Flora June Blair turned 13 today. It’s the end of an era. Our youngest is officially a teenager. To mark the day, I thought it would be fun to republish Flora June’s birth story. And be sure to check out the links in the last paragraph for more photos and details.
From June 7, 2010
Today, Flora June Blair is one month old. I can hardly believe it. What was our family like before June arrived? I don’t even remember. To mark the day, I wanted to write down her birth story before I forget the details.
June’s Story
Do you think it’s possible to mentally shut down labor? To stop contractions with your brain because you can’t wrap your head around the day? I think that’s what I did.
You may have seen my Walk of Shame post on May 7th. Early that morning, my brother-in-law, Mark, had answered our middle-of-the-night call and quickly come to our home to watch over our little sleeping flock. At about 3:30am, we checked into the hospital. It was 5 days before my due date. My contractions were strong and coming 3 to 5 minutes apart. I was clearly in active labor and we settled into our birthing room, excited, nervous and ready to have the baby.
I’ll be honest, I was sure we would arrive at the hospital and have the baby within the hour. It was going to work out perfectly. The baby would be born around 4:30 or 5:00 AM. We’d be settled into our recovery room by 6:00 AM. Then Ben Blair would head home and be there when the kids awoke. He’d manage their day — make lunches, get kids to and from school and bring them to the hospital that afternoon. Easy peasy.
But after I’d been monitored and checked, I realized the plan wasn’t happening. I was 90% effaced, but only 2 centimeters dilated. At some point, it sunk in that this labor still had a ways to go. That Ben Blair would not be home by 6:00 AM. That I’d need to make like a thousand arrangements to get my 5 other kids through their day. And just like that, my contractions stopped. Completely stopped. (You may wonder why we didn’t have childcare plans in place. We actually did, but I promise, it’s surprisingly difficult to nail anything down when you don’t know the exact day the baby is going to arrive.)
The midwife consulted with me. This was my 6th baby and she was afraid the labor would progress quickly once the contractions started again. She wanted me to stay at the hospital — I could walk the halls and that would probably start things up. But I was 100% sure nothing was going to happen labor-wise until I settled my head, so we went home with a plan to labor there and come back when I was farther along. You can imagine my embarrassment as we sent Mark home, apologizing for dragging him out of bed in the middle of the night. (I’m still blushing!)
We went about our Friday as usual (sort-of as usual — we were missing quite a few hours of sleep). Kids woke up. Dressed and ate. Went to middle school, went to elementary school, went to preschool. Went to dance class. And then, as each child came home and things started settling down for the day, (homework, dinner, baths, pjs, make arrangements for Ralph to go to the Father & Son campout with a substitute day) the contractions started right up again stronger than ever. I am not even kidding you.
We made new childcare plans for the night ahead, and started monitoring contractions.
Doctors typically recommend heading to the hospital when contractions are 3-5 minutes apart. This guideline was in my head and made it hard to know when to call the midwife. The contractions were so hard! I would fall to my knees and rock back on forth on all fours to get through them. But then, I would get these luxurious 9 and 10 minutes breaks between each one which made them manageable. And confusing.
I finally called the midwife to get some advice on when I should come in and how I should manage the contraction pain in the meantime. She heard my voice and told me to come in immediately. So we did.
We showed up at the hospital for the second time that day. It was around 8:00 PM. The midwife, Mary, checked me and told me the baby would arrive in the next half hour or so. She said if we broke my water, the baby would come in just a few minutes. (Random tidbit: 6 pregnancies and my water has never broken on its own.)
I continued getting breaks between contractions and I’m telling you, it made the whole thing so much more doable. I could laugh and joke and chat between each. It was so civilized. Then I’d summon every relaxation technique I knew when I would feel a contraction coming on. If it came on steadily, I could manage the pain really well. Once in awhile I’d have one that would come on really strong right from the beginning, and then I would panic and tense and it hurt like crazy.
After a few more contractions I decided I was worn out. I asked Mary to break my water and she did.
[Tangent: I know there are women that feel empowered by childbirth (more power to them!), but I am not one of them. I feel empowered by many things, but childbirth isn’t on the list. Yes, I’m glad I’ve experienced it. No, it’s not my favorite thing. I’ve concluded there is no easy way to get that baby out of you. I’ve had 6 births. Half medicated, half un-medicated. And really, either way is exhausting and painful. Because this whole other person has to come out of your body. The last few minutes of labor just about kill me. I basically throw a 3-year-old tantrum where I fuss and yell that I can’t do it, that I don’t want to do it, that I want it to stop, that I hate it, that it’s too hard, etc. And at the same time I have another voice in my head that’s far more reasonable saying: you have to do it, you don’t have a choice, it won’t stop hurting till you do it, just do it.]
