It’s always such an honor to use my camera to document a birth story through photos and film. But words can be powerful glue that help to weave that story together. When Jeanne agreed to write her birth story, I was so excited to hear it all from her perspective. I just loved getting to read this birth story, in the words of this strong mama who worked so hard and found surrender. Seeing it next to my documentation is just so amazing. As always, I’m so very honored to have been invited into Jeanne’s birth space, and to have been witness to the birth of her beautiful “Ellie.”
P.S. Check out the film I created to tell this birth story! It’s really cool to get to see it in conjunction with Jeanne’s own words!
Ellie's Birth Story
The day before 42 weeks something finally started to happen. I was starting to have contractions consistently but far apart. So we took the 2 big kids to get ice cream at clementines. Then cooked dinner and went to bed. Things seemed to have slowed down so I was a little discouraged. In the morning the contractions were there so I let my mom take the big kids so that Ryan and I could prepare the house and get everything in order. I baked banana bread and mint chocolate cookies for my team.
By noon it seemed like everything stopped. I was frustrated. So by 3pm we decided to go to Powder Valley to be in nature and get grounded. We made dinner together and contractions seemed to get stronger and closer together. My mom and dad brought my big kids back to go to sleep. While my mom and Ryan were getting the kids to bed, I sat on my ball listening to music and talking to my dad between contractions. The app that I was using to time contractions kept saying "go to the hospital" every few contractions. This made me giggle.
I gave my birth team a heads up that the contractions were 3 minutes apart for at least the last hour, but not super intense. I was working through them just fine. Since it was the third baby, I didn't want to be surprised. And my team decided it was time to come over. My team consisting of my midwife, doula, and photographer all arrived between 9 pm and 10 pm. We all greeted each other and shared some laughs, as we all are friends.
I was hanging out in the living room and Ryan had already rearranged things to have enough room for the birth pool in front of the fish tank. My midwife, Julie, checked in on the baby. She would always say, "sounds like a happy baby." At first, I thought, man these are really easy to get through, maybe I called my team too early.
We talked and shared laughs between contractions for a while. I made sure they knew of all the treats I had prepared for them. I had a playlist of songs that were all over the place. The ones that made me want to dance were the best.
As the contractions started to get a little more intense I was feeling a lot of discomfort in my sacrum like my first labor. CBD rub worked wonders, but I kept needing to reapply. So we went to the bed to do some spinning babies — side-lying release and open knee-chest. These were supported by my amazing doula and friend, Steffanie.
After a while, I asked about getting into the pool to relax my pelvic floor to see if baby would come down into the pelvis better. Once in the pool, I could feel things open up for sure. I worked through a lot of contractions with each person on my team supporting me — holding a hand, giving me ice to cool down, a cool rag, orange pieces to eat, water to drink, and positions to try.
We thought I was close so we called my mom and the midwife support. This was just before 2 am. I put a prayer on, the Divine Mercy Chaplet, that I played during labor with my other babies and played to practice contraction breathing.
When my mom got there she woke up the kids, and they would come in and out of the living room encouraging me. They definitely had one too many cookies while waiting, but I let it slide because they were so good.
When the midwife support came, my team greeted her with, "Hi Katie!" In my head, I'm like “Who is Katie?” I thought I knew who she was, but didn't come out of my zone to meet or greet her. She ended up being exactly the person I needed to enter my space.
Eventually, I learned that I had an anterior cervical lip and that the baby was having a hard time getting past it. I tried all kinds of positions and even got out of the tub to go to the bed to try even more positions, but I couldn't get the baby to come down.
We had to do a terrible position where you lay on your back with a bolster under your butt and feet dangling off the bed. It's awful during contractions, but it can get the baby past a lip. I was getting very frustrated and you could probably tell with some of my deep roars coming from me. I was determined to get this baby out using my breath and low tones. I went back to the birth pool to try to relax again.
Katie suggested that I try a made up move where I almost do a side plank on the side of the birth pool and switch from side to side to try to jostle the baby past that cervical lip. Well, this did the trick. My baby started to come down.
I could feel the pressure getting more intense. As the head started to come my midwife was supporting my peritoneum all around to try to prevent tearing. I felt like my front was tearing. The ring of fire that everyone talks about! It was quite painful. I was ready to be done, but my midwife reminded me to be patient and let the tissues stretch. This was so hard.
My doula said, "Jeanne this one has hair. A lot of black hair." I couldn't believe it and couldn't wait to meet my baby. I knew I was so close.
The head came out in the water, but I couldn't get the rest of the baby out. Julie asked my team to get me out of the tub. Ryan ripped me out of the tub so fast.
The baby's head was out already which made it hard to move around. Julie told me to get on my hands and knees and use the contractions to push my baby out. I couldn't even feel the contractions at this point. With all of my might, I pushed the baby out at 5:32am.
She came with both shoulders at the same time. This is what made it so hard. I was sitting on the floor in my living room right in front of our fish tank. I pulled her up to my chest as Julie did a little stimulation to get her to cry. She was here!
I remember looking at her and seeing if it was a girl or boy. I looked at my mom and the kids and said, "It's a girl!" I thought it was a boy the whole time. "It's Marielle Jean. Look at all that hair."
After things were settled I asked to go to the bed. From there we all settled in. She nursed, got to meet her siblings, and Julie did the newborn screening. Her brother, Dominic got to cut the cord and got a lesson all about the placenta.
She was 8lbs 12oz 20.5inches long. Born on Friday the 13th of November, 2020. Marielle "Ellie" Jean changed our lives and completed our family. We fell in love, immediately, with those wide-open blue eyes ready to see the world.
Giving birth is such a powerful experience. Of ultimate surrender. Complete Trust in the process and your body. Quite simply amazing!