This is the birth story of my third child.  My first son Wyatt was born after my water broke at 38 wks and not knowing what I know now, I went on in to the hospital and allowed them to start me on pitocin after only 4 hours of not contracting.  I ended up with a posterior baby, pain medication, an epidural plus three hours of pushing.  Needless to say, when the time came for my second son Sawyer, I was determined to do things differently.  I switched providers and hospitals, planned a waterbirth, and hired a doula.  Mission accomplished.  I had an unmedicated waterbirth that was fast and furious.  I was a “park and push”…showed up to the hospital at 9 cm and had a baby within 30 minutes. It was empowering and overwhelming, yet scary because everything happened so fast.  It scared my husband Shane too.  He felt like we “barely made it there.”

When I found out I was pregnant with our third baby, I knew I was going all natural waterbirth again. As I entered the third trimester, I started to become anxious over the position of the baby.  I think I just knew that this one was going to give me some trouble for some reason. Every time I had my midwife palpate my tummy, the baby was anything but head down. But I stayed calm and listened to them about how it’s not an issue and babies almost always turn head down.  BUT, even if the baby was breech, it was okay too because I could have a vaginal breech birth.  And I would do it because that’s just how I roll.

But as the weeks passed, Baby Lloyd v3.0 decided that transverse (sideways) was the most comfy position to lie. And I knew something for certain…babies couldn’t come out sideways!  I did it all to try to turn the baby…chiropractor for Webster technique, moxibustion (basically burning some stinky incense that sticks off of your pinky toe), forward leaning inversions off the couch, and lots of reading on the Spinning Babies website about how to encourage optimal fetal positioning.  I talked to the baby, I begged the baby, and I cried some. Then at 36 weeks, I had an ultrasound to confirm, and yes, baby was still transverse.  I discussed and external cephalic version (ECV) with my backup OB/Perinatologist and while he didn’t think it was 100% necessary (he remained steadfast that labor will often turn a baby into a birthable position), he agreed to do it when I was almost 37 weeks. We had the room at the hospital booked and everything.  Continue reading »