It was Wednesday night about 9PM and we had a friend over visiting..
he'd asked in the beginning of his visit, wasn't I about due to pop?
and I had said, "Oh, don't worry, if I suddenly go into labor, you'll
most likely have 24 hours or so to get to a safe distance..."  Little
did I know! Anyway, at 9PM I felt a kind of popping twingey feeling
in the general area of my cervix, and thought it peculiar, so I stood
up to go to the bathroom and check it out. While I was walking there,
I felt a short gush of fluid, though not an enormous amount. 

In the bathroom, I dripped some bloody mucus on the toilet seat, and 
found my panties were wet with mucus, and when I wiped I got a big 
glob of what looked like bloody snot... so I figured it must be my
mucus plug! I went out to the living room and told Chad, and we were
both very excited, but knew it could still be quite a while before 
anything happened. 

I called our midwife, Yelena, right away, and left a message.  I
figured I wouldn't worry too much about anything until I felt some
contractions or something, and I sat down and continued to visit
with our friend for a bit until he left. When he did, I paged our
midwife too, just to be sure and let her know things were starting
before it got to be too late in the day.  I also got ahold of my
cousin, who was planning to come down from Oakland for the birth,
and let her know to be ready for me to call and say "Okay, c'mon
down now!"  Yelena called back, and I described everything to her,
and she said it did sound like things were starting to get going, and
it could be tonight, or tomorrow, and we'd pay attention and see.  We
already had everything ready for the home birth, having been eagerly
waiting for it to happen, so Yelena suggested I have something to eat
if I could, and go take a long hot shower, then try to get some sleep.

I watched the clock and timed about 6 contractions which were very
mild, and about 15 minutes apart. Chad made me a big bowl of pasta,
which I wolfed down, I had to urinate after every contraction, and
then we went to take a shower. We spent about a half an hour in the
shower, during which time I had a couple more contractions, which
were a little stronger, and started feeling a fairly strong crampy
feeling in my cervix.  When we got out of the shower, I found another
big glob of mucus with blood in it.

I sat down at the computer for a second or two, waiting for my hair
to dry a bit because I was going to braid it so it'd be out of the
way for labor, since it was definite to me that I was in labor. While
I was at the computer, for about 10 minutes, I had two more contract-
ions, much stronger, and continued to feel crampy. The only place it
seemed to feel any better was sitting on the toilet, so I headed back
there while Chad ran around the house doing a few last-minute things.
After having one really strong contraction on the toilet, which I had
been unable to get through without moaning, I stood up and said I
thought it was time to call Yelena because these contractions seemed
to me to be somewhere between 3 and 5 minutes apart, though I had no
idea how long they were lasting, and that they were strong and not
slowing down or going away.  Chad and I agreed that we should time
some, and see where they went, and if there were 3 of them that were
less than 5 minutes apart, definitely call. He timed the first at
12:01, lasting about 45 seconds, and the second at 12:05 and about
the same length, and said, "Okay, if there's another by 12:10, then
we definitely call."  At 12:09, another one started, and we got the 
phone and called.  I talked to Yelena while resting on my knees and
arms, and she talked me through two more contractions, recommending
making low-pitched moaning noises and trying to slow down my breathing.
She sent over her two assistant midwives, who took about 45 minutes
to arrive.

During that time, I went back and forth from kneeling on the floor,
to sitting on the toilet, to lying on my side on the bed, and the
contractins got closer together and more and more intense. I started
thinking, "Geeze, I know I'm supposed to take it all one contractin
at a time, but if this is just the beginning... this is going to be
hard to do for the better part of a day, or longer, like first labors
tend to be."  I started to be afraid I might not be as tough as I
always like to think I am... after all, pregnancy was much harder
than I had expected!  

By the time Elizabeth arrived, things were definitely hot and heavy.
Chad was following me and helping me from place to place and position
to position, and putting the heating pad wherever I asked him to, like
my tailbone area and lower back, which was sore pretty much constantly,
though sharper with contractions.  Elizabeth had a very hard time with
trying to get my blood pressure, as contractions were closer together 
than the lenght of time it took to do it. Similarly, it was very hard
for her to do an internal check -- it took two tries to do it because
I had a big contraction in the middle. She said my cervix was very soft
and loose, and about 4cm dilated.  I tried to think of that as "almost
halfway," but to be honest, I was afraid I might not be able to cope
with the pain if it kept up like this! I was also very thirsty, and
trying hard to keep drinking liquid.

