Noah's Birth Story

Hey everybody! Guess what? We had our baby!

Noah Archibald Page 

was born March 20th, at 6:01 pm!

He weighed 7lbs, 3 ounces and

measured 21 inches long!

The following is our birth story. If you'd prefer not to read details about an unassisted labor and delivery, feel free to skip this post. If you're game, read on!

Our's is a unique journey, bringing little Noah into the world. I got pregnant sooner than planned after our first son, Silas, while still breastfeeding. With Silas, I had very few prenatal visits; with Noah, I monitored my health and progress entirely. We didn't get any tests or scans done at all, so of course we didn't know we had another son until delivery!

The day before Noah was born, I decided to go shopping. I took Silas with me and we did a lot of walking and cart-pushing. I'm sure that helped move things along. I had already been feeling some pressure lower down than usual and suspected baby had dropped.

At about 5 am the next morning, Silas woke up and so I pulled him into bed with us and nursed him a little, as was our habit. Shortly after placing him back in his crib, I began feeling contractions, not very intense, but about 5-8 minutes apart. They didn't subside after two hours, despite a trip to the bathroom, a sip of water, and repositioning in bed. I couldn't go back to sleep after that, because I was getting excited; was today the day??

Throughout the morning the contractions came and went, some close together, some farther apart, some lasting only a few seconds, some longer. I remembered that it had been pointless to time the contractions with Silas, because they were sporadic and didn't follow a regular, progressively more intense pattern, like all the books tell you they're supposed to. It was going about the same this time...at least at first. At some point, I think somewhere around 2 pm, the contractions started feeling pretty unpleasant, and I gave Neal the go-ahead to run a warm bath, as I was planning on birthing in water, as I had done with Silas.

I sat in the bath for awhile, got out for awhile, then got back in. Between baths, Neal checked dilation and determined I was dilated about 7 or 8 centimeters. Almost as soon as I got back in the tub, my water broke and things ramped up a bit. It was around 5 pm and the contractions seemed (as they do at that point in active labor) unmanageably painful. I could feel baby in the birth canal, and had an irresistible urge to push with each contraction. It felt like baby could start crowning any moment and because I couldn't find a way to sit in the tub that felt right for birthing the baby, I decided to get out again and made my way to our bedroom.

Things progressed really rapidly after that. We stripped the bed and laid down a lot of clean towels. I got up on the bed and stayed there, on all-fours. Baby came a few minutes later, after several big pushes.

my boys! 

The "fourth stage" of labor went a little differently than expected. In retrospect, I think I should have tried to do some uterine massage and perhaps try to walk around a bit, because I retained the placenta longer than usual. Although I was breastfeeding Noah, he wasn't eating vigorously, and my after-birth contractions tapered off pretty fast. We were a little concerned, but I wasn't bleeding heavily, so we decided to wait. It was actually about 4 hours later that the placenta was birthed, and it took a warm shower and me reaching in and stretching the cervix a bit for it to happen. The placenta was intact (not fragmented) so we cleaned up and just made sure to monitor things closely for the next few hours. Everything checked out fine. 

I delivered Noah, unassisted, in only about 4 hours of active labor (do people usually count the "easy" part, pre-labor?) and with no tearing! We're really happy with our birth experience and so grateful for another healthy pregnancy and birth with no complications.

And we're in love with our brand new baby boy! He is the sweetest, prettiest baby. We're enjoying our "babymoon" for now, knowing the newborn stage is going to go by in the blink of an eye. But we're also looking forward to all the crazy, brotherly shenanigans the two monsters are sure to get into as they grow up together! It's sure going to be an adventure being an all-boy mom, but I think I'm up for the challenge!