I love reflecting upon the birth stories of each of my boys. Each birth was unique in its own way, and has been so fun to remember and recount to them. Matt and I did a lot of preparation in order to have Aiden & Graham naturally, and I want the boys to know how loved they were right from the moment we met. If you’re curious, you can read Aiden’s birth story here.
I’ll start by saying that the women in my family have very fast labors. The longest first-born labor in my family was 10 hours, and the second-born labors ranged from 2-4 hours in length. So because Aiden was born in under 9 hours, I expected my second labor to be in the 3 hour range, which is why I was pretty surprised when it took 9 hours and 15 mins to birth my second babe.
We decided to be surprised with the gender of this baby, because I wanted the experience at least once of learning the baby’s gender upon meeting them. So when my labor began 6 days past my due date, you can imagine, we were quite ready to meet our baby and learn what we were having.
On Thursday, January 2nd, I had awoken in the middle of the night to some painful contractions that subsided after an hour. Later that morning, my body seemed to be exhibiting some signs that labor was coming soon so we called my mom and asked her to drive up and come watch Aiden, just in case.
By around 12:30pm while eating lunch, contractions re-started for me and were about 10-11 minutes apart. We placed our hospital bags in the car, put Aiden down for a nap, and went to my pre-scheduled midwife appointment. By the time we arrived, I was having contractions that were closer together and my midwife said I was already 4cm dilated.
She suggested we go get some dessert, walk around, and when contractions pick up a bit more, head to the hospital because the baby would be coming soon. My contractions began to get closer together and more intense, so we briefly stopped at a Dunkin’ Donuts, got some donut fuel and headed to the hospital.
At around 4pm, we got to the hospital and were given a labor & delivery room, where Matt helped me labor naturally for the next 5 1/2 hours. Some things that were helpful in furthering my labor along and relaxing during contractions were: a labor playlist, a medicine ball, labor essential oil blend, spoonfuls of honey, and a soaking tub.
By 9:55pm, I was standing as Matt supported me and I started to feel the need to push. As I pushed upon one of the contractions, my water broke all over Matt’s feet (my apologies to Matt’s socks, which ended up in the trash later) and within a minute, my midwife and nurses were in position ready to catch the baby.
I pushed for just a couple of minutes and baby came out, with his hand held right up next to his face, and the umbilical cord around his neck. Thankfully, my midwife very quickly moved the cord, and passed the baby to Matt for him to lift up and discover that we had a boy! Graham Owen McCrory was born at exactly 10pm weighing in at 8 lbs 12 oz. Our sweet boy was quite bruised at first because of the umbilical cord, but we were so in love.
Both of my boys took about 9 hours of labor to be born, but each labor was unique to each boy. I loved getting to experience natural, unmedicated labors with both of them and was so grateful for the amazing support of Matt through each labor.
Graham, you surprised us in so many ways. You came late, when your brother came early; you took your time when I thought labor would be fast; you weighed a whole pound more than your big brother, and totally surprised us by making me a double-boy-mom. I am so grateful to the Lord for the surprise of you–you have fit into our family better than I could have imagined, and I can’t wait to recount to you this story of the surprise and gift that you are.
