Photo: Shea Long, Coastal Lifestyles Photography
I was 40 weeks and six days pregnant with my second baby, feeling huge and uncomfortable and more than ready to meet our new family member. In an effort to bring on labour (and after trying everything else under the sun), I got myself a tea latte and went for a solo hike in our local park. I sat on a tree stump and meditated, asking the baby to please come out now, and proceeded to march quickly up a steep hill.
Well, apparently that did it. Later that night, I went to bed feeling consistent, gentle contractions. Shortly after 10 p.m., what I can only describe as a surprising but painless internal firework exploded?it was my water breaking. My husband, Andrew, and I erupted into fits of laughter as we tried to get a handle on what was happening, and we began to prepare ourselves to meet our newest little one. I?d chosen to have a home birth this time because my first birth experience was so fast. Archie had come like a bat out of the night. I was only in the hospital for three hours in total, and then I was back in my own bed at home to recover. I?d had a drug-free vaginal birth, so I was confident I?d be able to do it again. This time around, I was dead set against driving through city traffic and labouring in a car at all, especially since I knew my active labour was likely to be short. Our plan was that if I went into labour at night, we?d move our ?labour room? to the basement in an effort to avoid waking Archie, our todd...