birthED Express + Refresh Birth Story - Transformative Birth in The Backseat

Thank you Amelia for sharing your backseat birth story! What a wild ride! Amelia is also a birth and postpartum doula - check out her website to learn more about her.

My first birth was a long one that started with premature rupture of the membranes at 41.5 weeks and after labor didn’t start within 12 hours, I was urged to go into the hospital to start an induction process that took days. While my daughter’s birth was incredible, I knew there were things I could change for next time.

Halfway into my pregnancy with my second child, I started prep work which included hiring a doula with spinning babies experience ( and practicing spinning babies regularly leading up to the birth), taking birthED Express class with Liz, and switching from a hospital birth center to Willow Birth Center. In the final weeks I also enlisted the help of an acupuncturist. My final trimester felt incredibly supported, celebrated and most importantly I felt incredibly confident. Throughout my pregnancy I had always said that I felt labor would begin once trick-or-treating ended and my proved to true.

At 10PM on Halloween night, I began experience light contractions. I laid down and was able to sleep intermittently through them. My first labor was days, so I spent the next 24 hours in complete denial that birth was imminent. I had an acupuncture appointment scheduled for 3PM on Nov 1st and decided to keep it. Going into the appointment I would estimate my contractions were about 6 minutes apart and leaving that appointment they were about 4 minutes apart.

I continued to cook dinner for my family and kissed my toddler to bed before going to the basement to continue laboring. By this point contractions were intense and coming very regularly. I let my doula and the birth center know where I was at. They encouraged me to hop in the bath and see if they slowed down and to check back in at 10PM.  I took this as a sign to continue laboring at home. I continued until the intensity ramped up to a point where I started crying “I can’t do this anymore.” In hindsight, I was in transition, but it’s amazing how you lose sight of these things when you are the one birthing.

We loaded up the car and I sat in the backseat to have more space to move. Within 5 minutes of leaving my house I was instinctively and silently ripping my clothes off. After seeing blood on the seat, I reached down, and I could feel a head. I informed my husband that he would need to pull over and call 911. He pulled into a church parking lot and came around to my seat where he was absolutely shocked (maybe slightly horrified?) to see a head crowning.

My baby did all the work as they slid out with minimal pushing ( a far cry from my first birth which was 3 hours of pushing). My husband caught the baby and put it through my legs, and I brought it up to my chest. At 10 PM my second daughter entered this world. and we sat silently in awe of what just happened.

I walked away from that birth a new person. Every birth is transformative for its own reasons but this one showed me that I am stronger than I know. It also showed me preparation is key. I strongly credit Liz’s teachings as to why my husband didn’t faint as he caught his daughter (which he nearly did in our first birth), and my ability to remain composed and know that everything was okay. I also feel that Spinning Babies helped position my baby allowing for a nearly textbook birth (even if I missed the cues). While I never made it to the cushy birthing tubs at Willow, it turns out a backseat birth could be just as beautiful.