After my water was broken, Ben Blair stopped taking photos and the room got serious. I had a couple of intense contractions and then it was time to push. And suddenly she arrived. After one push. One really painful push with accompanying tantrum.
Then I calmed down. Then I met my daughter. And she was perfect. She looked so exactly like each of my other babies that I knew her immediately and said something like: Well hello. I’ve seen you before.
It was 9:10 pm. May 7th, 2010.
The followup: June was tiny. 6 pounds even. (Blessed day: no stitches!) We settled into our recovery room at around midnight. The room had a bed for Ben Blair which was wonderful. I was ravenous and ate a giant sandwich. We got as much sleep as we could that night and the next morning we checked out as soon as possible. I couldn’t wait to get home and introduce Flora June to her brothers and sisters. You can read about June’s Homecoming here. Oh. And you can see lots more birth photos, and her newborn portraits too. And don’t miss her birth announcement either.
Thank you for sharing. You looked so lovely throughout the whole process.
Loved your story. I love the part about the tantrums. I feel the same way.
Love that you were civilized.
June is totally beautiful. What an angel. Congratulations! The pics of all your sweet kids had me getting teary eyed. So many great moments to come.
Hypnobirthing changed my life (this is not an Infomercial.) That, and Rikki Lake’s documentary, “The Business of Being Born.” Highly recommended. Mazal Tov to you!
I’m so terribly late reading this!
What an amazing birth story… I love all the photos.
I too have temper tantrums during those last few moments of birthing babies. But I’ve only delivered two and I think I’ll stop there.
WOW – what a story!!! And such beautiful photos! Ben Blair is one talented hubby. :)
I can’t believe you have done it six times! And I can’t believe you got out of there with no stitches. But after six births, you deserve a stitchless birth.
I love the name June. It is my nickname for Susan’s daughter Julia – even though she was born in May. LOL It is because I called her junebug when she was a baby. I don’t know why. I have never even seen a junebug — I hope they aren’t horribly gross. I have a feeling they are and so I won’t look it up. But now I call her June. It is my special name for her.
Being pregnant with my first now I love reading these birth stories and having them all compiled in one place is just great!
Congratulations! I’m both a bit bummed and reassured by your statement that no birth is easy. The first wasn’t for me and I don’t have much hope that the second will be either. But then I read stories where people seem to find it blissful and I just don’t understand. Amazed you’ve been through it six times!
Hi Gabrielle,
I’m a new visitor to your blog and I must say that I adore it. I’m currently 38 weeks pregnant with my 4th child and our first boy and it’s so funny I’m reading this now because something similar happened to me last night only, they weren’t real labor contractions (at least I don’t think so). Anyway, I just wanted to say that I’m all choked up reading this story. Your perspective on just about everything is not only refreshing but real. I read your FAQ’s as well and love your ability to embrace beautiful things (design etc) but you are still real about life with children.
Anyway, you have a new fan here. And a HUGE cheers for the top 50 of Time Mag websites. You deserve it.
Beautiful story! I’m amazed and impressed that you went natural. For my first birth (which happened in Feb. of this year) I decided to go epidural just to help control the fear I had beforehand. It ended up being the best thing for me, especially since our little guy (not really little – 10.1 pounds) was facing the wrong way and needed a little help coming out! But we had a great doctor who knew what he was doing and everything ended up being fine. :)
I totally believe you can stop your labor. For me, the midwife on duty was not one that I was comfortable with and I’m quite certain that it stalled my labor. So glad you could get your other children together and settled so that you could bring June into the world. I love the photos you have of your experience and wish I had more but I know they would not have been G rated! LOL. Congratulations on your little one!
Oh my goodness, I love this post. It so resonated with me. I was totally the “hahah everything is great, i’m so happy!” between contractions and “get away from me, don’t talk, don’t touch and don’t even try to encourage me” during contractions.
And I also threw a tantrum during the last rush of pushing. My poor dr. was trying to encourage me “you can do it!!” “No! I can’t! YOU DO IT!! Get in there with those tongs and GET IT OUT!!” Oh man. So hard, but so great. And oh, the meal at the end. My husband almost missed the birth because I sent him out for two meatball subs and a six-pack of Sprite. Besides the baby, the BEST part about giving birth.
Love the story. And I am bewildered that both birth stories I have read have both of my child’s birthdates in them. I also named my second baby girl, Flora. She was born, April 22, 2009. I love the name!!! My oldest daughter Ciera was born May 7, 2007.
