Paiges Story

So in the interest of time I'll try and make this quick and easy to read!

For those who don't know...we decided to have this baby at our home with midwives. I have to admit the initial reason we even considered it was because we don't have maternity coverage on our insurance but the more we educated ourselves the more we were sure that this was something we wanted and felt confident about doing! Honestly, even if an actual home birth is something you would never do yourself, there are three things that I did during this pregnancy that I wish I would have done with Emery and that I think every pregnant woman should do during her own pregnancy

1. Prenatal Yoga

2. Read Ina May's Guide to Childbirth

(it gets pretty granola but still very informative and empowering)

3. Watch The Business of Being Born

now onto the story...

Friday November 12

10:00 am had an appointment with the midwives to have my membranes stripped. When we got there I was dilated to a 4 and 90% effaced but still needed a little help telling my body to release that oxytocin to get things going so she stripped me and said to get walking.

12:00 pm Morgan and I met my mom, Annie (who had Emery with her while we were at the appointment) and Courtney at Sams Club so I could walk while my mom did her shopping. Started having some contractions but I figured they were just cramps from having been stripped

2:00 pm came home to put emery down for a nap, we laid down for a little bit too but I couldn't really get comfortable so we got up and did some stuff around the house...dishes, laundry, watered the flowers etc...

4:30 pm my mom, Annie and her two kiddos come over to hang some china plates i'd been wanting to hang. We worked on a puzzle Annie brought with her and timed contractions. 3ish minutes apart by now but not quite lasting a minute

5:00 pm contractions were getting harder...I decided to give the midwives a call to keep them updated. They said to get to bed early and call when they get more intense

5:30 pm I decided it was time for Annie to take the kids and go to my parents for the evening...we sent Emery with her pj's thinking she'd either sleep there or have Annie sneak her into bed sometime in the late evening

6:10 pm by now the contractions started to change...and when I say change I mean hurt...oh wow, they hurt (come to find out I was in transition) so Morgan called the midwives and let them know

6:45 pm midwives got to our house (thank the heavens) I was complete and ready to push!! My water hadn't broken yet so she broke it and I started pushing

7:14 pm out she came!! And we became a family of four. Words cannot describe the feeling...

8:00 pm Emery got to meet her baby sister

We are totally in love with our new little girl...and so grateful to our amazing midwives who got her here safely :)