Elizabeth called Yelena and told her where things were, and Yelena
said to call her back in an hour and update her, and in the meantime
I made a mad dash to the bathroom because I had to pee again, and
ended up stuck on the toilet having more contractions.  I told 
Elizabeth it felt like I had to take the world's largest shit, and
she said to let her know when it felt that way through the entire
contraction.  Peggy, the other assistant midwife, was getting the
bathtub ready for me to get in and soak, things being pretty intense.
I made it back to the bed somehow, and I was there on all fours with
Chad pressing the heating pad to my back, and sometimes falling onto
my side with everyone working to try to help me relax, having a hard
time catching my breath.  I was moaning loud and very low, and next
thing I knew I screamed at the top of my lungs with my face buried in
a pillow. About then my cousin arrived, and Elizabeth wanted to check
me again, but I couldn't roll onto my back.  She managed to check me
while I knelt, and said, "Yep, she's ready! Let's get Yelena here."
They called Yelena and told her she should come, and I felt a dire need
to change my position somehow, and someone suggested perhaps I might
try kneeling with my arms on the foot of the bed, which sounded just
terrific. Somehow I managed to get there, and I was there with my 
face alternately buried in pillows, screaming, and aware that I was
helplessly pushing. 

My cousin managed to have a large cup full of ice, which was great 
because I couldn't catch my breath to drink, and she had a cool
washcloth and was mopping my face and neck with it, which felt just
fantastic, while Chad kept the heating pad on my lower back.  I do
remember one time I said, "I want the heat on my front..." and Chad
moved it there and then I said, "No, no, no, never mind, my back!"
and he put it back.

I can remember thinking, "Oh god, I can't do this!" and saying so,
and Elizabeth said, "Well, you are doing it," and that helped me
enormously.  I think, in retrospect, that was just about the time
Elizabeth checked me and declared me fully dilated and effaced and
ready to push. She told me the baby had lots of hair, she had felt it.

While I was kneeling, they asked me if I wanted to use the birthing
stool Yelena takes everywhere once she arrived, and I said yes. I 
could feel that it was hard to relax fully while I was supporting
myself partly with my legs, and wanted to be able to sit more. I can
remember swearing a lot, and biting Chad's hand at one point, and
telling him I wasn't ever going to do this again, and thinking the
entire world must be trying to come out my ass.  Peggy and Elizabeth
were holding hot compresses on my perineum, and they felt just
fantastic, and helped enormously with relaxing, which was VERY hard.
During one push, someone said she could see the baby's head, and that
if I reached down I could touch it just inside my vagina. I didn't
think I could reach, but I tried, and there it was, I felt it with a
fingertip, all squishy and crinkled feeling with something hard below
the surface.  "It feels squishy and crinkly," I said, and they told
me that was the baby's hair, and there was lots of it.  It didn't
feel like hair.  I don't know what it felt like, but I'll never 
forget it! It was just inside my labia, and I felt such enormous
pressure everywhere in my pelvis, and a slight burning a little deeper
in than I'd felt the head with my fingertips.

Yelena got there and set up the birthing stool, and Chad got behind
it in a chair, and I leaned back against him while I squatted on the
birthing stool.  Yelena squatted down in front of me and kept the hot
compresses on me, and talked me through a couple more pushes, telling
me to relax and let it happen.  I had to shift my position on the 
stool once, and leaned back more on Chad, and then I could feel the
head being about halfway out, then all the way out, and then Yelena
said, "The head's out, now breathe, easy, here come the shoulders,
reach down and help your baby, Abby," and I did, and I can remember
feeling an ear on the head, seeing lots of dark hair, and then the
baby was out and Yelena was helping me pull the baby up to my chest
where I held it for a while, they covered the baby with receiving
blankets and I took a few deep breaths, noting that I could do so at
all, and feeling almost dizzy with each breath.  The baby was all warm
and slippery and crying -- as soon as the head had been out I had
heard a kind of snorting and sputtering, then a few cries while the
body came and I pulled it all to my chest with Yelena's help.  

After a few seconds, we stood me up and moved me to the bed, where I
lay on my back with the baby on my chest, covered in warm receiving
blankets, gasping and crying.  Chad sat right next to me, I relaxed a
bit, and took a break before pushing out the placenta, which was not
comfortable, but felt like nothing compared to pushing out the baby.
I wondered if it was a boy or a girl, but mostly just wanted to hold
the little moist and squirming baby.  Everyone agreed the baby had 
been born at 2:41 AM. I lay on my back still holding the baby, and
Yelena brought over the placenta to examine.  "Is it a girl or a boy?"
I asked, pulling away blankets to try to see... and there were th
little male genitalia.  "That would be a boy!" someone said, I can't
remember who, and we were surprised, because we'd all thought it 
would be a girl. "It's Edward Paul," I said, and looked at him where
he was on my chest and belly. Yelena helped with getting him to latch
on to my left breast (I picked one at random) and he nursed right away,
and it felt terrific. While he suckled, she showed us the placenta and
the amniotic sac. I don't think I remember the cord being cut, but it
had been somewhere in there... While Yelena examined the placenta, and
picked it up by the amniotic sac, she said, "This is about a 7-pound
baby," just by examining the placenta!

