Laurel Kaede's birth story

The birth of Laurel Kaede. Do not copy, edit or use this story without permission.

I’d already had 2 home births. One girl, one boy. I had midwives with both, and at the time I felt fine about that, but after #2 we knew deliverance was inevitable, not dependent on outside hands. My midwives were lovely and did not control the experience.

After 2 babies, 18 months apart and tandem nursing for a few years, I didn’t think I would have more. 4 years and 2 months after Thayer, I was pregnant again! What a gift, realizing “control” is an illusion. :)

About 3 days before my expected period, I was cleaning the house, I was in my bathroom wiping the sink and suddenly felt like taking a pregnancy test. I guess it was instinct. My period wasn’t late, I didn’t feel symptoms, I didn’t consciously think anything, just felt driven to take one. It was later in the day so it was very, very light…but undeniable. That day I took a shaky trip to Dollar Tree for three more tests, and called my husband on the way. Neither of us felt ready for more kids! But the Creator of beautiful things knows better than we do…we always said that if The Father wants us to have more, the power is His to cause it to be, our conscious avoidance is futile. This was the case, it seems. :)

I knew from the moment I saw the test that I didn’t want to hire midwives but I was unsure how my husband would feel even though we had talked prior to that, as though we would likely go without professionals...I wasn’t sure if he’d still be on board now that it was a reality. He asked me what I thought and I said I wanted to free birth, and I was slightly surprised to hear him say that’s what he wanted too, he just didn’t want me to feel pushed into anything either way.

Fast forward...a beautiful, intimate, mindful and sacred pregnancy season, from June through March.
The whole pregnancy I just simply invested in trust. Trust in our Creator and Father as my sole Care Provider. He empowered me to care for us in the ways He authored-eating well, moving, spending time with the earth, with God. (Keeping my own records of certain “clinical” things only to have later on in case of accusations) I trusted the Spirit to make known to me everything I needed to be aware of, that my body was made well to speak to me about what I needed, how I should move. The Word did that in every way, and cared very personally for me and the new being inside me. I pursued Wisdom and let myself trust Her. I avoided sharing a lot of details, I wasn’t looking for affirmation from anyone. I remained very active and strong, most of my preparations involved special moments I wanted to share with my family. I made a strand of stone beads for my labor—an unknown number of beads signifying how little I knew of how it would go and how many contractions it would take to bring her, and 10 moonstones along with some other beautiful gemstones. Just before our 10th new moon (I counted moons instead of weeks)...

Thursday, March 15, I had a regularly scheduled chiro adjustment, after which we did some wilding at a local nature trail around 3 small lakes...I kept having to pee so bad and got a bit impatient toward the end. After lunch and a little quiet time we went to another park for more wilding...my kids love climbing trees, etc so I wanted to squeeze in as much as possible since I knew one of those days would be the last. During time at the second park I contracted and while peeing in tall grasses noticed more and more pink tissue. Drew was working next to Bryan Park, so as he left the job site, I had him come by so that I could tell him in person that I felt somewhat like true labor was beginning. 

Funny story: A beloved friend lives in the same neighborhood as this park, and as I was slowly getting more reclusive, uncomfortable and ready to get home, she and her 3 children came trooping down the street. We said hello, but I wanted to leave since now my options for going pee were more limited. However, they wanted to show us a dead beaver they'd seen in another part of the park. I wasn't ready to reveal the sense that I was possibly already laboring, but I didn't even want my Pranas buttoned at that point! I was merely tolerating this disruption. A dead beaver was not on my list of things to purpose attention toward. 😂Love you, Martha! 😆

seeing Daddy on his way back
to the shop from the job site is special!

Later that afternoon, cooking dinner and getting my big kids showered, they helped by pushing the start stop button on a contraction app so I could see the frequency, in case I needed to ask Drew to leave work early. I texted him the screen shot, he finished a meeting he was in, then left work. I made dinner, some toothpaste, water kefir, etc...just in case it was for real so it would all be done. We had dinner, and while we played our traditional game of SkipBo with our 6 & almost 5 year old, I got impatient; the game seemed to drag on like never before!

Midnight 3.16 in labor, total shalom.
With none but the One Deliverer.

