The Traumatic Birth That Shattered Everything I Believed (Part 1)
This is the story of how I became a mother.
Trigger Warning: Traumatic Birth
As I’ve decided to start blogging and sharing my stories, there’s one I need to tell before I go much further. This story is the story. It is my why. It’s the worst and best thing that’s ever happened to me. It’s my defining moment.
This is the story of how I became a mother. A story of life and resilience. Of pain and grace. Of misplaced trust and hard-won wisdom. Of love, in its rawest and fiercest form—and of the reckoning that comes when everything you believed turns out to be wrong.
I’ve wrestled with how and whether to share it. So much of this is Matilda’s story, and I want to respect the line between where my story ends and hers begins. But this changed me forever, and it continues to shape the way I see the world, my work, and myself.
When my youngest sister went into labor a couple of weeks early, I was thrilled. My kids were beyond excited to have a brand-new cousin. But as the hours passed, excitement turned into something darker. Flashbacks from my first labor crept in—slowly at first, then all at once.
I went into labor with Matilda at 40 weeks, right on time, like a responsible firstborn daughter (both her and I). After months of research, reading, and conversations with my husband, we chose a home birth attended by two midwives and a doula. I felt confident. Prepared.
I had done everything right.
I ate almost perfectly (okay, the occasional Crunchwrap Supreme from Taco Bell did happen). I did prenatal yoga religiously through all three trimesters. I walked 10,000 steps a day because movement was good for baby and good for me. I even got a promotion at work while pregnant.
I read every parenting book. I prepared my dog. I spent hours creating the perfect nursery. My freezer was stocked with homemade lactation cookies, casseroles, soups, and broths.
I didn’t need anything from anyone. I could do this myself.
I had done the research—the right research, nothing whatsoever that was being pushed by the medical establishment. I knew how flawed hospital birth outcomes were, how interventions led to more interventions, and thought that the system wasn’t designed for me, for us. I wasn’t just another patient on a conveyor belt of epidurals and unnecessary C-sections. I trusted my body. I trusted nature. I trusted the centuries of wisdom that said birth was something sacred, something primal…not a medical event.
Until suddenly, it was.
Early labor was long and painful, but I held onto the belief that my body knew what to do. When the first midwife finally arrived, she looked exhausted, like she’d just come from another birth. She told me to take some allergy medication and try to rest. Then she stretched out on the couch and dozed off.
I drifted in and out of consciousness between contractions. Not sleep exactly, but more like blacking out between the increasingly unbearable waves of pain. What felt like years later, but also suddenly, my water broke. This was it. Real labor had begun.
By then, both midwives and my doula were present. I remember my husband being there too, of course. But when I try to picture his face, I can’t.
I just wanted to push.
"It’s too early," they kept telling me. "Save your energy."
But the urge was too great. The birthing tub appeared in my bedroom, and I forced myself into it. It didn’t help. I got out.
The bed? No better.
The regular bathtub? Worse. Like knives.
Something was wrong. I knew it. I could feel it. But I didn’t listen to it.
The midwives and my husband asked if we should go to the hospital, as if I were capable of making a decision. I said no, convinced that if I sat in a car, I would actually die. Convinced that my body would figure it out.
By the time darkness fell, I was pushing. Really pushing. She was stuck. I was exhausted. I faltered. For a moment, I felt like I couldn’t go on. But then, one final push.
Relief.
After nearly three days of labor, she arrived.
But she was blue.
She was quiet.
She wasn’t breathing.
The room froze and time stopped.
"Matilda!" I screamed at her, as if she were about to be so grounded.
She was ripped from me. A police officer was suddenly in my bedroom. I was lying there, bloodied and exposed.
But she had a heartbeat.
My midwife fought with the EMTs to let her ride in the ambulance. They refused. My husband insisted and they relented. One midwife and my baby were gone.
I had not held her.
I had not heard her.
I had not touched her.
And I had not stopped bleeding.
The second midwife started instructing the doula to grab my hospital bag. The doula was dressing me. I didn’t know why.
I don’t remember how I got there, but suddenly I was in a hospital bed, searching for my baby, but nurses were rushing around me, worried. What are they doing here? I’m fine! Go save my baby! I thought.
"She’s a couple of doors down," they told me.
They finally got my bleeding under control, and I was up, determined to find her. After a horribly painful walk down the hallway, we found her.
She was covered in wires.
She was bigger than I expected.
She was breathing.
"We need to transfer her immediately to a hospital with cooling."
What in the world was that?
I learned that she had suffered HIE (Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy). No one knew why or how or what the future would hold. But if they lowered her core body temperature, they could reduce the impact of brain damage.
She was gone again.
And they sent me home.
Home?!?!?
Without my baby.
It was the middle of the night. Maybe 2 AM.
I slept hard for a few hours, then woke up with urgency and called the number they had given me.
"She’s made it through the night."
We got in the car and drove to the NICU.
And the next chapter of our lives began.
To be continued…