The gentlebirth.org website is provided courtesy of
Ronnie Falcao, LM MS, a homebirth midwife in Mountain View, CA

Horrible First Birth and Dream VBAC for Second Birth

I am thankful to hear all of your stories. I am glad to know that I am not the only one that has to "bite her tongue" . As I have said before I had a c-section with the birth of my daughter. Get this, the baby unexpectedly flipped at 36 weeks and was frank breach. I figured she would switch back and even did an exercise once or twice, but at 36 1/2 weeks my water broke about 2:00pm. by the time I got to the hospital (yes I went very quickly) it was 4:30pm. the doctor saw me at 5:00pm and said -- "it's a breech, let's do a section". I said that I wanted to try and have it vaginally and he said, "well ok but I don't think you can do it, it'll be better to just get the section over. We'll schedule it now and that'll even put me home for dinner"! I found out later that he even delivers breeches on a regular basis!

On top of that the epidural didn't take and I felt the surgery, every last bit of the blazing hot cauterizing. The Anesthesiologist kept telling me I couldn't be feeling it!! I finally told him shut up. My doctor had to tug my baby's bottom out of the birth canal. I was disappointed, but I had this wonderful daughter so I was okay with it. When I planned for the birth of my son, I read everything I could get my hands on, so much so that I don't know which book has which information anymore... Any way I read Silent Knife and Open Season... Boy was I mad! some at the doctors, but mostly at myself. I was the one person I should have been able to count on, myself. If a woman is truly educated about her rights of birthing she will choose the right paths. Education is liberating. My husband tell everyone that the fear of birthing is the fear of the unknown, but if you're truly educated on birth, that fear is replaced by anticipation.

The birth of my son was every thing I'd ever dreamed of, oh sure things didn't go exactly perfect, like the leak in the birthing tub, and the water not being quite warm enough when I was ready to get in. We (actually, my birthing "crew"), just made it work anyway. I took total responsibility in the birth of my son. I planned for a long long labor, they say that many VBAC's have so much to work out that it is like a first labor, so I figured better to be prepared for it. I guess I did most of my work during the pregnancy, because my labor start to finish was four hours, and 56 min's of that was pushing and the first hour I was still debating on whether it was well timed gas cramps or labor (haha).

So I guess the gist of this is: Vent now, it is healing. Take responsibility for you birthing experience, read read read. Know that every thing you do now to prepare will make you strong during labor. And just know if you are unable to have the homebirth you want, your knowledge will prepare you for the best hospital birth you can have, even if it ends up in a section, you'll know in your heart that you were truly informed and prepared for labor and delivery.

I wish you a wonderful experience filled with loving anticipation. You Can Do It!