We first found out I was pregnant just before Christmas of 2005. We were pleasantly surprised, as up to that point I hadn't had a luteal phase long enough to support a pregnancy. It was a lot of fun to share the news with family and friends at this special time of year. My mom in particular gave us a great opportunity to tell in a unique way; as she called to tell us she and Dad were on the way up here for Christmas, she said that if we had any more children, she was either going to have to start shipping the presents to us or buy an SUV. So Read had the clever idea of buying her a Matchbox SUV and wrapping it up as a present. She got it right away, and everyone was excited to hear that there would be another little King around.

From the beginning there were some things about this pregnancy that were different. Usually during the first trimester nothing sounds good except junk food, but this time I had an aversion to sweets, which was really odd. I had a hard time emotionally in the first trimester as well; I kept fearing that I was going to miscarry, and couldn't really let myself get excited about being pregnant until we finally heard the heartbeat at 11 weeks. Later on I was plagued by repeated UTIs in the second trimester and a couple of nasty stomach viruses in my third. Still, overall I felt well and was thankful for the little life growing inside of me.

Since we already had three boys, we figured the odds were good that this baby would be a boy as well. We warned everyone that asked if we knew what the gender of the baby was that they should assume it was a boy until proven otherwise. It became a subject I was rather defensive about; I got very tired of hearing “Are you hoping for a girl this time?” or similar comments. Most people assumed that the reason we were continuing to have more children was because we were trying for a girl, and I wanted them to understand that we just wanted more children, regardless of the gender, and that if we had a houseful of boys that was fine by us. Still, our oldest son Geren had been hoping for a sister for about 4 years, and he prayed regularly that God would give him one. He knew that this baby could very well be another brother and he would love him if he was, but his heart's desire was for a sister.

For a large portion of the pregnancy I never let my mind entertain the idea that the baby could be a girl, and didn't acknowledge even to myself how much I would like to have one. Then one morning while sitting at church, there was a sweet little baby girl a couple of rows up who spent a long time staring at me. I found myself asking “Lord, why don't I have a girl?” Suddenly James 4:2 came into my mind: “You do not have because you do not ask.” It was at that point that I realized that in my haste to defend my love for my boys I had never allowed myself to admit that I would like to have a girl as well. So, I kept it quiet, but I began to pray that God would give me a daughter, while at the same time telling Him that I would joyfully accept whatever child He saw fit to give me.

As my due date grew closer, I began to have some anxiety about the birth as well. My last birth, while quick, had been really difficult for me, and I was a little afraid of a repeat experience. So I decided to pray for some specific things in regards to the birth as well. I prayed that I would have a little longer early labor phase this time, so I wasn't hit so hard and fast; that everyone that I wanted to be here would be able to make it; that I would be able to cope well with the contractions; and that I would have a pushing stage of less than 20 minutes. That last one was a big one for me, as the least I've ever pushed is 40 minutes, and I've always hated it. Again, I asked all these things in an effort to pour out my heart before the Lord and to share my desires with Him, but was also willing to accept whatever birth experience I had.

Wednesday, August 30th was my official due date as calculated by ovulation. In the past I have tended to go about a week past my due date, but this was the first time I had been charting when I got pregnant. If I had calculated my due date by LMP instead, I would have been due three days earlier. So Read and I were both guessing that the baby would come sometime over Labor Day weekend, September 1st-4th. On the morning of the 30th I went to the bathroom and had a small amount of pink tinged mucus. I emailed Read, my mom, and my doulas, Lesley and Delilah, to let them know. I told them all not to make too much of it, but that things seemed to be moving in the right direction. Later that night I had what I would definitely call bloody show, but still didn't have anything other than Braxton-Hicks contractions.

