Medjula Rose.
by Ellah Ray
As I sit down to tell the story of my giving birth, I realize that within this one story there are hundreds of stories to tell. Stories of community, politics, sexuality, commitment, contracts, hypocrisy, sacrifice, privacy, instinct, devotion, growing up, and trust. Stories about life paths, about making choice, about how to listen, and about what to listen to. Stories about rules, awareness, and consequence; stories about embracing and relinquishing; stories about wading through agendas—mine and others’; stories about a profound coming home to myself; and stories about falling in love. And, of course, stories of angels, as they are in all stories.
Being pregnant and giving birth have shaped the way I walk through life.
For this occasion of birth telling, let’s see what comes.
On June 27, soon after the sun rose, I gave birth to Medjula. I tell this tale to her: Without knowing much about what was involved, I had always imagined giving birth to you at home. It never came up as a question.
I had recently moved to a small, isolated, rainforesty island with monster slugs, feral sheep, and a solid, strong community of back-to-the-land homesteaders, artists, and musicians—your first home. Most of the islanders had settled twenty years earlier and birthed their babies on dirt floors at home attended by the island midwife.
When I was four months pregnant, I met with this much-loved and valued midwife. It was a good meeting and she spoke extensively of how natural it was to give birth, how my body knew exactly what to do, how women had been giving birth forever, that there was nothing to fear, and that your dad could be as involved as he wanted to be. She was passionate and obviously loved assisting women during pregnancy, labor, and birth. I left our meeting believing in my body’s inherent wisdom to give birth to you.
It wasn’t until the third visit, when I was six months pregnant, that the midwife said it was time to schedule a tour to the hospital. I realized then that she was intending a hospital birth for us. I was surprised and confused and told her that I wanted to give birth at home. She smiled and spoke gently saying that she fully understood. She said everyone feels at home in the pretty birthing rooms, and that it was the best of both worlds: a homey atmosphere, with all the available safety. She told me that hospitals have changed and that I needed to be open-minded and above all consider the health and well-being of my baby. She said that by insisting on a homebirth, I was being swept away by romantic and outdated notions, and that my baby deserved the safest option.
Of course you did, Medjula! We both did and I wanted to find a midwife that would collaborate with us. I ended that relationship, trusting that I would find someone who would respect us by supporting the birthing atmosphere that was right for us. I did pay a visit to the hospital. I wanted to understand all options. The salmon-colored curtains and wallpaper weren’t just like home. I didn’t like the smell, and in my gut it did not feel like our safest environment.
As a part of becoming informed, I began collecting information and reading books. I read books for pregnant women as well as books for midwives. I learned a lot and became more and more fascinated, interested, and awestruck by the magnificence of my woman body and of your body and by how we were growing and changing together. I was falling deeply in love with you.
During that time, I had a great visit with an angel disguised as an MD. He told me that my pregnancy was progressing well and he gave me blank prenatal charts to fill out weekly at home. This way, when I chose my birth attendant, that person would have an idea of how the pregnancy was going. It would be charted.
The doctor and I also had an interesting conversation about risk. I had some questions. He responded by saying that depending on which way one cocked his or her head, a woman could be considered either high risk or low risk. I was low risk for being twenty-eight years old. I was high risk for having an “untried pelvis.” I was low risk for being a healthy weight. I was high risk for living in an isolated place. He suggested that I ignore this risk debate. He said that he sees obstetrics as having excelled in its ability to induce worry in perfectly healthy pregnant women. His opinion was that the women who had fewer tests and fewer visits to the doctors had more enjoyable and vibrant pregnancies.
I spoke with many women about their birth experiences. It was rare to meet someone who felt empowered, strong, capable, and beautiful after a hospital birth. More often than not, they expressed how grateful they were to be in a hospital because their bodies weren’t “working right” and they needed medical attention to save their lives and the lives of their babies. The actual necessity or harm of these interventions was very rarely questioned. These women carried with them the belief that they had failed—that they did not have powerful, capable, and wise animal bodies. Years later, I worked in a birthing center and noticed that the more aggressive the interventions, the more gratitude the birthing woman expressed. Yet, interventions very often get in the way of the woman’s natural ability to continue her pregnancy or birthing, as she is interrupted rather than supported. Her confidence is undermined, and any doubt or fear she has is reinforced.
