What does a 40 hour labor look like?
One of the biggest things I find myself counseling families about is the unpredictability of birth. It’s one of the few things in life that we can predict…unlike jobs, vacations, school, or family visits, a birth will start, well….when it’s ready to start. Sometimes birth is short (I recently attended a birth in which the mama labored for a total of 1.5 hours–the baby was born 20 minutes after I arrived!), and sometimes it’s looooong…and we never really know until it gets going which it will be.
This story is a great example of this…this mama, a former client of mine, has written a wonderful account of her 40 hour vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC) at 35 weeks! What was so wonderful about this birth was how empowered this mama was throughout the whole process. She was a great inspiration to the entire labor and delivery staff. It’s births like these that leave me in awe of women’s strength and intuitive wisdom as they bring new life into the world.
