hanaa has arrived

Hanaa Lynn Baldwin was born December 29, 2008 at 3:13am.

I had originally decided not to post this, but changed my mind.

Here is the story:

I have never been one to have a detailed birth plan just because flexibility is so key in every birth. If I had written one though, it would be a whole lot like Hanaa's birth. I am still in shock at how everything just came together.

I started having some mild contractions around 10:30 pm. I decided they were in fact contractions around 11:15 and called Toni (my midwife) although I still wasn't sure they would amount to anything. Because of Molly's precipitous birth, I was under strict orders to call sooner rather than later. Toni agreed to come over and arrived around 11:35.

While we were waiting for her to arrive, Marc and I set up the birthing pool.

She listened to the baby's heartbeat, and checked me. I was 3-4 centimeters. Toni suggested I get up and walk around, and she would hang around for a few hours and see if anything developed. I made cinnamon buns and folded some laundry, then Toni and I started a game of scrabble, and sent Marc to bed for a nap.

While I was walking around, contractions were coming about every 3-4 minutes, lasting less than a minute and were not very intense, but not something I would be able to sleep through. When I sat down for scrabble, the contractions came less often. Around 1:30 am something changed. Now, quite possibly it was because Toni had just used the Q on the triple word score, but I found I couldn't concentrate on the game anymore. Toni had another listen to the baby and checked me again. I was at 6 centimeters with a bulging bag of waters. She agreed that tonight was the night, and called the second midwife (Kelly) to come. We woke up Marc and started filling the pool.

Waiting for the pool to be ready seemed to take hours, but I probably climbed in around 1:45. Kelly arrived around 2. I had Marc put on the music I had chosen. The water felt so good. I laboured for an hour while Marc sat beside the pool. Toni and Kelly retreated to the couch and visited quietly. Toni checked the baby's heartbeat every 15 or 20 minutes.

As the song "Down to the River" came on, the contractions became definitely more intense and I felt like each one opened me up just a little bit more. I started to whimper. Around 3:05, we heard the pitter patter of Noah's feet, so Marc went and put him back to bed. As he was coming back down the stairs around 3:10, I felt the baby come down and my water broke followed by an urge to push. I said something like "oh" and during this first push felt the urge to push even more so I just kept going. Toni told me to put my hands down and catch the baby. At the end of that one monumental push, her head was out, and another small push and she came swimming out. Hanaa Lynn Baldwin was born at 3:13 am.

Everyone in the room was astonished.

The only scary part of the birth was the discovery of a true knot in her cord, although it was a loose one.

Even though she was born so quickly, I didn't tear at all, which was awesome!

Hanaa weighed in at 7 pounds and 6 ounces and was 20.5 inches long (Molly's exact stats).

So, there it is. It all went according to plan. Home birth, water birth, in the middle of the night while the kids slept through (more or less).

I am still in a bit of shock. I am so grateful for this beautiful experience and think my midwives are of course the best ever!