It was a year and a half later before I got pregnant again, the longest natural spacing I had yet had. In that time my midwife had left
the state because of their continued refusal to certify her. My husband and I didn't really talk about it much. It was just sort of
understood that this time we would do it on our own. It seemed as though the Lord had brought us along this road step by step, and now He had
removed all the last props we had. 

        As we approached my due date of September 24th, my husband thought he heard from the Lord that the baby would be born on the 15th
and that it was another boy! This time he didn't keep it to himself. We fully expected it to come to fruition. We went out to dinner to celebrate
our last free night for a while, and a couple of hours later I had some good real contractions. When I went to bed, they stopped. Around 10:30 I
was awakend by a contraction and began having fairly convincing contractions about every twenty minutes. I really thought I'd have the
baby by midnight, and was thrilled to think I only had to go through an hour of labor. Beats four days any time! But they petered out by
midnight, and no baby arrived.

        My husband was under a lot of stress at work and at the same time his father was undergoing more cancer treatment and wasn't doing well. So
he was trying to spend a lot of time helping in that situation, while dealing with problems at work, and the baby's lack of cooperation in
arriving on time was beginning to tell on his nerves. In addition, being wrong about thinking you've heard from the Lord about something tends to
rattle your confidence! My due date of the 24th came and went. One week went by, two weeks went by. At least last time I had STARTED labor on the
15th day, but that, too, passed with no sign. My husband was climbing the walls. Day 19 was a Sunday and my husband was at the very end of his
rope. He told me that he was ready to present me at the nearest emergency room and tell them this baby had to be born NOW. He was very concerned
that he was going to end up with a dead baby AND a dead wife! 

        I freaked and cried and carried on. He said since it was Sunday, he wasn't going to do anything today. Finally, I asked if I could go for
a drive by myself. I drove to our church's prayer chapel and got on my knees before the Lord and cried my heart out. I was there about an hour.
As I went out and stepped up into our van, I felt a little pop and an almost imperceptible spurt of water. I stopped in my tracks. My water had
never broken prior to labor in any of my other births, and I wasn't sure if that's what had happened.
  
      I drove over to a nearby park and went into the restroom to try to assess the situation. My clothes were definitely damp, but not in any
way soaked the way I would have expected if my water had really broken. I took a walk around the walking path, probably about a half mile, hoping
to stimulate some contractions. Then I drove home and told my husband that I thought my water had broken just a little bit. I kept waiting for
contractions to start, but when we went to bed, nothing was going on.
   
     Around 11:00 p.m., I woke up with a contraction, and lay in bed waiting for another. They began to come steadily, about twenty minutes
apart, strong enough to get me too excited to sleep. Eventually I got out of bed and went downstairs to walk around. At times I propped myself on
the couch and could comfortably breathe through contractions and even doze on and off. When I went to the bathroom I was encouraged to see that
I was beginning to lose my mucus plug. The amount of mucus loss increased through the night. Gradually my contractions got closer together. By
morning, they were about ten minutes apart.
   
     My husband came downstairs around 6:00 a.m. and asked me what was happening. "Well, I think I'm in labor," I said. I didn't know if I was
looking at four more days before the baby was born, but because of the encouraging signs of the mucus plug going and possibly the water having
broken, neither of which were consistent with my longer labors, I was hoping it wouldn't be that way this time. My husband notified work that
he wasn't coming in, and I continued in consistent, only slightly uncomfortable labor all day. 
      
    Around 5:00, I was beginning to grumble that this wasn't very much fun. My husband got the kids fed and around 7:00 gathered us all
together to pray before putting them to bed. In the middle of that I had a contraction that I really had to breathe hard through, and all the
little kids just stared at me! The four little ones were put to bed, and the three older ones went downstairs to stay out of the way.
    
     I had really begun to believe something about my other labors that I planned to implement this time. That was, I wondered if a laboring
woman can have an urge to push on one contraction, but not necessarily have it on succeeding contractions. With my first two natural labors, I
had never felt an urge to push. It was just, "Okay, you're fully dilated, start pushing." I experienced a genuine urge to push with my last baby,
but then was told to push with each contraction after that. I had really begun to wonder if this resulted in either a prolonged pushing stage, or
stress on the baby. So I was determined that I was going to assess each contraction individually, and not fall into that trap again.
   
      Unfortunately, I completely forgot that resolve as soon as I had my first urge to push during a contraction while using the bathroom. It
was around 9:00, and afterwards I came into the bedroom, knelt by the bed, and said, "I'm going to start pushing. I hope it's not too soon."
But it seemed fairly apparent after about an hour that it wasn't accomplishing much. I was getting very tired.
       
    Around that time my husband suggested I call my sister for encouragement. She has twelve children, five of which were born
unassisted at home. She asked me if I was tired. I said yes. S he asked me if I was discouraged. I said yes. She said, "Well, maybe that's a good
sign," hinting that I might be in transition. I said, "Only problem is, I've been pushing for an hour." She said, "Oh! Do you really think it's
time for that?" I said I wasn't sure. She recommended I try to really tune in to whether or not I was really having an urge to push. This was
at about 10:00.
     
     After I hung up, I got into the bathtub and soaked in the warm water. Initially this slowed down my contractions, but after a breather,
they started back up again in very good form. It was very uncomfortable trying to get through contractions sitting in the hard tub. So I got back
out, but kept my goal in mind of not pushing unless I really felt the urge. At times the contractions would roll one right into another, with
barely enough time between to take a breath. Once in a while a contraction would end in a definite pushy feeling, and I'd go with it,
and others I could breathe through and stay in control.
      
    Finally I sank to my knees by the bed and started crying. I was pretty sure this baby was never going to come. At that very moment, a
contraction came and I could feel the baby just about to come out. I yelled at my husband, "The baby's coming! Right now!" He looked sort of
surprised, and said, "Okay," in a very strange voice. I wasn't sure if it meant, "What am I supposed to do about it?" or "What did you expect?" He
got behind me where he could see and during a contraction he said he could see the bag of waters. That frustrated me because I was sure the
baby had to be on its way out. For a couple of contractions, the water bag would protrude and then recede. Then the baby's head came and the
water broke at the same time. My husband wanted me to keep pushing to get the rest of the baby out, so I tried, but nothing happened until another
good contraction came. Then, with the contraction and push combined, the baby came the rest of the way out. It was 11:10 p.m.
        
   We were so sure this baby was going to be our fifth boy in a row that my husband kept referring to it as "him". "We have to turn him over
and suction him out," he said, but when we turned "him" over, I laughed and said, "It's a girl!" She didn't need any suctioning really, and she
was the most beautiful color of pink. She started nursing right away after we wrapped her up, and my husband went to get the kids. I was still
kneeling on the floor, and after quite a while I was getting stiff, so I shifted my legs, and plop! Out came the placenta! I didn't even have a
contraction!

        I thought this was the best birth ever. It was almost exactly 24 hours from start to finish, pretty short for me! I loved just having my
husband near, and loved being able to call the kids to come see their new sister within minutes of her birth. It wasn't particular easy or pain
free, but it was better than any of my hospital births, and even than my home births, with the exception of my first one, which went about the
same way. I just think God is so good, and He wants birth to be very private and personal.

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