From Walmart to Baby in 19 minutes
5/10/04
By Jenni Blankenship
My first birth was at my mom's birth center. I had a three and a half hour labor and ten minute pushing stage. We thought my second birth would be similarly short, but had no idea how short it would be! I was having some very, very light contractions around 11:45 p.m. on May 10th - the same day my sister Tiffany had delivered her baby. I decided to go to Walmart to buy some supplies as they were about fifteen minutes apart, nothing big, and I wasn't tired.
I bought some of the essentials I would need and was back in the baby department at 1:10 am when things PICKED UP QUICK!!! I went from contractions every fifteen minutes, that I barely noticed, to my first "real" contraction at 1:10 am. The next one was at 1:13a.m., and I felt a distinct change and decided I'd better check out and get home. I had another contraction at 1:16 am and another when checking out. My receipt says it was 1:20 a.m. when I checked out. Two more on the way home, and I walked in the door at home at 1:28 a.m. and told my sister I'd been contracting for fifteen minutes and she needed to wake up mom! I turned on the roman tub in my bathroom while my mom got up. She walked in and I said, "I think the baby is coming soon!" My mom looked down and saw a huge bulging bag of water. Her eyes were priceless! She told Tiffany to call her midwife friend down the road, and went to get her birth supplies.
My mom’s midwife friend walked in at 1:35 a.m. and I remember looking over at my sister, Tiffany, nursing her newborn and taking pictures of me with one hand. My mom checked me (the first and only time) and declared the baby was just inside. A minute later, my water broke, and my beautiful baby girl, Sadie Rose, slid out, with no effort, into my mom's waiting hands. It was 1:39 a.m., just 29 minutes from my first contraction. My sister lovingly looked down at me and said with a huge smile on her face, "I hate you". Everyone in the room burst out laughing. My mom couldn't stop smiling. Two grandbabies in 22 hours and 35 minutes.
This is birthing at its best: believing in birth, believing in the process, knowing that birth is a normal life condition and not an illness, being surrounded by people you trust and love, who comfort you and empower you to believe that you can do anything. To me, that is what birth with a midwife is all about!