Part I.
Half an hour of Mark timing the contractions, and we can see they're three to five minutes apart, forty seconds long. Mark calls V___ to give her a "heads up." She tells us to call back when we are sure we need her, or when they're a minute long. After hanging up, I burst into tears. I can't quite articulate my frustration. I thought we were calling her because we were sure it was time for the midwife to come. I want someone else to make the decision for me. I am tired of hoping every night that the baby will come. I am scared and tense and I can't figure out why. The contractions aren't particularly strong — I can breathe gently through them, they don't take my whole attention — but I feel short of breath, panicky.
"Do you want to try getting in the tub?" Mark suggests. "A hot shower?" I tell him no through my tears.
Mark calls Hannah. I am so glad that he does; I didn't want to wake her up yet, but I'm glad Mark has decided to. He describes what's going on and tells her I'm feeling scared. He hands me the phone.
"Hello," I say and am glad to hear her voice asking how I'm doing. I tell her how tense I am. On the other end, I can hear her searching for the right thing to say or to suggest.
"Can you maybe find something to help calm yourself down?" she asks. "Maybe get a cup of tea? Or take a hot bath?"
The hot bath is suddenly appealing. "Yes — yes, I'll do that," I say. "I'm just going to try to, I don't know, to get a little bit more grounded." I return the phone to Mark.
The sound of the water pouring into the tub attracts me, draws me into the bathroom. I think of soaking in the deep tub, in the hot water, and start to shiver. Some rational part of me takes note of the shivering, which won't seem to stop. The contractions keep coming while the tub is filling, and they are still not long, but I am still anxious. I am cold, cold, shaking. I know I have to call V____ and Hannah, and get them over here, soon.
So we call V____ and Mark puts me on. I am still nervous and tense and worried about calling her over too soon, and at the same time — "V___," I tell her, "the contractions still aren't very long and they still aren't very intense, but…"
I search for the words that will tell her "Come" without saying "Come."
"…Uh, this kind of feels like transition to me."
"I'll come," she says. There. Good. That did it.
And naming it has done something to me, too: I knew what the shaking was, all along, I knew what the tension was, all along. Not early labor but middle labor: transition.
The tub is running cold water now, all out of hot, so I turn it off. I ask Mark to call Hannah and tell her to come over. I grasp the handlebar and step into the tub; I don't feel like taking off my nightgown so I tuck it up, turning it into a twisty sort of bra-top, and settle down into the water. Hands and knees seems like a good idea for dealing with the contractions, so that's where I stay.
Odd, that. I don't sink down into the tub and let the water immerse my hips and abdomen. I stay on hands and knees. But I feel so much better, mentally. It's as if getting in the tub has centered me in myself and given me something firm to grasp. Or maybe, it occurs to me later, the calmness comes from the decision to call V____ to our house at last. The shakiness is gone and my breathing starts to turn more normal. Mark comes back from downstairs where he had gone to unlock the front door; he sits with me and puts his hand on my back. I breathe through the contractions, which have not changed at all even now that I am in the hot water. "Do you need more water?" he asks. "Should I turn up the water heater?" I tell him no. I don't need it hot, just warm. I don't need it deeper, this is fine. I don't need the water to give me pain relief; the pain is really not so bad. I just need to be kneeling in the water, that's all. I got in the water and the shaking went away, and that's enough.
We hear the door open downstairs; V____ is here. Some bustle ensues in some part of the house, and then here she is in my bathroom. There are some questions about where the birth supplies are — "They're all in the second bedroom," I say, and then have to give more detailed directions, and am irritated with myself for not having showed Mark explicitly where everything is. The goldenseal is in the same ziploc bag with the rest of the herbs. The crockpot is downstairs in the kitchen of course. The chux pads are in the big cardboard box. The spare sheets for the bed are in the clean trash bag in the laundry basket, stacked and in order. They're all RIGHT THERE. It seems as if there are not quite enough people around, because I am trying to be in labor here, and I am getting fed up and wondering if I am going to have to haul myself out of the tub and go unpack the birth supplies MYSELF.
(What's going on, of course, is that there is a bit of a hurry. I'm not all that far away from giving birth.)
V___ has called J____ , I learn, and that makes me glad too. Mark sits by me a while as I breathe through the contractions. They hurt, but not terribly, coming and going like the proverbial waves. A bit ragged on the edges, with a sharpness at the end, but not so bad. The lower back pain that everyone warned me about, with the posterior baby, has gone away. These are just like the ordinary sort of contractions. Perhaps the hard part hasn't started yet.
I remain on hands and knees, or on knees leaning against the tub edge. Once I try sitting down, so I can be deeper in the water, and i know that's a mistake as soon as the contraction starts, and I laugh through gritted teeth and mutter "Wrong position!" — I can't really move until it's over, but as soon as it is over I turn back over.
No, I don't need the water hotter. No, I don't need the water deeper. this is fine.
The hard part is not happening in my body, but in my mind. It is a vague underlying panic and a sense that something isn't quite right somewhere – seems to be wrapped up in the birth supplies not being all ready, Hannah not here yet; I should be downstairs showing everyone where everything is, I should have laid it all out for Mark to see so he would know, and of course it would be so much easier if I could just go take care of everything myself… or when Hannah gets here, she will be able to show V___ where everything is…
Mark is saying to me that he wants to go downstairs for a few minutes, to help V____ with something, maybe. I tell him "I'll be okay for a few minutes by myself." He gets up and then I am alone.
As the next contraction starts, I think: This is going to be something big — I hope I really am okay! And just then I feel a very soft thump, not deep inside, and I know instantly what it is. "Water!" I yelp, and I put my hands against the tub to shove myself up to standing. I hear Mark's feet pounding up the stairs, and I look down and see a few little chunks of brown meconium in the tub wa
ter. Amniotic fluid is flowing gently out of me. My head clears immediately.
"My water broke," I tell Mark, and we are able to grin at each other. Now we are sure we will have our baby tonight. Now I know what is going to happen. I'm still worried about the posterior position, but it's pretty clear now that I'm staying here in my home, that I'm having my baby here and now, and I am suddenly grounded.
I am standing in the water in a wet nightgown (though I notice I am no longer shaky and "cold"). I strip the nightgown off and Mark brings me a basket of clean laundry so I can choose a dry shirt. I know which one I want, the orange, stripey, over-large maternity tee. I climb out, put the shirt on; I lean on Mark for a couple more contractions. No more bath. I don't need it now.
To be continued…
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