Home Birth Check-In 1/15

crazychickenlady · January 2015

Good morning my fellow home birth ladies!!

I am not sure who all is still here – but I will tag everyone who has shown interest in the check-in in the past. (@MrsMopar67 @Audrey1787 @MitoRachel @3GirlsMama @kdenke @whippoorwill3 @thiscrazylifeilove @stephaniejfree @Claynese).

I don’t know how many of you are still here, or want to continue to participate, but I figured I would post this, just to try to get some normalcy going on the board while the dust settles. As we go, we can get a feel for who wants to continue with this check-in in the future.

I hope you are all doing well. Let’s hear about your home birth plans!

*** If you haven’t posted before in the check-in, tell us a little about yourself and your home birth plans (how many, if any, previous children do you have? Is this your first planned home birth? What made you decide on home birth? Etc)***

~ How is your home birth prep going? Have you started to do any prep?

~ Have you gotten your “home birth kit” list from your midwife of things you need to get? If so, did anything surprise you on it?

~ Who do you plan on having present at your birth (Birth team, family, doula, photographer, etc)?

~ Do you plan on telling anyone, aside from your pre-established birth team when you go into labor? Or do you plan on keeping it quiet until after baby’s arrival?

~ Anything else you want to talk about with us this week?

As always, if you would like to be tagged in future home birth check-ins, please participate in the check-in or let me know you want to be on the list, so I can add you for future weeks.

mama2blu+new · January 2015

Hello beauties!
This may be a premature post but I should be finding out soon whether I am definitely trying for a vbac home water birth.
This is my 2nd pregnancy and child and as I mentioned I had a c-section with my first. I also had diabetes but have recently taken the glucose screening and was cleared (yippee! Managing GD with diet with my 1st was TOUGH and made eating no fun at all)...
Soooo, being that I have always wanted a home water birth but got it snatched away the 1st time, I am scrambling at 25 weeks to find a homebirth midwife in my area that will take me on. I'm very excited! And hopeful the stars will align for me because this is likely my last baby.
I found a wonderful, very experienced and like minded midwife this week. My insurance does not cover midwifery care (bastards!) so she has to do some finagling and find someone to do her billing. Once all those little kinks are worked out, we will be a go!

I have almost no "prep" work done except I am interviewing a doula this wknd and I know I just want a doula, my midwife and her team, and my fiancé there at the birth. My 3 year old is very sensitive and I think she would be worried about mommy, and in turn I'd worry about her being worried! No bueno.
I'd love to be apart of this check-in and be inspired by all of your posts.
I gotta say I am surprised there are so few of us?
I thought homebirth was on the rise?!
Looking forward to hearing more from you fellow home-birthers!

crazychickenlady · January 2015

~ How is your home birth prep going? Have you started to do any prep? I haven’t started any sort of prep yet, other than getting things organized in my head on what I want to do between now and 36 weeks. I feel pretty far behind on baby prep in general at this point, so I should probably start taking the ideas out of my head and get them actually happening. Now that we are in the New Year, I definitely feel a bigger push to get things done – DH and I even created a schedule, which is good. Actual things start happening on Saturday, so that makes me excited.

~ Have you gotten your “home birth kit” list from your midwife of things you need to get? If so, did anything surprise you on it? I haven’t gotten my list yet – My midwife tells me that I will get it next month at my 28 week appointment. Looking forward to getting it and getting a better idea of what I am looking at. As a FTM and a FT home birther, I have NO idea what I am in for at this point. But I am excited. Now that we are actually in the year our baby will be born, shit is getting real.

~ Who do you plan on having present at your birth (Birth team, family, doula, photographer, etc)? Midwife and her two assistants (one is another full-fledged midwife and one is a midwife in training who is also a doula), DH and my Mom. We won’t need to hire a separate doula since one of my birth team midwives is also a doula, so that was a bonus. We decided against a photographer for financial reasons, as well as not really knowing how I will react to strangers being around me during labor. My birth team has offered to take photos when they can if I provide my camera for them, so that was a good compromise. My midwife brought up the good point of not knowing how I will react with the photographer basically being a stranger in my environment during labor, and how we don’t know how I will react. Not to mention, that is adding another body into our tiny home and it could just be too much for me. Since I was debating it financially to begin with, this and their offer to snap photos really helped make my decision on no photographer. Keeping it small with people I have built a relationship with.

~ Do you plan on telling anyone, aside from your pre-established birth team when you go into labor? Or do you plan on keeping it quiet until after baby’s arrival? Absolutely not. No no no. We will notify only my birth team and my mom, as they are going to be the ones present at the birth. The main reason I plan on keeping it quiet otherwise is because the moment DH’s mom finds out we are in labor, she is guaranteed to show up, uninvited. And I just font need that when I am trying to give birth. Her and I just don’t get along and it will mess up the entire vibe. So as much as I want to update the other people who will be interested in progress, I have to keep it quiet until I am ready for MIL to come meet baby.

