The ex-midwives
Being confronted with my greatest fear left me with no other option than complete surrender. When I allowed my mind to travel to the worst possible scenario, the destination where I arrived was Maya dying in during childbirth. There was nothing I had ever been more sure about than choosing Maya as my life partner. Nothing would be more devastating than losing her. This was the backdrop for the vortex of terror I entered when Maya, who was presumably in labor, was told by our midwife (who shall not be named) that if she didn't get to an emergency room immediately she could have a stroke and die.
With Maya 37 weeks pregnant, our midwives informed us that Taishan was too large, and if Maya didn't go into labor before her due date, she would need to be induced. We left the meeting in tears, fearing we would be forced to go to the hospital, since first born children typically arrive 10 days after the due date. We were in the height of COVID-19, and a hospital birth meant she would have to choose between me or her mother joining her in the delivery room. Her mother was the most experienced and informed person we know when it comes to childbirth, and I was simply not going to miss this birth. It was an impossible dilemma. The only hope provided by our midwives was for Maya to begin consuming copious amounts of red raspberry leaf tea to naturally induce labor.
The prescription appeared to be effective, and within a week Maya began what we presumed was active labor. I was wrapping up what was supposed to be my second to last week of work ever with my first baby, Youth Impact Hub Oakland, the organization I co-founded and nurtured for the previous decade. I was frantically documenting my organizational history, when Maya stepped into our home office and calmly reported that she was in an altered state of consciousness. We walked outside under a clear blue sky, and she was entranced by the vivid colors and the shapes of the trees. We had read many accounts of this happening to women as they began going into labor, so I had a feeling the afternoon would be eventful. I returned to work, bouncing rhythmically in front of my computer on a pilates ball, trying to keep my mind from drifting to thoughts about the birth. During my last meeting of the day, I began hearing subtle moaning sounds coming from the bedroom. Maya poked her head into the office and and announced she was having contractions. I swiftly wrapped up my Zoom call and let my colleagues know it would probably be the last meeting we ever have together.
For the next 5 days, Maya went through what we later learned was false labor. We rode an emotional roller coaster as she continued to have waves of intense contractions that never progressed towards her cervix opening. We were desperate for Taishan to descend from the womb. We prayed to our ancestors. We bounced on the pilates ball and sang songs together. We visited the avocado tree where we did our pregnancy test and asked for support from the earth. We built a birth altar with photos and relics of our own births. Nothing seemed to be working.
Day 5 was my birthday, which would prove to be the most tumultuous, memorable, and ultimately satisfying celebration I have ever experienced. We began the day wondering if Taishan would become my birthday twin. Following the pattern of the previous days, Maya continued to ride the consistent waves of contractions that ebbed and flowed through her body. One of our midwives came to check in on Maya in the afternoon. At this point, we were trying to do everything in our power to avoid contact with the midwives since each time we saw them we left with heightened fear and stress. This is not the desirable way to feel when interacting with the people entrusted to guide you through the birth process! When she quickly attempted to take Maya’s blood pressure, we pleaded for her to leave Maya in peace. She insisted that she follow her protocol, and I could sense that Maya was on the verge of tears as the band was being tightly velcroed around her upper arm. When the machine announced the completion of its examination with a soulless beep, the midwife looked at the number like it was a pile of vomit with traces of undigested gummy worms. She scrunched her nose and said that based on the extremely high reading, Maya needed to be hospitalized immediately. We launched into a hysterical protest, trying to educate her about white coat syndrome and the very real possibility that the history of stressful interactions we had with her in the previous months resulted in an artificially high reading. In response to our pleas, she agreed to let Maya have some time to get grounded and then do another reading.
Maya, who hadn’t so much as stepped out of bed in the last 3 days, jumped out of the blankets with the agility of a teenage gymnast and marched to the shower while shouting over her shoulder, “I am not going to the hospital.”
I followed her lead and shut the door behind us. I quickly turned on the hot water and helped her step gingerly into the tub. We sat together and visualized being in her happy place at the hot springs of Tabacon, Costa Rica. As steam filled the room, we practiced deep breathing while holding hands. When she felt sufficiently grounded, we turned off the water and returned to the bedroom.
She succeeded in getting a low number on her next blood pressure reading, but at that point it was inconsequential. The midwife said that based on the first number Maya recorded, she was required to be hospitalized and that we could no longer legally proceed with a home birth. Our options were to call an ambulance or drive directly to the hospital so she could transfer our care. She said that Maya was at risk of a stroke and feared for her life if she did not go to the hospital. My heart sunk beneath the floor. She shared that at the hospital they were likely to induce labor with pitocin and an epidural, which were exactly the kinds of interventions we were trying to avoid. My whole body descended to the core of the earth. I was terrified and frozen in a state of shock. My worst fear was surfacing and starring me aggressively in the face. Maya could die. I was depressed about the prospect of going to the hospital, yet I didn't see how we could possibly go against the information that was just provided. I looked at Maya, and she appeared unusually calm. She requested a quick break so that we could discuss our options, and the midwife agreed to step outside and wait in her car.
