This is a continuation of my post from yesterday, found here: http://homesteademporium.wordpress.com/2011/09/05/the-waiting-game-in-pregnancy-and-in-life/
When The Ice Storm of 1998 hit our area, and hit it hard, we found ourselves without power. We lived like this for days. My sister, her husband and her two children were visiting us from British Columbia at the time, making things even more trying since not only did we need to think about our own family of four and the birth of our upcoming babe, but we also had guests to consider through it all.
We stayed at home as long as possible. Trying to find ways to keep warm. We had a wood furnace, but the fan for the furnace was powered through electricity, so unless that fan was going, no heat was getting into the actual house. Neighbours pulled together and helped one another. We had lots of wood which we shared with neighbours, another neighbour had a cookstove and shared some food, etc.. It really was actually quite a nice time of ‘bonding’, as disasters tend to be.
After several days without heat, power, & water, I can’t remember any longer just how many days, Graydon’s (my husband) cousin invited us to come stay in their home. They had a wood stove, and a propane stove/oven and were fairing out better then we were. To open their home to us, AND my sister’s family was such a HUGE blessing.
To top it all off, their neighbour, whom I also knew casually through our children’s social activities, had not just heat but hot water too! That evening, because this neighbour knew I was pregnant, overdue, and very big and uncomfortable and had been without water and heat for DAYS, invited me to come on over and have a nice hot bath! I was ELATED!
This was Saturday evening, 7:00 pm to be exact. My scheduled induction/c-section was marked down for first thing Monday morning.
After my nice hot bath, just like that, I went into labour.
It was time to find our way, through the icy roads (we were in the middle of an ice storm! The Great Ice Storm!), from our rural town to the nearest hospital.
Thankfully, we made it!
However, the hospital had minimal staff, minimal power (generator) AND the doctor on call that night REFUSED to let me try and birth this breech baby.
Refused.
It was either have a c-section right then or there, or find some other doctor, somewhere else, to help deliver this baby.
We’ve never been ones to take the ‘easy’ way. We opted for another doctor, in the city, over an hour away, (in GOOD weather) in the opposite direction. If we wanted an ambulance, it was going to take at least a couple of hours of waiting for one to be free because of The Ice Storm.
We said “goodbye, we’ll take it from here.” They said “good luck with that!”
And away we went, to Kingston General, a teaching hospital.
At the time it was one of the scariest decisions we ever made. My first two babies had been birthed in a matter of 4 hours, then 2 hours, of hard labour. I had already been in labour for several hours, and now we had a long, tedious, and dangerous, drive ahead of us all the way to the nearest large city hospital.
However, it also turned out to be one of the best decisions we ever made.
When we arrived at the hospital, the doctor on call who had already agreed to let me try and birth this baby breech, had been alerted and was ready and waiting for us.
He was one of the nicest doctors I have ever met. A no BS kind of man, with a gentle side. He explained that he was more then happy to let me try and birth this baby, however, they were a teaching hospital and since breech births were so rare these days, would I consent to any, and all, interns to be present during the birth of my baby.
He also wanted to know if I would consent to an epidural, so my body would be ready, just in case something went wrong and an emergency c-section would be required to save the baby, or myself.
Yes! Yes! and Yes! I agreed to all of these things!
I was SO happy that I was being given the chance to at least TRY to birth this baby breech, that I didn’t care WHO was there to witness it! I actually felt proud knowing that if this birth was successful, having these interns be a part of it all, may even help them be brave enough to allow another woman to at least TRY to birth a breech baby in the futureof their careers.
I had come up against SO many walls with this! I wanted to do anything to help other women have it a little easier, if they were to experience the same thing.
When I had first gone into labour, it was 7pm Saturday evening. By the time we had arrived at the first hospital, I believe it was about 9pm. After the discussions there, and then the subsequent very slow, very cautious drive to the city hospital, we arrived around 2am Sunday.
Elisabeth Grace was born into this world, breech, at 8am Sunday morning, exactly 24 hours before she was scheduled to be born via c-section. The doctor informed me afterwards that he had given me until 8:15, if she hadn’t been born by then, it would have been time for a c-section. It had simply begun to take too long.
It was not easy, and there were some consequences. She swallowed some meconium during the birth. This isn’t unusual with a baby coming out the wrong end first! Because of this, she had to be whisked away to ICU for a couple of hours. The hardest couple of hours of my life. I was so angry with the nurse as she kept trying to take my baby away while I had hoped so much that for once, just once, I would be able to nurse one of my babies straight from the womb!
The first two had been whisked off by nurses as well. I had wanted things to be different this time. But alas, Elsa was taken away and I was left without a baby, wondering what was going on.
After being monitored for a couple of hours, she was finally brought back to me, where she would stay from that point on.
The two of us spent the rest of The Great Ice Storm cozy in a warm city hospital, with warm food, warm blankets, and time to get to know one another.
The time that I had spent waiting for Elsa to finally be born, a birth that everyone and their uncle predicted would happen at LEAST four weeks earlier, was the very longest, drawn out, emotionally exhausting, time of my life.
During that time, I learned so much about myself, about my faith, about my emotions, my body, my strengths, and even my weaknesses, then I had ever learned in the 26 years of my life before she was born.
After Elsa was born, and the anguishing wait was FINALLY over, I swore that I would never, ever, allow myself to become that mentally and emotionally exhausted and drained ever again. I told myself, my husband, and God Himself, that if I ever, EVER had to wait for ANYTHING, EVER again in my life, I would do it with much more GRACE, and more importantly, patience, then I exhibited while awaiting Elsa’s birth.
And I succeeded!
Until now.
The waiting game we are playing right now, has succeeded in just about beating me. This waiting, and wondering, when & sometimes even IF, our home will ever sell?!
And wondering WHEN will our family ever be together once again?!
Well… it’s humbled me to the point of realizing, I really never, EVER, EVER, should have said, “never again”.
