The Golden Grahams

 'Ema was born almost 3 weeks ago, and I have been meaning to get on here to finish her birth story. My last blog post came from a place of raw, unfiltered pain -- both physical and emotional. I was still lying flat in my hospital bed while I wrote it on my phone, unable to move very much without pain. I sobbed as I wrote it, and with each sob, it felt like I was tearing open my stitches, but I couldn't control it. Statistics say that about 1 in 3 births in the U.S. are c-sections. That is a high percentage, and is so common that mentioning when one gives birth via c-section, it does not elicit any strong emotion or reactions from others....but it should. 30% of births in the U.S. are c-sections? That is unacceptable. I regret not listening more carefully to women who have been through this; I regret not trying taking it more seriously. I regret ever thinking to myself, "Well, she's taking the easy way out," when I hear of elective c-sections. It is MAJOR surgery....

  Birth Story — Part 1 Every bone and muscle in my body aches of trauma. Imprints of hands and instruments where they shouldn’t have been. My body did not welcome them there. And yet without them -  she  would not be here. Why does my throat and chest hurt? I got intubated? When did that happen?  My stitches burn in pain reminding me.  How did everything go so wrong in an instant?  I was powerful. I was doing it. One contraction at a time.  Contractions all week. Contractions all day. I endured, each one bringing me closer to her, I said.  1/18/25 8:15 pm “Josh, get me a towel. It feels like my water is about to break.” Towel is placed just as I feel the  pop! Progress , I proudly tell myself.  The fluid looks funny. Is that meconium? Should I be worried? Contractions immediately intensify like a freight train. My unmedicated, natural dream birth was just around the corner.  Or so I thought. Or so I hoped.  Something about each...