Little Liam

This picture was taken at our home, the day after Liam was born.

Liam Patrick Carter was born Sept. 2, 2012 at 11:43pm. He weighed 7lb 7oz and was 20inches long.  I was due Sept. 12th/13th, but had felt that he would come a little early. Honestly, though, I thought he might be only a couple of days early, not a week and a half, especially since Otto was 2 days late! He certainly had different plans, though. :)

We had decided to utilize The Birth Center in Murray, which is just a few minutes away from where we live. The more I went to my prenatal appointments, the more I appreciated the midwives', Becky and Adrienne, knowledge and their willingness to make the birth a family-centered, intimate experience. I also really appreciated their openness and gratitude for modern medicine and their non-judgmental attitudes. They really allow you to make your own decisions, providing you with educational material, and respecting those decisions. Anyway, The Birth Center is what we chose. (As a disclaimer - I am really grateful for modern medicine  and I don't feel that every woman will be able to or want to birth this way, but I do feel that many could birth this way if they were informed and chose to. Also, Otto was born in a hospital, with an epidural, and I don't regret it at all. That being said, I wanted to try something different, and I'm grateful Eric supported this decision and that we were able to make it work.)

Now on to the birth story... (This may be long, but I'll try to keep it shorter.)

Contractions (or surges for those of you with Hypnobirthing or other natural birthing training... haha) began during the night on Saturday (Sept 1st) and woke me up about every half hour. The next day they subsided a little so I went to church with the boys and sat in nursery the whole time, having contractions about every half hour. Contractions were coming sporadically after that, but generally were happening no more than half an hour apart. Eric's parents had invited us for dinner and we were planning to have breakfast with my siblings Monday morning to celebrate Bryce's birthday. The thought crossed my mind that perhaps these contractions were just practice labor and could stop, but we prepared for things to continue, just in case. We went down to Springville (45 minutes from Murray) as soon as we could after church to relax with Eric's family. We ate dinner (which, I think I ate maybe 4000 calories between Saturday night and Sunday night... probably not, but I felt like I had an insatiable appetite) and enjoyed watching "Shakiest Gun in the West" with Don Knotts... one of my family's favorites growing up. It's a silly movie. After eating and visiting (all the while tracking my sporadic contractions on Eric's iPhone app), we went to stay the night at my dad's house. We got Otto ready for bed (it was about 9pm at this point) and I had to go to the bathroom. While sitting there, my water broke (boy, I'm lucky!). It didn't leak until I stood up, but we had prepared by bringing towels. We loaded back into the car, called Eric's parents (to have them stay with Otto at our house since he didn't want to stay at their house... he knew his little brother was coming!), and my contractions were coming more intensely and consistently (about 5-6 minutes apart), I think.

While on the road, we called Becky and told her we'd like to check into the birthing center. She mentioned that active labor doesn't usually begin until about 2 hours after the water breaking (especially since my contractions were inconsistent up to this point) and let us decide whether or not we actually wanted to check in, which we decided to go ahead and do. We dropped Otto off at home (he fell asleep in the car and transfers easily) with Eric's parents meeting us there, and then checked into the birthing center at about 10:40pm. My contractions were very heavy by this point and Becky could easily see I was in active labor. She didn't even measure me, but just checked the baby's heartbeat with the ultrasound, then got to preparing my IV (I was Group B Strep positive again so we administered an antibiotic to protect the baby). I tried relaxing on the birthing ball which didn't relieve anything really. There was a LOT of pressure and I kept thinking "I really don't want to feel that down there!" but then I would think "He's coming! YES!"