Thursday morning I woke up around 5:30 in the morning with a contraction that was more like what I have experienced in labor. I continued to have contractions every 15-20 minutes for about an hour and a half. I expected them to go away when I got up around 7 am, and they did. The boys and I got ready and headed out to homeschool park day around 9 am and played until nearly 11. Afterwards we came home and ate lunch, and I tried to take a nap, but the phone kept ringing, so I finally gave up and went back to working on things around the house. I emailed Lesley and Delilah periodically throughout the day to let them know how things were going, and my mom called to check in as well. My mother-in-law, Flo, arrived around 4:30 in the afternoon; she had come up from The Woodlands to stay until after the baby was born and help keep up with the boys a bit. Once she got here I was finally able to lie down and get a nap. I had some contractions off and on throughout the afternoon and evening, as well as some intermittent bloody show. I talked to my mom about 9:30 that night and let her know that while it still looked like things were getting ready, there was no real sign of progression at this point. She opted to go on to bed early and get some sleep, hoping I would wake her in the night.

The contractions continued throughout most of the night, which made it hard to get much sleep. Read elected to work from home on Friday so that he would be close by if I needed him. My mom checked in with me around 8:30 that morning and decided that she and my dad were going to go ahead and leave around 10 am to head up here from Huntsville as well. As I got up the contractions took a break for a couple of hours, but then started back late morning. I tried taking a walk to see if that would help things along, but it didn't seem to make any difference, and it was too hot to walk for long. The contractions continued to be about 15-45 minutes apart on average; sometimes a bit closer, sometimes a bit longer. Though they weren't all that frequent, by this point when they did come they were fairly intense and uncomfortable. My parents arrived around 1:30 in the afternoon, and I think my mom was surprised to see that things really hadn't changed. She was anxious to get this show on the road, and I was too. I spent most of the day by myself in my room; I just wasn't feeling very social and needed to be alone. I tried to rest some, but wasn't very successful. By Friday evening I was feeling very tired and frustrated. I wanted things to either pick up and go until full blown labor, or to stop long enough for me to get some real sleep. I felt like I was hanging out in some sort of labor limbo land – not really in labor, but not really NOT in labor. I emailed Lesley and Delilah with another update and vented for a while about how discouraged I was feeling, and they promised to pray for me and offered to come sit with me any time I needed them to. Read was a gem, and went out and got me a chicken ranch sandwich from Chili's when nothing else sounded good to me. He kept assuring me that our baby was going to come soon, and that I would do great.

After the boys were all in bed my mom and I headed out for another walk. It was much cooler now, so it was tolerable to walk for a longer period of time. Still, there was no real change in the contractions. When we got back Lesley called to encourage me, and let me know again that she was happy to come sit up with me during the night if I needed her, even if I didn't think I was really in labor. I thanked her, and told her that if nothing had happened by morning that I would probably ask her to come over for a while on Saturday. Afterwards I decided to get in the birth tub for a little while to see if I could relax there and at least rest. Even that didn't seem to help though, and I got out feeling just as annoyed as when I got in.

I told Read I was going to bed a little before 11 pm, and hoped again for rest to come. This time however, the contractions really started to pick up. By 11:15 I went and got Read out of his office and told him I needed him as I was having a hard time coping by myself any longer. After finding out how regularly the contractions were coming and seeing how I was acting, he decided to go ahead and call our midwife, Molly. (Since I have a history of being in denial about when I'm in labor, we had all previously agreed that he got to decide when it was time to call.) They talked for a bit about how things were going, and the plan was for him to call her back in about 30 minutes to report on our progress. Within about 20 minutes he decided to go ahead and call her again, as well as Lesley and Delilah, as he really felt like things were moving right along at this point. Labor had gone quickly for me last time, and everyone was a good 30 minutes to an hour away. Read also woke up my mom and she came in to help me as well.

