Preparing for this VBAC has felt like a radical act of hope.
I say “radical” not because I am putting myself or my baby in physical danger or because a vaginal birth after cesarean is unlikely to happen. Neither is true.
I say “radical” because I am daring to believe again in the power of my body and to have hope amidst the mystery of the birth process. I am trying again. Boldly. Wholeheartedly. With deep intention and awareness.
I am bringing my whole self to this process once again. Vulnerably. Passionately. Adventurously.
I say “radical” because the hope that has taken up space in my heart in preparing for this birth is far-reaching and profound. It has stretched to touch all other parts of me in a fundamental way, rebuilding the way I approach myself and the way I approach my life.
When we dare to hope and have faith, we make ourselves vulnerable to disappointment. We put our pride on the line, risking to be wrong. Hope can make us feel like a fool. It feels like a courageous choice for me to choose to walk this uncertain path again.
My choice to pursue a VBAC affects not just the way I birth but my whole stance for how I live. Following my intuition as valid information. Trusting the wisdom of my body. Believing that how I feel matters. Making informed decisions with confidence in my judgment. Embracing the uncertainty of life. Leaning into my lack of complete control. Making choices rooted in hope rather than fear.
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When I found out I was pregnant, I didn’t think I would care about birth this time.
I could hardly wrap my mind around the pregnancy–all the effort ahead of me and the whole idea of bringing a new person into our family. I had cared deeply about birth once before and worked tirelessly toward creating the birth I wanted. I left birth disappointed, hurt, and confused. Didn’t I deserve it? Didn’t I deserve that empowering birth I worked so hard to achieve?
All my effort was not rewarded with the birth I wanted. I’d experienced firsthand that the way our babies come out of our bodies is not the grade we earn for the work we put in. Tremendous effort, determination, and education do not always determine the outcome in birth. Why bother then? I was the discouraged student slumped in my seat pretending like I just didn’t care.
Then somehow the birth machine fired up in me again. The coals from my last birth were still burning. I blew gentle air on them and saw them flare. I blew stronger, and they blazed. A new vision and a new hope for this birth burned in me. I allowed myself to care and to hope again.
I dared to plan and prepare for an uncertain outcome, set somewhere between knowing deep in my bones that I can do this and remaining open to whatever birth my baby and I need. In preparing for birth, there is a fragile balance of striving and surrender, of action and hope, of envisioning the birth you want and receiving the birth you need. I dared to live in the shaky balance once again. I dared to live in the present, knowing that I would be called to make and live with fallible, human choices moment by moment.
This is not an empty hope that I practice, a cheap excuse for inaction. This is a full hope at the end of doing everything in my power to have the birth I want. To have the birth that to me embodies safety, gentleness, celebration, and empowerment. This is the way I want to bring my baby into the world.
And doesn’t wanting something from your birth other than “healthy mom and healthy baby” feel like a radical act anyways?
To redefine “healthy mom” as one who does not just have a pulse and functioning organs but one who comes out of birth with a sense of deep safety, self-possession, confidence, and inner strength.
To acknowledge that birth is a life-shaping event in a mother’s overall health and to recognize that her physical and emotional well-being will have a long-term impact on the health of her family.
To honor birth is a sacred passage that acknowledges the preciousness of life–not just the baby’s life, but also the mother’s life.
I dare to dream of coming out of birth full of vigor, strong in body, nourished in spirit. I dare to dream of a birth that helps me grow into radiant wellness.
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So many “what ifs” from my first birth have passed through my mind in these two years since I birthed my first child via cesarean.
But when I am practicing compassion with myself, I realize that back then, too, I had done all I could to prepare. And after that, I hoped. Could I really ask anything more of myself?
I couldn’t ask myself to have wisdom back then that I could only gain through the growth of lived birth and lived motherhood, which forced me to step into the power of my womanhood in a new way.
If I am not conscious of my thoughts and language, I can sometimes shade who I was in my first birth as a fool, someone deficient in essential knowledge, sense, or decision-making power. But I wasn’t a fool. I was highly educated. I was as wise and intuitive as I could have been. I was intentional in my choices. I lined up all the support I knew to need. I was not a victim.
I wanted to come out of birth empowered, but I had only one idea of what that would look like or feel like. I didn’t know that what it might really take to feel empowered in the end was the exact birth that I didn’t want: a cesarean birth. I didn’t know that the empowerment wouldn’t come in that moment of first breath or immediately after but in small moments of healing collected over two years.
This healing would confront not only my birth as a mother but wounds created long before, at each stage in my life and across generations of inherited trauma.
I didn’t know that there were so many pieces within me that were not aligned for me to seize the empowerment I wanted in my first birth. The pieces were scattered far throughout my past, and I have followed them like breadcrumbs ever since, getting closer and closer to myself.
Once again, I have done what I can. Now I hope. I await the birth process, where I will meet each moment breath by breath and may be called to make decisions with no clear right answer.
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The medical field calls VBAC labor a “trial of labor”.
“Trial of labor” does not do justice to this process. This is not me “trying labor”. This is me stepping boldly into the power of my body. This is me honing the power of my mind and vision. This is me moving away from doubt and toward faith. This is me moving away from fear and toward safety. This is me choosing peace and hope over and over again and holding it steady. This is me practicing agency in a situation I will never fully control.
This is not “trying” labor, with failure as an option. There is no outcome here that could be failure. The woman who was made as I prepared for and will live through this birth will never be the same. I have been and will continue to be transformed by hope, trust, and confidence in myself. There is no window for failure in that.
I have confidence in my ability to birth a baby vaginally. I have confidence in my ability to birth a baby via cesarean.
I have confidence in my ability to experience the intense sensations of labor without medication. I have confidence in my ability to accept the epidural as a tool if needed.
You see, what I have is confidence in myself. I have confidence in my decisions, my intuition, my intentions, and my preparations. I have confidence in my birth team. I have confidence in my ability to integrate whatever birth sends me into my learning as a mother and a woman.
This is my own labor and delivery as a woman. In the end, I meet not only my baby–I meet myself. I am delivered to the self I always held within me. This is the birth I’ve always wanted.
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Photo credit: Jess Bollaert Eddleman
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