I asked if I had torn... I really felt pretty good, I could feel things
inside me starting to shift around and it felt good to lie on my back.
"Well, yes, you did tear a little bit," Yelena said, and someone got a
mirror and she showed me where I had torn. "The funny thing is," she 
said, "it really looks like a tiny episiotomy, it's right where one
would be and it's so straight."  It was about a half an inch long. My
labia and everything looked very swollen, and I said so. "Actually,"
Yelena said, "you're not very swollen at all, and things look pretty
good. I'm surprised you tore, in fact."  She asked if I wanted stitches,
saying it could go either way.  I asked what she would do if it were
her.  Everyone laughed, but Peggy answered, and said, "If it were me,
I would take stitches, just because that would make it hold together
easier while it heals and be a little less to think about."  I said
okay, the stitches sounded like a plan then. Yelena offered spray 
lidocaine or lidocaine gel, and I said sure.  We waited a while for
more swelling to go down, and then Yelena stitched me up, and I can't
say it felt terrific or that I was a very good patient at that point.
It's the first stitches I ever had.  It was a second-degree tear that
took three stitches.

One of the wonderful things the whole crew had done was prepare these
pads soaked in witch hazel and frozen, which just felt terrific when
placed on my perineum. Some of them were also soaked in sitz bath herb
solution, and frozen. Or, well, chilled at any rate! My cousin fed me
a sandwich and ginger ale, and then I got up to pee and Elizabeth and
Peggy helped me to the bathroom and gave me the rundown on peeing
technique to avoid my stitches, use of a squirt bottle, and not to
wipe, and to keep baby wipes handy for me in the bathroom to clean
off things not in the area of the stitches or tear.  I looked in the
toilet and said, "oooh, there's a lot of blood," and they said no,
actually, it was very little.  Overall, Yelena said, I lost less than
300 cc's of blood.

I lay back on the bed against a huge pile of pillows, and breastfed
Edward a little more while Yelena made a few suggestions about that,
and about sleeping with the baby, since that was what we figured we
would do, and she palpated my abdomen again to make sure that my
uterus was going down like it should, and she told me what to expect
in terms of bleeding and the like, and admonished me to remain in bed
and not be going up and down the stairs for a week or so. Between 5
and 6, everyone was done with everything, and cleared out of the house,
and Chad and I were left alone in bed with our cuddly little newborn
son, who had been weighed and measured and everything, right after I
had come back from the bathroom trip. He weighed 7 pounds, 6 ounces,
and was 20.5 inches long, his Apgars had been 9 and 10, and I remember
being astonished to learn his head was 14 _inches_ in circumference.

>From the first sign of labor at 9 PM, to when Edward was born, it was
less than 6 hours... and from the onset of active labor to his birth,
it was maybe 3 hours, of which a little less than one was pushing. I
never got to braid my hair -- I barely got it into a ponytail. I hardly
had time to throw on a long cotton knit nightshirt, which hadn't stayed
on long anyway. 

It was incredibly fast and intense, and while I'm very glad it went so
quick, it was almost surreal, and part of me kind of wishes that I
could have had a chance to settle into labor, since I feel like I 
might have handled it all better.  However, I'm thrilled with the birth
experience and it was really wonderful, and Edward is such a delight I
just can't even find words for it.  I will say it took me right to the
limit of what I can take in terms of pain, though, and maybe a little
bit beyond, and that nothing about it was really like I had imagined,
except for Yelena, Elizabeth, and Peggy being incredibly competent,
efficient, and helpful.  I'm SOOOOO glad I had him at home! I don't
know what I'd have done if I'd had to ride in a car to a hospital while
contractions were 3 minues apart and monstrously tough, or what I'd 
have done when I got there and they didn't think 4cm was very much, or
how a hospital would have handled me going fro 4cm to pushing in less
than 20 minutes, as Elizabeth said that I did.  And it was just so 
wonderful when it was all over to be right in our bed with our newborn
son, and to go to sleep with him right there... he slept on his side on
Chad's chest, and it was just about the most beautiful thing I'd ever
seen to turn my head and look at the two of them right before I fell
asleep, just as the sun was coming up.