Eric was so supportive, giving me positive feedback and trying to keep me as comfortable and relaxed as possible (utilizing techniques we learned in our Hypnobirthing class as well as improvising a bit). He was also extremely responsive to my orders (yeah, I get kind of bossy during labor), which was so sweet to see. He also kept extremely calm (there were a couple of frantic light-touch massage moments, that he quickly changed to slow, calm massage), which is something I have always admired about him. Quiet humility and calmness; two attributes that I absolutely love about him. During the birthing ball labor, Becky was trying to put in my IV (my veins love to roll in moments like this), succeeded and administered the antibiotic, while Adrianna, the birthing assistant, was filling the tub because I had mentioned I would love to labor there. I still didn't know for sure if I would like to deliver the baby there because I was a little uncertain about how clean I would feel, but I knew labor would feel better in warm water. Between contractions, Eric helped me over to and into the tub. As soon as my legs were in the tub, I felt immediately more relaxed. As I sat down, it was WAY better in the tub and I was better able to allow my body to finish it's job of getting little Liam out. That was all my body needed and about 2-3 contractions later I said, "I want to push!" I had definitely never felt that sensation and didn't really expect it to come so clearly. I was so ready to just get him out in one giant push, but thankfully Becky and Adrianna encouraged me to take it a little slower so that I didn't tear. I used as much control as I could muster, while Eric stroked my hair, and I pushed Liam's head out. Then I kind of relaxed a little and felt Liam inside of me, also working to get out; he kicked about 3-4 little kicks that I felt. I smiled and told Eric, Becky, and Adrianna what I felt. It was absolutely awesome. Then, they told me it was time to push him out, so I consciously pushed again and then lifted him out of the water onto my chest. He was born at 11:43pm, about an hour after checking in. They put a warm towel on Liam while Eric poured warm water over him to keep him warm while the cord was pulsating (lasting about 15 or so minutes). Eric cut the cord then and was able to hold Liam while I finished up. Eric helped me out and then we were able to rest with the baby and nurse him a while. Becky and Adrianna checked in on us every once in a while and took care of me, but otherwise, we were left to rest. We left the birthing center at about 4:15 or 4:30am to rest at home. We were able to go home, tell Eric's parents about it and then rest in our own bed, allowing Liam to do the things newborns do best; sleep, eat, and poop. :)

The experience was truly beautiful. I'm not saying it wasn't hard. But it really was beautiful and I am grateful to have shared the experience with my sweetheart and the wonderful ladies at The Birth Center. We can't fully express our gratitude and happiness. It was empowering to know that we could do this as a team, utilizing The Birth Center staff and our own tools from Hypnobirthing that had prepared us along the way. It was also a completely different mentality delivering at The Birth Center. I'm not gonna lie, we loved our doctor and the experience we had at LDS Hospital. I probably would not have sought out an alternative if we had not had circumstances in our lives change.  In spite of the positive experience we had with Otto's birth, we felt much more like an informed family working through natural labor instead of being set up to be the "best" patients possible.

Eric & Liam dosing at The Birth Center

Jacquie relishing the fact that he's here

When Otto woke up the next morning, Eric's parents were resting on the couch and Otto went up to Silly Grandpa and said, "Grandpa! The baby came out!"  He then went into our room (I had just finished feeding Liam), sat next to us, gingerly held out his hand to touch Liam's chest and almost reverently said, "He's so cute!" Then he went to play and eat breakfast as if it were any regular day. :)

Kisses from big brother

Sept. 3, 2012

Liam is a sweet boy and seems pretty easygoing. He is getting nursing down and sleeping the way a newborn does. He's healthy and giggles and smiles while sleeping, which we love.  He endures Otto's constant smothering love or when Otto wakes up Liam "so he can look at me" (meaning look at Otto). Haha. Otto is continually asking why Liam is sleeping and he is excited to help change diapers, get mommy a burp cloth, or whatever he can do to help. Otto is worried for him when he cries and will make the "shhhh" sound to try to help calm him. One day, he even ran into the house with daddy to hear Liam crying and said, "The baby needs me!" then dashed into the room to Liam's aid. It's fun to see him act the big brother part and it seems to help when he's in a somewhat selfish mood to have someone else to look after and worry about. My recovery has been amazing; much faster than I expected and I'm feeling great.  Dealing with two little ones is wonderful and a challenge all at the same time; it will take getting used to and yet it's somewhat natural already.

We are so blessed and grateful for a healthy baby!