From this point forward I have no real recollection of times. My labor was very different from anything I had had previously. Physically and mentally I felt done before I ever really got started. I have always felt my contractions more in my back, and counterpressure and hip squeezes help a lot with that. This time around most of the pain was low and in front, and I couldn't find anything that seemed to help. It was like my uterus was already sore from all the contractions prior to active labor, and it just hurt so much with each additional contraction. They seemed to spread out from my belly around to my back and also down my inner thighs. Read suggested that I get back in the birth tub and see if that helped, so I did. The water was a bit warm, so he turned on the bubbles to cool it down. I normally don't care for that, but at the moment it was actually helpful. There was something hypnotic about the rhythm of being bounced around by them and the noise, so we left them on.

Molly arrived and listened to the baby's heartbeat and took my blood pressure. I lamented that the water didn't seem to be nearly as helpful this time as it had in the past, and whined to Read that I really didn't think that I could do this again. I told him that an epidural was sounding good at this point, and he told me if I transferred for that he was taking me to Lewisville Medical Center! (For those of you not from around here, it doesn't have a great reputation for being very natural birth friendly.) I got out of the tub to go to the bathroom, and then decided to labor sitting backwards on the toilet for a little while. Sometime around this point Lesley and Delilah got here, and various people took turns staying with me and rubbing my back. When that stopped working for me Read asked if I wanted to get back in the tub, but it just didn't sound appealing, so instead I got into bed. Read sat up near my head and talked to me, and Delilah and Lesley took turns rubbing my feet. It was obvious that I was reaching transition – I was shaking uncontrollably and the contractions were coming hard and fast.

A little while later Molly asked if I was feeling pushy, since I was starting to sound that way. I told her maybe a little, and she asked if I wanted her to check me. I said fine, and she found me to be 7 stretchy to 8, with the baby pretty low. It wasn't very much longer though until I was moaning a lot more loudly and feeling a stronger urge to push. Someone asked me if I wanted to get back into the tub to push, and I did. I really wasn't looking forward to pushing at all, as that has always been the toughest part of labor for me. Delilah reminded me that this birth was not my past births, and that she had faith that things would go great. Someone went to wake up Joshua and David so that they would be here for the birth.

It took me a contraction or two after getting in to get settled on my knees leaning over the edge of the tub. Read got in with me and did the hip squeeze, while Delilah kneeled by my head and quoted some of the scriptures I had said that I liked. The first time I tried to push it just felt all wrong, and I kind of freaked out for a minute. Molly told me that if it hurt to push that my cervix might not be completely out of the way yet, and to back off. I told her that it didn't feel right to push, but it didn't feel right NOT to push either. By the next contraction pushing did feel like the right thing to do though, so I went at it full force. After that first push people were already saying that they could see the head, and all I could think was that they were crazy! But Molly told me to reach down and touch the head, and I realized they were right. She suggested I keep my hand on the baby's head while I pushed, that it would help me with my pushing and help prevent tearing. It did, and I was amazed to feel how quickly the baby was moving down. I've never been able to feel that before, and it was really cool. Within just a couple of pushes the head was crowning, and it was tough to slow down and give myself time to stretch a bit. But I did, and then was able to birth the head while holding it in my hand the whole time – very neat. At 3:33 am on Saturday, September 2nd, I pushed the rest of the body out and Read was able to catch the baby all by himself. He had never really expressed an interest in doing that, but I think he was glad to have done it and found it a pretty special experience. The umbilical cord was loosely around the baby's neck, and Molly had tried to help him remove it while just the head was out, but apparently I pushed too quickly for them to manage that. So they had to somersault the baby out of the cord afterwards instead.

