On Sept. 11th, I started my countdown to Maciella’s arrival. She was already 4 days past due, and although I had not felt anything but Braxton Hicks contractions; I was definitely sensing she was going to be making her appearance soon. However, if at all possible, I really didn’t want my baby girl to be born on a day our nation mourned. I wanted her to be free to celebrate her birth without the pull to memorialize the tragic event of 9/11.
The birth story of my first born was not exactly how my husband and I envisioned it would be. But isn’t labor like that for every first time mom? Nevertheless, we were doing everything we could to be “well-prepared” parents on the day of our little man’s delivery.
I can remember by husband and I attending every birthing class offered. We were those eager students ready to learn all we could, in hopes to have the perfect labor experience. I love planning and organizing, so I already had a detailed vision of what my labor was going to look like. My birthing plan in a nutshell was to labor as much as possible at home, give birth to my son vaginally without any medication, and rely on the help of my mid-wife with just my husband and I in the delivery room. My husband was going to help by cuing the instrumental music, be on standby for inspirational scriptures, pillow propping, massages and yoga ball exercises as needed. We were ready to execute our plan! As far as the baby room preparation, getting all the baby clothes ready to wear and packing my hospital bag, we were just going to wait until I was off of work. After all, we were still in March, I was going to take the month of April off to relax and slowly prepare. The baby wasn’t due till May 2nd-that should have been enough time right? So we thought.
It All Began With Two 