Maya and I returned to the bathroom, this time joined by her mother. Irit is an acupuncturist who specializes in fertility and pregnancy, and in my mind should very well have the letters M.D. after her name. If there was anyone who could help guide us out of this pickle, she would be the one. As soon as I shut the door, Maya began laughing hysterically. She was clothed in a giant white sheet wrapped haphazardly around her bulging pregnant body. I felt like curling up in a ball and crying, and she appeared to be having the time of her life. Was she in an altered state from the emotional rush of being in labor for 4 days? Was I in an altered state? Even though she looked like a drunk college student dressed as a Greek goddess, she appeared to be completely lucid.
A 10 minute meeting ensued, mostly spoken in Hebrew between Maya and her mother to avoid the risk of the midwife overhearing the conversation. I followed along through a combination of context and body language and got the gist of it. “This bitch is crazy. She is totally incompetent. She doesn't even understand that she is the reason I have high blood pressure. I am fine. I know my body, and I know I'm fine. I am NOT going to the hospital!” I was terrified based on what I heard from the midwife, but I saw the grounded certainty in Maya’s eyes and knew there was no stopping this train.
Irit saw that same fiery, confident glare in her daughter’s eyes and validated the need to trust her intuition. She began to look up Youtube videos about cutting the umbilical cord in case we needed to deliver the baby without support. As if she had been lightly struck by a lightning bolt of divine intervention, she casually announced an even better idea, which was to seek out a substitute midwife. She made a brief call to Paula, a midwife she had briefly met at an event years ago. Paula miraculously answered the phone, despite being in the middle of a holiday party. Within a few minutes, Irit explained the bullet points of our situation. Paula said she thought Maya should be able to have a home birth and agreed to meet with us the same night! We were ecstatic. My fears were given temporary permission to rest, knowing that we would not be completely alone in our birthing journey.
With our plan B secured, Maya jubilantly dashed out of the house wearing nothing but her white sheet. She nimbly traversed our garden, her bare feet skipping along the frigid concrete pathway until she arrived at the driver’s side window of the midwife’s car. In the most economical use of words she has ever spoken, she declared, “We’re done with you, you can leave.” With a dramatic twirl of her white sheet, she turned around and hopped happily back into our warm home.
The midwife timidly returned to our kitchen to make us sign a legal release. Maya seemed to be in a better mood than anytime since before becoming pregnant. I felt like I could ride on the coattails of her confidence, but the embers of fear were still burning softly in my belly. We anxiously awaited our meeting with Paula, hoping she would confirm Maya’s intuition and disprove the messages we had been fed by our now ex-midwife (an ex-midwife is definitely never the kind of ex I would ever thought I would have in this lifetime). I prayed that we were making the right decision not to go to the hospital. Maya continued to bask in confidence, but until we met with Paula, my mind kept going through worst case scenarios and wondering if we were making a terrible mistake.
That night we drove to Paula's house, and from the moment we walked into her home, I knew our reality was going to radically change for the better. Her living room was filled with a forest of well attended plants, and her own children lounging on comfortable couches, the epitome of a wholesome, winter family gathering. We stepped into her office and proceeded to relay our series of unfortunate encounters with our ex-midwives. She knocked down each of our concerns as quickly as we unveiled them, as if she were playing a game of midwife whack-a-mole. She said that it didn’t matter if Maya has GBS. Boom! Based on her assessment, Maya likely did not have gestational diabetes or high blood pressure. Boom! Boom! She showed us that Taishan was perfectly sized and that the ex-midwives measured him incorrectly because he was not yet engaged in Maya’s cervix. BOOM! She shared that Maya's five days of false labor were likely caused by the red raspberry leaf tea she had consumed under the misguided advice of the ex-midwives. Every revelation felt like a layer of smog being filtered out of the air, until I began to see clearly again for the first time in months. I noticed that Paula’s arm chair had the exact same fabric pattern as our shower curtain. It all combined to give me the unmistakable feeling that we were in precisely the right place at the right time. She comically gave us the marching orders to go home, watch movies, make love, drink a beer and relax. As we left her home, she smiled and said, “The baby will come when it is ready to come.”
We drove home in ecstatic celebration. The vast desert of fear and dread that we had been traversing for months had transformed into an oasis of ease. We looked at each other and laughed hysterically, the only sensible action to process the immense emotional roller coaster we had traversed in one day. We had gone from thinking Maya was going to give birth in the morning, to being told that she was at risk of death in the afternoon, to now being told that she was having a normal, healthy pregnancy that would conclude with our baby arriving anytime in the next 26 days. We got home and ate my birthday cake, which could not have tasted any sweeter.
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For a musical offering on trusting in a greater power, check out “Surrender” by clicking the image below.
“I’m approaching the altar with an offering
and a prayer for my heart to keep softening ,
So I can be the melody you want sing
Life always bounces back that’s why we call it spring”