Geren had the job of announcing the baby's gender, so someone asked him if it was a boy or a girl. I still had my back to the baby and couldn't see, but I heard him say it was a boy. (In his defense, he didn't have the best viewpoint, and I think the umbilical cord confused him. Plus I don't think he had ever seen a baby girl before.) Someone said no, that it was a girl, and I couldn't really believe them. When I turned around and sat down and Read handed her to me, I had to check for myself! I was totally in shock, both at how quickly pushing had gone, and that we really had a girl. Everyone was excited, and Geren was just beside himself. Flo had brought a little soft baby doll, just in case, and she gave it to Joshua for the baby. He kept trying to give it to her while we were still in the water. She started sucking on her fist almost immediately, which explains what she was doing with her hand up by her face for the past month. Then she started trying to nurse through my sports bra, so I decided to go ahead and get out of the tub and get settled in bed so we could do so more easily. When I stood up, Molly asked if it felt like the placenta was ready to come yet; I wasn't sure so she told me to give a little push and see. It came out easily, and she was officially on her own.

I handed her to my mom to hold while I got out of the tub, dried off, and settled into bed. We let Geren announce her name to everyone: Sarah Elizabeth King. Joshua was going to cut the cord this time, and he tried, but I think he was afraid he was going to hurt her. So Geren took over instead. Then we spent some time nursing, and she was a pro right from the start. After she was done Molly got out the scale so that Read could weigh her. Molly had guessed that Sarah was about a 7 pound baby before she was born, so she was surprised to find out that she was actually 8 pounds 9 ounces – pretty close to the size of our boys when they were born. Molly then took her other measurements: 21 inches long, 13 1/8 inch head (a full inch plus smaller than any of the boys have been), 14.5 inch chest. She finished up the newborn exam and proclaimed her in perfect health.

By this time I was ready to get cleaned up, so Kara, Molly's apprentice, got my herb bath ready. David woke up about this time and was obviously confused about why all these people were here in his house in the middle of the night. He sat with Read for a while, trying to wake up and take it all in, before he finally went over to check out his new baby sister. I went to go soak in the tub and chatted some with the girls about the birth. Meanwhile, my mom and the boys helped get Sarah dressed. We did have one little pink sleeper that a friend had brought to David's birth; after he was born she had told me to hang on to it, that I might need it one day. Flo has also given all of her grandchildren a Baby Morgan waffle knit blanket, and she had sent up the remaining three colors she had left, so they were able to wrap her in a pink blanket as well. Later I got out and got dressed, and had my post-birth meal: chocolate gravy and biscuits, yum. Geren brought me my crown that he and his brothers had given me last Christmas, as he thought I needed to be wearing it.

As things settled down, Molly went over my postpartum instructions, and then checked me for any tears. Everything was great – not even a skid mark really. Everyone finished cleaning up and packing up, and Read, Sarah, and I snuggled into bed around 6:30 am. The boys were wide awake, and stayed up with their grandparents, who I think at least got to take turns dozing a little bit.

I am still somewhat in a state of disbelief. I find myself double checking that we really do have a girl every time I change her diaper. Her birth was just such an amazing answer to prayer on so many levels, and I am in awe that He saw fit to grant the desires of our hearts so fully. Geren has been going around telling everyone that he prayed for God to give him a sister, and God said yes! Not only were we blessed with a daughter, but many of my other birth related prayers were answered as well. Instead of being caught off guard, we had plenty of warning that labor was starting up this time around. (Though I would prefer something between no warning and two days of prelabor – perhaps I'll be more specific next time!) Everyone that we wanted to be here for the birth was able to be here. While I don't know that I would say I coped well with the contractions – they were really tough for me this time around – God did give me the strength to get through them, and those who were here with me were a real blessing to me in labor. They all claim that I looked very relaxed and composed, even if I didn't feel that way inside. But the most amazing answer to prayer, second to the fact that she was a girl, was how easy the pushing stage was for me this time. I only had to push for 11 minutes, and while I still wouldn't say that it felt great, it was an awesome experience this time around, and definitely the best part of my labor. Considering how much I have always hated pushing, that is nothing short of miraculous.

This pregnancy and birth has certainly been a time of spiritual growth for me. It wasn't the easiest path to walk, but the view from the top is worth it. I am so thankful that I was given the opportunity to become a mother again, and for the blessing that Sarah is in our lives.


“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” Ephesians 3:20-21

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