Ethan's birth story

Emerson's birth story started with the Jelly Belly factory tour followed by the Anheuser Busch brewery tour right nearby; Ethan's starts with Family Fun Day featuring Dinosaur World, a fruit punch winery, and Santa at the mall. I guess nothing inspires my body to bring a baby into this world quite so much as ridiculous tourist attractions.

It was at the mall that I first started feeling some light contractions. I didn't want to jinx anything by getting too excited too quickly so I tried to ignore them until they developed into something more definite. Which took a little while. I still wasn't sure if they were worth mentioning to Eric as we were heading to bed at 9pm that night, but I did let him know that something might be happening. (Yes, 9pm. That's how we roll these days.)

I woke up at 11:30pm with the awareness that labor was definitely starting. The contractions were still very manageable but they were more consistent and I could feel they were starting to get more intense. I just laid in bed and breathed through them until midnight when I decided to wake Eric up. Given how crazy it was last time to get the tub filled up I wanted to give him enough time. He got up and went downstairs to start preparations while I stayed in bed a little longer. I was very excited that this meant I would get to meet Ethan soon...and just a little nervous about how hard the labor might be.

At 12:15am I called our midwife Rebecca and gave her the heads up that labor was starting. She said I still sounded a bit too cheery to be in full-blown labor yet but that she was ready to come over whenever we needed her so I should just let her know when to come.

I headed downstairs and labored through contractions standing at the kitchen counter while Eric worked on filling up the tub. I was timing my own contractions and noticed that they seemed to be accelerating. At 12:45 I called Rebecca back and said that while it was probably still a little early, I would feel much better if she were here with us, especially since she lives 45 min away. She said she would be on her way shortly.

By 1am I couldn't manage to time the contractions myself: they were intense enough that I really needed Eric's support with them. He was great at helping me breathe through the contractions and not just make "this hurts too much" noises which are not very useful.

At 1:30, when she should have been arriving, we got a text from the midwife that said the highway was closed and she would be here in another 30 min. I was discouraged by this because I was looking forward to having her support (plus she had some special tricks for easing the pain of back labor, which is apparently a hallmark of labor for me). But I wasn't too worried about it.

So Eric and I continued working through the contractions together. I found that our light brown leather chair helped me with the now incredibly intense and close together contractions and this is where I was when Rebecca finally showed up about 10 minutes before 2am. She brought in all her gear and then came to check in with me. 

She suggested I move to the birth ball to labor there for a little while and I immediately regretted leaving the chair: the next contraction was a doozy. As was the next. On the third contraction I suddenly felt that it was time to push and Rebecca knew it too before I even told her. Then my water broke on our expensive new rug. (It cleaned up just fine!)

I had wanted to give birth in the tub like I did with Emerson but the tub was less than half full and the water was scalding hot (Eric learned the hard way the first time that you need the first half of the water to be extra hot because the second half will be cold). Eric began madly dumping ice into the tub while Rebecca helped me walk towards it. We knew it wouldn't be long now before Ethan would be making his big entrance.

I got to the tub but didn't manage to get in it. Instead, I knelt next to it as I felt the next contraction coming. Rebecca asked Eric to grab a towel and when he turned back, Ethan's head had been born. Moments later his body was out as well and Rebecca was handing him to me. It was 2:09am. She had been at our house less than 20 minutes.

The joy of meeting Ethan was immediate. Eric kept saying: "He's beautiful, Ellie." We just looked and looked at him, overwhelmed with amazement and gratitude (and still a little shocked he was already here!). His little eyes peeked open and looked back at us. We all just sat there for a long moment, taking it all in.

And then we heard Emerson shout from upstairs, just like he does when he wakes up from a nap: "Mom! Mom! Dad! Dad!" Eric went and got Emerson and brought him down to meet his new brother.

"Brother," Emerson said. "Yeah."

The next few hours were a happy blur of moving up to our bed, me taking a shower, Eric repeatedly trying to get Emerson to go back to sleep and Ethan's newborn exam where we learned he was 9lb 5oz, 21 inches long and perfectly healthy.

And now we are a family of four.