Congratulations! You are amazing to have so many children. I love your honesty in the story about how you feel about birth.
I just found this series, and I am so glad that I did! My partner and I have been trying to conceive for over a year, and we just found out in June that we have to do IVF, which starts in September. Since the beginning of this whole parade of months of negatives, procedures, surgery and disappointment, I’ve been searching obsessively for birth stories that I can relate to and find some sort of comfort in. I have this strange urgency in needing to know what it’s going to be like, and these stories are perfect. I hope you continue them!
I love a birth story. Yours had me teary even though I don’t know you.
And it reminded me of my last labor, #4.
10 days before my due date, dialated to 4. My dr. stripped my membranes and said, “you call me as soon as labor starts. It might be fast.”
Trouble was I had 2 kids home with strep thraot and one whose tonsils were so swollen he could hardly breathe. I was up with him the whole night before shaking him awake when he gasped for breath.
His dr. gave him a big dose of prednizone in hopes that it would shrink the tonsils enough for him to breath normally.
Otherwise he’d be admitted into the hospital that night for monitering.
Say what?
Amd, to make matters really worse, my boy threw up each time he tried to take that nasty medicine.
So much so that we had him sitting on the back porch in his underwear, trying to take the medicine and barfing.
I was totally in labor by that point but I was not allowing myself to think about it.
Instead, I trying to figure out how James and I would both be in differnt hospitals for the night and hosing the barf off the patio.
It was great.
Finally my husband got prednizone my son could keep down, we got everyone in bed for the night, I took a shower, had some dinner, folded some laundry, sat down on the couch and yow! my contractions really started to hurt.
I called the dr and went to the hospital.
Not that you cared about any of that, but there it is anyway.
Hope you don’t mind me stalking your blog and reading all about you.
I am inspired by you, your family, your life and the things you are doing.
Love from,
Greta
I love reading your stories. you draw us in into your story. Thanks for writing this blog. it never gets boring
Your birth story reveals such a refreshing and healthy attitude towards childbirth, especially resonating as you are a mother of 6: amazing! I truly enjoyed the part about “another person needs to come out of you”… so practical! I feel a healthy baby and mother should always be the goal, but it seems there is an increasing fixation on natural birth and dealing with the challenge without medical aid… and that those who do so are “real woman”. That maybe the best choice for some, but after my birth (very long with back labor so I went for the epi after I got to 5+ cm) experience, I am glad my body was in expert hands. I hope to have another although I do not think I will make it to 6!
Oh, wow, those homecoming photos from 2 yrs ago make my ovaries ache! Happy birthday, June, and many years to come!
I was just reading through June’s birth story and got down to the picture of your midwife and go so excited! I work with Mary as a Labor and Delivery nurse where you delivered. It is an awesome hospital and was fun to see a connection. Even though I see birth’s for a living I still love the birth stories that are shared on your blog.
Hi mates, good paragraph and good urging commented here, I am actually enjoying by these.|
Oh this I can relate to, I love epidurals because I hate pain and I hate pushing, even though I really had it decently easy- Charlie Brown head baby number two, a boy, was for the longest time the hardest birth, but still fast, number 4 was one push because she was 5. 13 or something (I have no memory for numbers anymore) but baby five and baby 4 both were whatever you call it when their head is up instead of down, right? Well one push tiny baby that worked fine, but closer to 7 lb baby was very hard, even more than Charlie Brown who was 8lbs something oz. ! I am too old to do this again. It freaks me out. I love being pregnant, I love them after with soft baby skin and hair, and as they grow, even teenagers, but birthing scares me. My last two I totally went through the panic, and then the panic tantrum very much the last one with the same voices in my head vs what I was saying! :)
Congratulations Gabrielle!! Beautifully written story.
You wrote this post years ago, so I’ll understand if you don’t respond, but I thought I’d throw it out there in case. We are pregnant with our third girl and considering the name June for her first name. I have looked up the popularity of it on the social security website, and it shows that it’s rising in popularity (probably because of your cute June! :), but I’m wondering if you’ve noticed the same, or if you still feel like it’s pretty uncommon? Our other two girls have names that aren’t even in the top thousand, so I’m not sure I want a more popular one paired with their names. You are the only person I know of who has a June, so I wonder how popular it really could be, and thought I’d just see what your thoughts are after several years of experience with it.
Can’t believe how much you look like Maude in these photos :)
I loved re-reading this story! I first started reading Design Mom while you were pregnant with Flora June. Although my own children were well into their teen years at that time, the blog was such a gift and I’ve continued to follow you over the years. My oldest and his wife just had their first baby, and it was fun to read Flora June’s birth story as a new grandmother!!