~ Anything else you want to talk about with us this week? Not that I can think of at the moment.

crazychickenlady · January 2015

@Audrey1787 ~ I hope you get to your "fuck yeah I can birth this baby like a rock star" mode soon! I will need to be feeding off that energy soon!

crazychickenlady · January 2015

@mama2blu+new ~ Welcome and I am very excited that things are looking up for you to get your HBAC! I am excited for you to get to know our little group and for us to get to know you along our journeys.

crazychickenlady · January 2015

@secondaryPULSE ~ Welcome! I for one am very excited to have another experienced home birth mama in the group. And a student midwife at that!

pblge · January 2015

Hi Ladies,

Feel free to tell me to eff off, but I'm wondering what this group's thoughts would be on expanding to include others planning on a "natural" birth. I'm doing a lot of work to prepare for that, but because of my age, history of infertility and losses, and a lack of local reliable alternatives, I'm planning on birthing in a hospital with midwives. I'm betting there are other women in this group who are like me, and I imagine a lot of our prep is similar.

Just an idea.

Congrats to you ladies! If I hadn't been through 2.5 years of hell to get pregnant, I'd be home birthing too!

ETA: Meant to add that this might be relevant if the group has shrunk a lot following TB drama!

crazychickenlady · January 2015

@pblge ~ When I first started this check-in, I had thought about making it more of a "med-free" check in that would include hospital and birth center mama's attempting to go med-free. If I remember right, there was a coconscious that it would make a very large check-in and would be hard to keep up with, in addition to that home birth mamas do have different things to talk about than those planning to birth med-free in the hospital or at a birth center. Anyone can start a check-in though, so if you are up to it, go ahead and start one for those planning a med-free birth in a hospital or birth center! I am sure you will find lots of ladies who would want to check-in there. I would just advise against calling it a "natural birth" check-in and would instead word it as med-free.

pblge · January 2015

Thanks, ladies! Thought it worth asking.

kdenke · January 2015

~ How is your home birth prep going? Have you started to do any prep?

I recently found my hypnobabies materials, and I started listening to the affirmations. I've also been watching videos of births. I haven't done anything else besides that. I've really been meaning to exercise more and start doing some yoga to help with positioning, but...you know. This pregnancy is moving fast, and I'm a little terrified that April is just going to creep up on me.

~ Have you gotten your “home birth kit” list from your midwife of things you need to get? If so, did anything surprise you on it?

I haven't gotten the list yet, and I'm not sure if anything changed from last time. I still have a lot of the stuff I ordered from my kit last time that I plan on using. I'm really hoping to not have to buy hardly anything. I remember I ordered it all from a website where I can order items a la carte. I also plan on getting some earth mama angel baby bottom balm. I remember loving that stuff postpartum last time.

~ Who do you plan on having present at your birth (Birth team, family, doula, photographer, etc)?

My birth team will consist of my midwife and an assistant. My husband, daughter, mother-in-law, and sister-in-law will be there too. My brother-in-law recently moved in with us, but I think he plans on getting out of the house as soon as the first signs of labor start.

kdenke · January 2015

Sorry, the last part didn't post.

~ Do you plan on telling anyone, aside from your pre-established birth team when you go into labor? Or do you plan on keeping it quiet until after baby’s arrival?

Last time we kept it quiet till I was nearly pushing for everyone (even for those who we wanted to be there). My family (not in town) didn't know until right before or right after I had the baby. Their feelings were kind of hurt, but they had given me so much pushback about my decision to have a homebirth that I didn't want them worrying or stressing me out. I will probably tell them earlier this time.

sapperbritt · January 2015

I rarely come on here anymore but my eye lit up when I seen this group. It's very refreshing to find other like minded women who are also on the same timetable.

This will be our four child but my first home birth. I've had two previous med free natural child births in hospitals. I have a history of very fast births my last being about 45mins, so I'm very happy to not have to get in a car during transition!

How is home prep? Well I'm much much happier now that the christmas stuff is neatly put away and cleaning has been done. We also moved our youngest to her toddler bed that santa brought. Besides that not a whole lot has been done and it drives me crazy! I want to nest like a mad lady. I am on moderate bed rest (history of ptl and shortening cervix) and I will not jeopardize this home birth cause I did to much.

My midwife provides the birthing kit but I do need to buy my pool, more towels, sheets and puppy pads.

So far we HOPE my midwife and her assistant make it to the birth lol my mom might come if I'm feeling nice but it very well could just be me and DH. My BFF will be called too so she can help watch the other little ones just incase they freak a bit.

If there is time I will let others know I'm in labor and to please send positive vibes, prayers and thoughts. I will also let those know to light their labor candle they got at my blessingway. I don't think I will straight up post to FB hey I'm in labor tho, more like a simple please light your candles ladies.

crazychickenlady · January 2015

Welcome to @mrsblissed and @sapperbritt ~ Glad to have you join our little group!

crazychickenlady · January 2015

Just wanted to let you ladies who are involved in this check-in know that I am done swimming in this pool and am moving to the other pool. Come find the party over there if you want to continue with this check-in.

OR - if you plan on staying here, someone else can take over this check-in, but I am out.

@Audrey1787 @MitoRachel @whippoorwill3 @thiscrazylifeilove @secondaryPULSE @mrsblissed MrsMopar673GirlsMamakdenkestephaniejfreeClaynese, @mama2blu+new, @sapperbritt @Pblge