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Birth Stories
Roman William G.
Hi Leslie,
Roman William arrived 5 days after his due date on July 1st at 7:35 a.m. His birth story is crazy and best told in an email that my husband sent to our friends shortly after his arrival:
Well, what a morning. In true procrastinating fashion, Kathryn and I were having a leisurely cup of tea/coffee (in between contractions) at 6:40 am discussing the significance of contractions and considering merits of calling our mid-wife/doula/emergency babysitter - and then at 7:30 careening up North Robinson street in our hot-rod mini-van to the nearest emergency room (with Dominic and Tilly in their pj's—Tilly crying, Dominic streaming a constant barrage of questions about why mommy is screaming)
Upon my entrance to Retreat hospital, when I banged on the doors and pressed the buzzer looking completely possessed, I informed the nurses "we got a baby coming" and they all just about sh**. Then I added, "oh, by the way, it's a vbac", adding further to my distress because of their collective looks of dismay. Not that we had any choice in birth locations at that point, but all the looks were apt when informed that this was the first birth at Retreat Hospital in 40 years.
So, Roman William is here, at 7:35am, 7/1/07, no weight (no baby scale) but in the 7lbs range they say, and latched on mum strait-away. Dominic and Tilly were 36 hours, Roman was about 3 minutes from passenger seat to gurney to birth.
Kathryn looks unbelievably well as does the boy, and if I had any computer aptitude I would attach a picture, but that will have to wait. We are now being transferred to St. Francis, our original destination, but one which was probably about 28 minutes too far.
Later, from cell phone records, we figured that from my water breaking to Roman's birth was exactly 17 minutes. I was completely taken by surprise, but so proud of the way that our family triaged the whole birth. Unfortunately my husband missed the birth because he was outside the hospital with our two children waiting for our sitter to arrive. I think he witnessed the passing of the placenta!
As with all the Yoga moms I have to say thank you. In my mind a couple things contributed to an air of calmness in a somewhat panicked situation. One was many long talks with my doula about birth and VBACs and the other was the hour a week I spent in your studio doing yoga.
Kathryn
P.S. I attached a photo of Roman and one of the two of us, taken just minutes after he arrived. It really was such an amazing birth.