To put this most intimate and important part of our life in the hands of this culturally condoned system seemed dangerous. I knew I had the right and responsibility to figure out what would be best for us. I continuously brought my awareness to you and to our connection. I knew that you trusted me to make wise and informed decisions—this one and many more to come. I chose and chose again the safe environment of a homebirth supported by people whom I loved and trusted, and people who loved and trusted me.
Throughout this early decision-making, your dad remained a steady and supportive presence. I appreciated him so much for not worrying, panicking, or being influenced by the curious, concerned, and strongly opinionated community around us.
I found myself seven and a half months pregnant, six weeks from my due date, still with no midwife. By then I had learned that the most serious complications during birth can be foreseen during pregnancy and that the most common unforeseen complications can be handled at home with the right equipment and skill. My pregnancy was going really well. I felt great and I knew I wanted a birth attendant who had experience in suctioning, suturing, stopping hemorrhage, and in newborn resuscitation. I wanted an oxygen tank and oxytocin* on hand. These are standard skills and resources a practicing midwife brings to a birth. I also wanted someone who knew about waiting, listening, being unintrusive, and being ready. These skills were more difficult to come by.
I met another midwife who was willing to do a homebirth in a house close to the hospital. She considered our island home too isolated for her comfort. I appreciated her for acknowledging her discomfort rather than classifying homebirths as unsafe, outdated, selfish, romantic fancies. She wanted to help me find a midwife that would come to the island.
At her suggestion, I went to an afternoon slide show led by midwife Gretchen Lewis. Waterbirth was the topic. The room was packed with pregnant women. It took only a slide or two before we got into what the women evidently really came for. Throughout the afternoon one woman after another tried to make sense of her previous birthing experience. They grieved the lost opportunity for their births to have been an empowering and liberating rite of passage.
The stories differed in detail but what they held in common was that a tremendous amount of shame was reinforced and generated as they were given the message that they were fundamentally flawed. Some stories were about hospital births, and surprisingly quite a few involved midwife-attended homebirths. Somehow, up until then, I had held the belief that to be a midwife meant one thing only, but of course it doesn’t. Every midwife comes with and is influenced by her own stack of preferences, belief systems, narratives, anxieties, skills, agendas, and desires.
Gretchen was so smart and kind. She answered question after question with great clarity and intelligence. It was evident that when she said things like “trust your intuition” or “listen to what your body is telling you,” she meant it in a very real and literal way. She was in her twentieth year as a midwife.
Most of the women seemed afraid, not of giving birth again, but of betraying themselves and their babies by going against a deeper knowing and being a “good woman” by acquiescing to the professional opinion of their doctor or midwife. Part of this was a fear of not choosing the socially sanctioned option so that if anything were to go seriously wrong, they wouldn’t have to bear the weight of sole responsibility.
Your dad and I spoke with Gretchen afterward and set up a meeting at her house the following day to talk to her about attending our birth. Both of us were inspired, relieved, and tremendously grateful to have met her. I could feel anxiety melting away. We had met another angel.
The next day at her house was more permission to believe that it was smart and safe to follow my instincts.
Gretchen wasn’t able to make it to the island to attend my birth, but her partner Martha was.
Martha was as wonderful as Gretchen. She arrived to the island on June 25, ready to be there for however long she was needed. I felt great big-fat-belly-round gratitude! Hooray! We invited Grandma Judy, Chris, and Rosemary to the birth. We talked about having a waterbirth, or birthing outside under the Douglas Fir trees.
It is the morning of June 26. I get out of bed and out drops a blob of mucus. I go for a walk with Martha. We talk about any specific desires I have for labor and birth, as well as what roles everyone is to fill. I am open to whatever feels right in the moment.
When I tell Martha about the mucus blob she exclaims, “You lost your mucus plug! You are in labor!” She guesses I’ll give birth within the next twenty-four hours.
It hits me again what an enormous, ancient, and beautiful journey we have had together.
Later that evening, we are eating dinner and I tell Grandma Judy and your dad that tonight is the night.
There is a soft rainbow in the sky and a baby owl in the plum tree outside the front door being fed by its mama and papa owls.
We all go to bed and within an hour of falling asleep, you and I begin working together toward birth. I don’t want to wake up the rest of the house so we stay in the bedroom: cozy, close, quiet, and contracting.
I think I may be in “false labor”—odd language to use to understand the beauty and miracle of the body’s process of toning and opening.
