Marlowe’s Birth Story
Our baby girl entered the world on her own terms and not at all according to plan, which is exactly why this is titled “Marlowe’s Birth Story,” not mine. I quickly realized I was not in control of her birth story, but I’m thankful that God was.
A few weeks before her birth, we discovered that Marlowe was in a breech position (her head near the top of my uterus instead of the bottom, where it’s optimal for labor). I wasn’t too stressed upon hearing this, as I knew there was still time for her to flip on her own and settle into a better birthing position. As the days and weeks went on, though, I began to stress about the fact that she was still breech. Every day, first thing in the morning I would run my hand over my belly and could feel the lump in my upper abdomen where her little head was. Day or night, it never seemed to budge.
I had always just assumed I would have a vaginal birth, and we had prepared for laboring and birth as much as we knew how. I had planned on laboring as long as I could before I opted for an epidural. We sought advice from friends and experienced moms, I read every word of “The Birth Partner” (perhaps the longest book I have ever successfully finished), listened to podcasts, toured the labor and delivery section of the hospital, took a birth class, and of course, Googled everything else. I made a point to eat 6 dates per day after reading a study in which consuming dates were proven to help thin the cervix and help childbirth naturally progress. I stayed active and went for a long walk every single day of my pregnancy. I felt strong, healthy, and confident in my God-given ability to give birth vaginally. The one thing I had not been prepared for was a breech baby.
Her breech position was something I didn’t think to mentally prepare for, and in turn, it caused me a lot of stress for the days and weeks following the discovery. I spent countless minutes each day in a hip-bridge position and many other poses that are supposed to help breech babies flip. I sat on an exercise ball all day, did squats, went to acupuncture, the chiropractor, and asked everyone we knew for prayer. I was determined to flip this baby because I had physically and mentally prepared for labor. But I had not prepared for this.
Eventually, as we neared our due date, I knew that baby was growing and running out of room to move around in my belly. I slowly came to terms with the fact that this baby just may not flip and we would inevitably need to do a C-section. A C-section was truly the last thing I wanted, but I am thankful God gave me some time to mentally and emotionally prepare for this possibility. If I had not known she was breech for a few weeks, it would have potentially been much more difficult for me to come to terms with at the last minute. I truly had time to grieve what I wanted and fully accept my new reality, and I am so thankful for that.
As a last-ditch effort, we decided to try something called an External Cephalic Version (ECV). I had little hope that it would work since I was already 39 weeks and 3 days along, but we figured it didn’t hurt to try. An ECV is a procedure in which the doctor manually pushes on the outside of your belly in an attempt to turn the baby to a head-down position. I had an epidural for this procedure in order to completely relax my muscles, and it was still a very intense and not fun experience. After about 5 minutes of trying to turn the baby, my doctor called it quits. She noticed the heart rate was dropping, indicating that baby was getting stressed out. Just like that, we were done trying to flip her. It was disappointing and overwhelming for all of our efforts to be over in an instant, but I knew it was best not to force anything.
Although the ECV didn’t turn out as we hoped, we had planned on going home and waiting it out as long as possible in case there was any chance this baby decided to join the 1% that flip in the final week of pregnancy. After the procedure, we had to stay and monitor the baby’s heart rate for 2 hours before we were cleared to head home. About 1.5 hours into that waiting period, fully prepared to be sent home, my doctor came back in with surprising news. She noticed some unusual drops in the baby’s heart rate throughout our visit that day, and she suggested that we go ahead and take the baby out. In fact, she could get us in for a C-section in 30 minutes. I was full-term and we didn’t want to go home if that meant risking the baby’s health. We asked for a few minutes alone to talk it over, called our moms, and ultimately decided it was best to follow the doctor’s orders. I could not believe we were going to meet our baby within an hour.
The next thing we knew, we were in the operating room. It was all happening so fast that I could barely process it (I think I was in shock for 3 straight days, to be honest). I remember my body shivering so uncontrollably from head to toe. I kept telling the doctor that I felt cold, and she assured me that it was my nerves. My physical body was literally bursting with anticipation, excitement, and shock. The doctors asked what our final guesses were of the baby’s gender. I felt an enormous amount of pressure in my abdomen, heard a small whimper of a cry, and my husband’s happy, quivering voice announced to the room, “it’s a girl.” I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe we were gifted the sweet Marlowe we had talked about for so long, let alone that we even had a baby at all. Yet here she was. Born at 5:22 pm, our sweet girl weighed 7 pounds 9 ounces, measured 19.5 inches long, and was perfect from head to toe.
It wasn’t the birth I envisioned, but it was so perfect. I feel incredibly blessed to not have experienced any birth trauma despite things not going as planned. In fact, everything went exactly opposite to our plan. Yet, I can’t imagine her arriving any other way. If we had not decided to go in for the ECV that day, we would have had no idea that her heart rate was dropping sporadically. Maybe we wouldn’t have had the C-section that day, and I don’t even want to imagine what could have happened if we didn’t. God was protecting her life every step of the way, as we were simply stepping forward in blind faith.
Her birth story just proved to me once again that God truly has the best plans, and we can actually have peace in knowing that we have very little control over our lives. We can trust that He has us. He is so good to us, protective, and loving. We are so thankful for our sweet baby Marlowe, and I’m so beyond excited that I get to be her mom.