After getting the kids down for bed, I took a bath and tried to sleep around 10:30 but reasoned that if this were it, I needed to do the work either way—spaced out and slow with half-assed sleep or keep moving and face the work...so I got up and labored alone, pacing, drinking labor-aid and ice water, listening to Genesis & Psalms, looking out at the night through the back door & dancing, circling on the ball in the glow of the salt lamp. Around midnight I did the ice trays then took a shower and headed upstairs and continued...now listening to music, swaying in the hammock, kneeling by the tub, and a little in the bath. A lot of prayer for surrender, worship, gratitude, asking for whatever He knew I needed to do this holy work. Around 3 I asked Drew to keep me company and we both ended up dozing on the bathroom floor; I would get up on all fours or leaning on the tub each time I felt the wave begin to build. I used my voice during that time. I kept waking up shivering cold, so I asked my husband for a blanket, then ran a bath, got in it and kept falling asleep between contractions. At one point I chose to focus on breathing underneath the source of the tension and I found that much more energy efficient than vocalizing, which seemed to waste energy/keep it too high in my body. A couple contractions this way and I felt a twinge of what they call “FER”(Best described by the Spirit as that raw mother growl flow downward energy straight from the King of Heaven and earth) so I got out of the tub and asked Drew to wake the kids; about 4:40 am. They were in and out of the bathroom, but mostly they sat on our bed listening to their audiobooks and waiting quietly. Next to the tub on a towel I kept breathing under the depth of the wave but FER didn’t return for a bit...I chose to see if I could feel the sac since my water hadn’t broken and when I did, after a few tries with my fingernail, it let out (that sac was TOUGH!) and FER returned within a few contractions... I will never forget that moment I felt her body move out of mine with primal sounds and movements, her head cradled as she emerged by the bare, strong, calloused hand of her Daddy...instantly after which l I picked up my sweet baby and saw it was a girl... strong and crying, breathing and 100% healthy.

5:40 am March 16. 8lbs 5oz 20.5” So exhilarating, and 100% perfect. Because she cried immediately, Arden and Thayer came running just after I pulled her to my chest. They were exclaiming “BABY!!!” Birthed the placenta into a bowl (same one that held Arden & Thayer’s placentas!) a couple minutes later.

I was fully immersed in the feminine power I was made for and suddenly saw how incredibly normal I am, how normal birth is, and how beautiful women are for participating in such an ordinary miracle. How happy I was that my children had the opportunity to see me this way. Radiant and strong. How silly it would be to rush out of that miraculous moment in a hurry to get to the next thing or dissociate from the rawness and incredible intimate bonding quality of it in order to quantify the experience the way society says to: weight, length, photos...We sat there skin to skin, messy with birth, taking in one another. Having my face gently wiped of blood i had apparently put there with a hand pushing my hair back from my face, by the only man I would allow in this intimate moment...who had been in the whole experience with me as a partner, unafraid and constantly willing to serve. Having a bath run for us both, her cord and placenta still attached but both of us covered in mec, amniotic fluid and blood...eating homemade granola (and attempting not to spill on her head as she slept in my arms and pooped on me some more) Spent the day snuggling quietly with our family of now five. 💜 it took us all day to decide what her name was, looking at her, asking her, getting to know her and sense her spirit. Laurel Kaede.

The whole day was like a dream...being completely absorbed in every moment together with no one to tell us how or what to do next. The smell of my own pot pie (and a celebratory apple pie I and the kids had prepared for this mysterious person and day) drifting upstairs at dinner time and sitting in my own bed nursing my fresh, new, (hair still plastered with amniotic fluid, vernix and a little bit of blood) tiny, perfect, healthy babe and eating my own satisfying, nourishing home cooked food.


Late that afternoon we weighed her in the scale sling I had sewn and dyed green with chlorophyll, and Daddy burned her cord with beeswax candles over the cedar box he had made from a log he’d brought from work.



We spent a week getting to know each other before sharing the news with anyone else so we wouldn’t have guests. DIY newborn photos because I didn’t want company, a keepsake birth record I personally designed while holding her. Not a single gloved or impersonal hand touching her, pure love energy. Placenta smoothies made by my love, lots of chlorophyll to help my blood volume return to normal, herbal iron (I didn’t lose a ton of blood but just by feeling I could tell I needed to restore my blood) herbal infusions, lots of great, nourishing food and so much LOVE. So high. Still.