing he said that he might have to go outside and "punch something". He's happy to surrender a first post position to a group of women helping me to labor through the pain.

Let the party begin. My mom arrived with tons of food and magazines. We watched TV and relaxed until the real labor began around 4 ish. It was perfect. I loved having people distract me and joke around with me during those early contractions. I couldn't have asked for anything better.

Around 4 hard labor started to kick in. I got in the birth tub and it started to slow down. Right before I had gotten in I was at 9 cm and felt really optomistic but something happened to make me think that things had slowed. I have as yet to give birth in the tub so I felt like I should get out and labor elsewhere. What happened, which my midwives didnt' tell me, which I'm glad that they didn't, was that he flipped posterior and took me back to 6 cm.

I got out and took another 3 hours to progress back to 10 cm and pushing. It was alot of pushing on my back and rocking in a standing position.

I tried to remain positive but I have to say at this point I was falling apart a bit. I felt discouraged and overwhelmed. I had in my head that this baby would make his appearance quicker than the other two. I didn't think it would be 2 hours but I thought maybe 5 or so. So I had to adjust my expectations and muster up strength to go the distance.

At 8:30 I was finally complete and felt like pushing. With Lily I only pushed 3 times, so this couldn't be that much longer right?....wrong.

A few minutes into pushing I knew this wasn't the same. My fear was that it was going to be like Eloise (3 1/2 hours of pushing). I started to lose all motivation. Thankfully I had great women around me cheering me on.

Here's why it was taking so long. This little boy was presenting posterior. At one point I made the statement, "I feel like I'm breaking in half". Finally at the last minute he flipped anterior (the right way). After 45 minutes of pushing the little guy finally made his appearance.

I cried many tears of joy but more tears of relief. I was done. I was crying so hard I didn't even notice this little slimmy person laying on my belly for 10 minutes.

It was an amazing birth experience and I appreciate the women who attended me, my husband who supported me, and my family that cheered me on. It is great to finally be holding this little baby in my arms. We are all happy baby Sam is here.

I'll post pictures soon.