In April, I gave birth to a baby girl. I had intended to use a home-like birth center, have a completely natural, drug-free, “perfect” birth, and live happily ever after. However, my water broke on a Sunday night, labor never started on its own, and I ended up being induced at a sterile, uninviting, local hospital. Two days after the water leak, 22 hours of pitocin-laden labor, and one round of stadol and phenergan (no epidural, though), my baby girl was born!
For awhile after her birth, I struggled to accept the way it all went down. I had put all of my intention and hope into having one experience, but got almost the opposite. I found it to be incredibly dismissive when others said things like, “well, it all turned out okay.“ I logically knew this, knew that it could have been much worse. Still, I needed to grieve the experience that I DID NOT have before I could accept the one I did.
Having looked at it through a thousand different lenses, I believe I have come to peace with the experience. Knowing what I do now, I can make more informed choices in the future, if I choose to have another child. And the beautiful bottom line (which I can now accept) is that I have the privilege of being the mother of an amazing little girl and I will do my absolute best to do right by her.
I cannot believe how my life has changed in three short months. Sometimes I find that my head is swimming with thoughts and emotions. Being that I am staying at home to raise our little one (something I am grateful to do), I often find myself with no adult outlet to express this wetness from the sea of motherhood; a sea so new and foreign to me. I have a feeling more and more of it will show up here.
