San Antonio Birth Photographer: Home Birth Turned Hospital Induction
Jordan planned to deliver her fourth baby the same way she had her last two: in a birthing pool in her living room. But when her fundal height was measuring significantly lower than expected at her 37 week appointment, her midwife made the unexpected call to head straight to the hospital. In triage, Jordan found out her amniotic fluid levels were significantly low and her placenta wasn’t doing great either. In the span of a few hours, her plans to birth at home turned into a 37 week induction. Her husband packed some necessities and met her at the hospital. As a doula and midwife-in-training, Jordan was prepared to advocate for herself and the low-intervention birth she was planning.
She consented to some cervical softening to start and was prepared to take things nice and slow. The next morning, they started Pitocin on a very low dose and planned to slowly increase it as (and if) needed. Later in the day, while still on a very low dose of Pitocin, Jordan and her husband had an informed discussion about potentially breaking her waters. She asked for time to think about it, gave it some thought, discussed it further with her birth team, and she ultimately decided she wanted to move forward with AROM (artificial rupture of the membranes). Things picked up very quickly after that, and within the hour, Jordan was sitting on the toilet and said something along the lines of how she wasn’t liking how intense they felt but that she knew that meant she was getting close. She got comfortable on the bed: hands and knees over the birthing ball.
I had actually just returned to the room after refilling her ice water when Jordan suddenly said the baby was coming. The nurse came in the room requesting a cervical check, but Jordan simply said no multiple times before the nurse gave up trying. Seconds later, while on her knees in the bed, her daughter was born into her own hands. She had a nuchal cord that Jordan pulled over baby’s head, and as a nurse came up with a bulb syringe, Jordan held her daughter out for some suctioning. A little while later the on-call OB came in the room. She did something you don’t often see at a hospital birth, which was sit down and wait. After about 5-10 minutes, she asked Jordan if she could asses for tears, clamp the cord, and get the placenta delivered. Within the hour, the room was quiet and emptying, and these fourth time parents got to enjoy some peaceful hours getting to know their baby girl! It was a birth full of autonomy, agency, and respect for the birth space and mother. This birth served as a beautiful reminder that a middle ground can be found between the medical and the physiological aspects of birth; and that a medical birth doesn’t mean relinquishing autonomy.
