Lisa's Homebirth Story of Gabriella

The natural homebirth story of Gabriella took place in our kitchen.  She is our third child. 

Baby #2 was born in the car and I was determined to avoid highway birthing again.  We arranged to have our midwife come to the house (an hour's drive for her) to deliver.  Toward the end of my pregnancy, I began to find her presence annoying.   I decided to secretly not call her in time for the birth.

I woke up about 8am the morning of Gabriella's birth with absolutely no contractions, no mucous, no symptoms at all that today would be the day, but I knew in my heart that it was.

I invited my best friend and her daughter over to play with my girls and we had fun painting on my belly- we painted a globe, a smiley face and  a basketball (I couldn't possibly have 3 girls in a row?).  We also took a few last-minute pictures.

Around 5pm I started having noticeable contractions, and called everyone else who had been invited to the birth.  At 6 pm they began to increase in intensity and I kept retreating to the bathroom to be alone.

At 7pm I came out of the bathroom and frantically raged through the house, making sure everything was in order (towels, blankets, cushions...) I sounded like an OR surgeon saying "Get me the fuzzy slippers, STAT"!

At 8pm I fell to my knees in the kitchen, gave the thumbs up to call the midwife (there's no way she'd make it now) and my mommy.  When they got the midwife on the line, I was between contractions, and tried to give her the impression that I wasn't very far along.  When My mom was on the line, I couldn't even talk on the phone, I was in the middle of an enormous contraction - I just had to hear her voice.

Gabriella was born at around 8:30pm.

Meagan (age 4 at the time) was so very excited,  she shouted "she looks like  a monkey, Mommy.  Our baby is a monkey" and the way she was jumping with excitement made me think that she looked very  much like a monkey herself at that moment.

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Page Last Modified by Catherine Beier, MS, CBE