During 36th week we got a checklist “what to bring with you to Birth Village,” on the day of Birthing. We should prepare three bags - Mamma’s bag, Baby’s bag and additional (miscellaneous bag). You would be curious to know the list of items on the additional bag. It consists of essential oil, fruits, dried fruits, nuts, tender coconuts, honey, dates, chocolate and tripod of videography, music system, candles, and favorite pictures religious or otherwise that make you feel comfortable at home.
As I mentioned, Birth Village is a home with caring hearts, on the day of your delivery you can organize the room as you want it to be. Dim lights, fragrance from essential oils and music of your choice will make you calm and relaxing.
We use to visit Birth Village every day after water trickle incident for fetal monitoring and regular blood tests. On Sunday mid-night, my wife started feeling a labor pain with intervals of 5-10 min. She performed pelvic movements to comfort pain and in the morning at 10:00 am we visited Birth Village for consultation. As usual fetal monitoring and blood pressure were checked and found normal. Occasionally, hot bag massage was given to back to comfort.
Donna did ask permission to check the baby positioning, after the checkup she said, “You can go home and take rest, look at you both are still smiling, if labor pain starts you both would not be smiling.” We again asked are you sure and she said “Yes, go home take a nap.” Little did we know that, she already knew, that night my wife will go for an active labor and she does not want us to panic and enter into a fear mode.
We were also thinking, it may be irregular pain and baby is still not in position, it may take some time to start real labor. Though we were not 100% convinced, but still we were not panicked. In the evening around 7pm, my wife noticed that there is meconium in the water discharge, we immediately called Priyanka and she told us to be there at Birth Village by 9pm.
We finished our dinner at 8:30 pm and reached Birth Village at 8:45 pm, Priyanka was already there, she asked about meconium and explained the pros and cons of meconium discharge inside and statistics of babies who pass meconium before birth. We did informed decision and asked to continue our process for natural birthing, she checked for dilation and it was 6cm.
Birth Village admits mother only after 6-7cm dilation, if dilation is not enough we were supposed to go back. Finally I brought all three bags packed for this day to Labor room. Took few snaps, arranged god’s photo, segregated clothes and essential things required for birthing.
My wife was asked to try different positions to check the pain level, so that perfect positon can be selected for birthing. It was 10:00 pm, Chechi provided Jeera water to increase the labor pain. Now the labor room was complete house and Priyanka was captain of the house, she said “your wait is over, now you need to climb the stairs (2steps at a time) for 5 times.” My wife was getting contractions every 3min and lasted for 40-50sec, for every contractions she stopped and did a hip movement to relax. Once the cycle is over, she continued climbing (ascending and descending) steps. Priyanka, like a coach to an athlete nudged my wife in every possible way.
By 3rd or 4th round of climbing, my wife had “Bloody Show” (Read stages of labor and dilation) and watch video here (Video1 and Video2), it is almost completion of stage1, after 5 rounds of climbing stairs, Priyanka did another examination to check the dilation, hurray! it was 9cm dilated.
Now the time was 10:45pm, along with Priyanka three more midwives were assisting and Cheechi provided another energy drink. My wife was asked to try spontaneous pushing in Upright position. As you may know before the invention of hospital, the birthing positions were natural upright (supported by gravity) or gravity-neutral (See detailed study of ancient positions here).
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This position used a rope tied to a tree or a cloth tied to something, This helped the woman to be in a standing squat position. The rope helped support her weight so her legs wouldn’t get as tired.
This positon was NOT comfortable for my wife |
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In this position, women would often sit on their husband’s lap to imitate a birth stool, half-stand or pull against someone in front of them during a contraction, then lean back and rest on their husband between contractions. This position was MOST comfortable for my wife |
Read this article on 16 birthing positions with images, in the above position the advantage is mother’s weight is shared on legs and mostly on husband’s lap and arm, so father has to be very strong and ready to tolerate this pain for two daysJ, moreover this is the reason you walked with her during pregnancy, you also built the stamina to carry your wife during labor.
It
was around 11:45 PM, Monday, I was wondering whether the birth date will be 17th
(Monday) or 18th (Tuesday), my wife was pushing and I was also
squeezing her hand during every contractions and asking her to push. Between
the contractions we used to see the midwives, they were happily sitting on the
floor and laughing, we also started laughing because we both were pushing in
this case. Below image may summarize close to the situation we had that night
during labor, calm, room filled with laugh and fun, embracing the birthing
completely by us.
It was 12:10 am, Priyanka took my wife hand and asked to touch the head of the baby, we were overwhelmed with a joy and she did a final push with grunting. 12:13 am, new life was born, I heard three voices.
One: My wife shouting “I did it…..”
Two: My daughters cry
Three: My inner voice with shouting, crying & dancing in joy
My wife accomplished the Goal, we accomplished the goal, and my body was colder and experiencing goosebumps. The feeling on that moment was completely different, one hand you accomplished what is nearly impossible as per Conventional Medical System and on the other hand you had a daughter.
Skin-to-skin contact with baby and mother within few minutes, Baby vitals were checked and within 10-20 minutes, placenta was out, my wife started feeding the baby immediately after the birth. Soon the umbilical cord stopped pulsating, and turned whitish (Delayed cord clamping).After an hour, I had the honor to cut the cord, I remember I told I will not do all this, I cannot see blood and cut the cord, but at that moment you are at a different level. I cut the cord with the help of midwife. Second in my honor, I got a chance to do Skin-to-skin contact with baby, she slept on my chest and we both enjoyed the moment. Meanwhile my wife was getting sutures for natural tears (not episiotomy), I liked the way one midwife was doing sutures and Priyanka was talking/asking feedback to my wife to distract from sutures pain.
My wife had hot chocolate drink and she had dry fruits and we slept till morning. After breakfast, house nurse/midwife checked the baby and mother and after everything seemed normal we were asked to go home. Few instructions were given to take care of baby, like exposing to sun early morning and evening for few days to reduce jaundice.
Regular house visits were done to check the health and growth of baby, stitches of mother and feeding. We were there for 3 weeks post birth, we visited Birth Village & pediatrician from 2nd week. Baby was provided with Vitamin K at birth and other regular vaccination was given from an external pediatrician.
During the complete journey, birth village was very supportive and when we planned to leave Kochi, we had a group photo, due to COVID-19 all wearing masks and Birth Village issued a letter to cross border.
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