C-section Awareness Month

“All at once.

It’s less about you.

And more about, a process.

It’s less of a “birth”

It’s more,

A procedure.

And I hate that. I really, really hate that.”

-Jordan Burch

I read these words from a poem about a woman watching her sister laboring and going in for a C-section. When I first read the poem a few months after my first birth and emergency C-section I cried at the words that were exactly what I was feeling, words that described what I couldn’t put into my own words before. Less about me. More about a procedure.

My body was numb. I remember an audible voice in my head “I’ve already failed her” as they wheeled me into the blindingly bright procedure room from my own warm delivery room. It felt more like I was laying there on the cold table for an ordinary surgery, it didn’t feel like I was going to meet my baby for the first time. I remember one of the nurses talked about her mom who lived in Germany, like she was just catching up with a friend over coffee. Like I wasn’t laying there, about to be cut open, about to have my baby.

It wouldn’t be my deep breaths, my pushing, my power. My husband wouldn’t be assisting me, my numb legs would be strapped down to the table. I would hear his voice, seeming distant and dreamy, “You can do this. You can do this” but I didn’t know what “this” was. I couldn’t see him, I couldn’t see my body, I couldn’t see my baby. My arms would be strapped down as she entered the world, not able to hold her in those first few scary moments of life. I couldn’t tell her that it was going to be alright, and this crushed me. I felt there was something being taken from me. An experience that I had waited my entire life for: the moment they would lay my daughter on my chest. A moment for me, my husband, and the baby we created together to be one for the very first time. Intimately and freshly united. Tears and sweat and blood, messy and extraordinary. One of those extremely few, deeply sacred moments we expect in life.

Like the scar that sits a few inches now below my bellybutton, is the scar of that expectation and experience that I felt was cut from my life. I felt a loss. I still feel that scar. I can run my fingers over the overgrown skin and be taken back to that moment when the doctors were stitching me up, still talking about their day and the trips they had coming up, just another day of work. My baby wasn’t in the same room as me for even 5 minutes, no first cry for me to hear. My husband was gone, no hand for mine to hold in a soft triumph of “I did it.” I felt more alone in that moment than in my entire life. The first time I saw my baby was through a picture my husband took of her in the nursery, I wouldn't see her in real life for a few hours. Even typing this now I feel the pain I did then.

I felt guilty that this experience was so traumatic. I felt that if my baby was healthy, I should feel grateful and nothing else. I did not feel strong.

The healing was long and difficult, both emotionally and physically. And my expectations were trampled by the unforeseen circumstances of life. I had to work through all of these things all the while learning how to be a mom. It’s a long journey, and it’s still not over yet.

But here I am, another C-section later. A scar a little thicker. My perspective on birth changed by the understanding that only comes through experience. I’ve learned that it’s okay to feel the pain of disappointment and loss. I’ve learned that birth trauma is real and something that many women face. I’ve learned that I did not fail my baby, I have shown my daughter that I can do hard things and so can she. It was her first hard thing, and we were in it together. I’ve learned that all mothers are strong because of the sacrifices we make from the moment a little poppy seed is growing in our bellies. I’ve learned that emotional support and healing are crucial. I’ve learned that even though it wasn’t what I expected, it doesn’t mean that I was not strong. I've learned that it was about my family - me, my baby, my husband. And it was miraculous.

The poem from above goes on…

“It’s less about the process.

The procedures.

And the music choices.

And it’s back to how it should be.

How it should have been, all along.

It’s all about the baby.

And you.

The story, ends so much happier.

Thankfully…

But there is still a story in the struggle.

And I won’t be silenced by those who can’t understand it…”

link for the whole beautiful poem here: https://www.lamaze.org/Connecting-the-Dots/a-poem-and-image-to-recognize-cesarean-awareness-month-2018