What’s up, followers? Once upon a time, at the beginning of the pandemic, I had a baby… Whew. Some days it feels like it’s still March 2020, and other times it feels like forever ago. Now that we’re nearly done with 2021, it’s time to share her birth story. There’s lots going on in this little lady’s life, but there’s no place else to start but the beginning!

Without further ado…

I’m baaaaaaack! It’s been a nutty, crazy, busy season. My oldest started preK, my youngest and I had the flu, this pregnancy took a major toll on me physically, and it just felt like I was barely keeping my head above water there for the last few months! And now, here we are in the middle of a pandemic. I’m 37 weeks, and it’s time to get serious.

Things are going well with this pregnancy, despite the discomfort, and for that I’m eternally grateful. Now nesting is in full swing, so thankfully even with the sheltering in place going on, I’m staying busy. The last things left to do are arrange the baby’s clothes in her closet and pack our bags.

Our first birth experience was a long, natural, hospital delivery of our rainbow baby, Claire. It was amazing, hard, and beautiful. Before becoming pregnant with Claire, we suffered a miscarriage at 10 weeks. I was devastated by that experience, so when we got pregnant again, I was grateful but extremely anxious. All pregnancy loss is sad, but there’s something especially tragic about losing your first because it forever taints your experience. When your only frame of reference up to that point is a loss, even a healthy pregnancy has an extra layer of fear and anxiety.

Three years later, I can still remember the most vivid details of this eventful day. Things like what songs I sang, what I ate for dinner, and where we parked at the hospital.

One of the aspects of pregnancy that lots of people talk about is creating a birth plan, but it gets put off until the very end for so many women. I was only able to find one sample birth plan that I liked. I wished my OB had provided some samples for me to work off of, but they didn’t talk about it with me at all. The one I based mine off of I ended up finding in the back of a book at one of the hospital classes we attended toward the end of our pregnancy with Claire.

When I made mine and showed it to my doctor, she said “Sure we can add that to your chart,” which I took to mean no one was going to read it and look it over to see what I might’ve missed, let alone help me stick to it. I took that opportunity to do tons more research, memorize my plan, talk it over with and share it with my husband, so that we could let nurses know what we wanted.