The sensations are strong and regular and with every contraction a rush of amniotic fluid comes. We soak every towel in the house! At about 2 a.m., I want to check in with Martha. Your dad wakes her up and they trade places. He goes to sleep and she crawls into bed with me and with each contraction gives me a most delicious and medicinal back massage. After about an hour of this, I need to throw up and poop. I am so indescribably uncomfortable in my body. I don’t understand—I have no access to my mind. Contractions get stronger and closer together until I feel as if I am riding one continuous wave of the most intense sensation I have ever experienced. All of my attention and energy is focused and I am expanding into a released surrender. It is the most profound sense of being present to this moment that I have yet experienced. I still have a lot of energy. I doze off between contractions. Somehow I remember that this could go on for hours or even days. I feel a little afraid.
At about 5 a.m. the sky begins to lighten. I am drawn to being outside, to being among the trees, the rocks, the pond, the air, the light, and the bird sounds of early morning. It is so hard to organize my body to walk; you are heavy between my legs. With one very tricky step at a time across the cold dew-soaked grass, I make it to the tall cedar trees outside the house. I lean into one for support. The bark is shaggy and soft. It feels so good. I sleep standing up, between contractions. I don’t know how long I am there before I suddenly feel very cold. Somehow I manage to get back inside. I crawl and walk.
I wake up your dad and ask him to light a fire to heat the water for a bath. I try to be quiet. I like the solitude I feel with everyone asleep. He leaps out of bed and gets right to it. He is very excited. It takes a few hours to heat enough water to fill the bath.
My chill intensifies. I am shivering. I can’t get warm. All my energy is going into my uterus contracting. I put on many layers of clothes. Grandma Judy is awake. She hears my sounds. Martha is rubbing my back again. I stay low to the ground on my hands and knees. Once I find this position, I don’t know how to move. Martha asks me if I want to be downstairs. I don’t know how to answer her. Grandma Judy strokes my forehead. It feels awful. I don’t want anyone touching me. I want space around me. I know why some animals crawl away to give birth. I am getting loud. Grandma Judy is tape recording. I am entirely consumed by odd and disturbing sensations. This is not my body. I can’t imagine how this could be right. I need to hear that this is what is supposed to happen, I want to surrender. Martha stays with us and lets us know we are doing beautifully. I welcome these words!
This is my powerful body. I feel like a cow or like a humpback whale, as they sound their low, sustained notes. I am a cow, a whale, so wide and slow.
I have an urge to push—“urge” is putting it mildly. It is an undeniable, roaring force to move you through and out of my body. This feels clear and totally satisfying. These waves of pushing are my universe. These waves of pushing are all that exist. I hold on. I go for the ride.
Mary checks to see if I am fully dilated and finds your head at the opening of my yoni, ready to be birthed. Grandma Judy and Martha manage to take my pants off. Grandma Judy puts water on to boil the scissors and the cord clamp and gets out the camera. Your dad calls Chris and Rosemary, stokes the fire and gets your first soft, cozy blanket ready.
There is an intense burning sensation at the opening of my yoni. Wow! Oww! I remember some words of wisdom an experienced woman gave me at our blessingway: “loose mouth lips equal loose yoni lips.” I am on my hands and knees, a cow, a whale, moaning, mooing, blowing out through relaxed, loose mouth and lips. Chris arrives and with another full-bodied push you are born into Dad’s hands. I lift my leg over your umbilical cord and take you into my arms as you cry and cry.
“Hello sweet, beautiful daughter, there you are!”
I thought I was birthing six boys.
We all look on in wonderment. You are oh, so lovely.
And as your Grandpa Jim says later that day, “No hair, no eyebrows, no teeth, and still the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
I lie back into Chris’ arms and am embraced by an angel
Grandma Judy’s eyes are so full of love and awe and relief
Your dad is right there with you, falling in love
You are sticky, bloody, pink, skinny, creamy, yummy, froggy, old
Creature
You smell so good
Martha makes a most divine oat straw, nettle, and honey tea for
me to sip through a straw
Another contraction and I birth our placenta
Your cord stops pulsing
Your dad clamps and cuts it
We admire the gorgeous placenta before Grandma Judy takes it
to prepare it for
eating
Rosemary walks in with a bowl of strawberries
You find my nipple and know exactly what to do
I love giving birth to you
Medjula Rose.
Ellah is now an urban-dwelling midwife, dancer, and clothes maker.
* Oxytocin is a hormone released by the pituitary gland that causes the contraction of the uterus during and after labor (to birth both the baby and the placenta).