Mother’s Experience

Editor’s note: This article first appeared in Midwifery Today, Issue 88, Winter 2008. Join Midwifery Today Online Membership “There’s the heart; everything looks okay. The placenta is over here; up here is the head.” The ultrasound probe zigzagged over my nicely rounded abdomen. It was the first time we realized that our baby was breech. It was only the 23rd week and the doctor assured us the baby was still flip-flopping around in my uterus and it had plenty of time to turn itself around before delivery. Knowing it was breech, however, got the wheels of my brain turning. I had assisted with quite a number of deliveries over a period of seven years and knew I did not want to have a breech baby. I’d witnessed ten breech births and knew it was something I hoped never to have to do. Furthermore, I was sure I knew way too much about the risks of a breech delivery to ever go into labor with confidence. With these misgivings I asked my midwife, Mary Hostetler, who’s also my grandmother, to check the baby’s position. It was breech. Oh, bother. I took it upon myself to do the slant lie. I lay in bed with my bottom on a pile of about four pillows until I felt like I was nearly standing on my head. I had a Doppler close by to check on the baby every once in a while. Then I started poking on my poor belly like I never had before, praying all the while that if I was being foolish God would deliver me from my own foolishness. I worked at getting her little butt up out of my pelvis then tried to push her little head around to flip her. I was in that position for about… Read more…. Mother’s Experience

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About Author: Elizabeth Beachy

Elizabeth Beachy is a stay-at-home mom. She attends an occasional birth here and there. She enjoys serving God, helping and spending time with people, being a mom, singing and scrapbooking. She likes to spend time outdoors, eating healthful foods and living a simple life.

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