The Lord was faithful to bless us with a calm and precious labor and birth. During the month proceeding Caleb's arrival I had several labor "spells". I would have consistent contractions for several hours at a time, coming anywhere from two to five minutes apart. At a week before my due date, I was progressed to about 3 centimeters and about 80% effaced. Thursday February 5th, labor seemed very real, and we called the midwives, but that was not the night! Bobby and I fell asleep and awoke to no contractions at 6 am, so the midwives went home.

The next few days, I would continue to labor and progress painlessly, and I started to call the situation "The Uterus that cried Wolf"! The following Wednesday night, February 11th, I stayed home from church, having another set of consistent mild contractions, which started getting progressively harder to cope with around 9pm, just in time for Bobby to get home from church and help out! I labored around the house while cleaning up and eating, as Bobby followed me around with a stopwatch, timing each one and helping to discern whether or not they were getting stronger and harder to deal with. We decided to call in the midwives at 10:30 pm, we knew then that THIS WAS FINALLY IT!

With Bobby's help and coaching, I continued to handle labor very well; I would've given the pain a five out of ten at this point of the night. I decided to labor in our tub at home so that we didn't have to fill up the big tub until closer to the actual birth, little did I know we were only one hour away from that!

The midwife's assistant arrived at 12:00am, and the midwife followed at 12:15am. As they set up the room, both of them checked my cervix to find that I was a good eight centimeters, and they could feel the bag of waters bulging. That news amazed me! I even said, "I feel like I just won the lottery!” The midwife then asked, "Where did you want to have this baby?" I said, “Bobby and I had planned a waterbirth, but thought we had a full night of labor ahead and didn't want the pool water to get cold, so we have not yet started filling the pool.” The contractions were still very manageable, so we were very surprised to hear the next words to come from her mouth, "Fill it up, you are looking at about twenty minutes."

Both of us were stunned, I could not believe that a baby could come that quickly when everything was going so calmly and with little pain. She was right though! After about two or three good, hard, contractions that seemed overwhelming, the bag of water broke. And even though the tub was only 1/3 full, Bobby helped me toward the pool. As soon as I stood up, I could feel the baby's head coming down quickly, and I felt overwhelmed and anxious. Before my bottom even hit the water, gravity brought the baby out! I barely pushed at all; if anything I was trying to hold back until I had "permission" to let my body just do what it needed to. The baby was finally out, and was just alert and screaming and as strong as could be, then we saw a penis! It was a boy! Bobby and I sat down in the water and cuddled little Caleb and held his little head, and just relaxed and praised the Lord for the amazing and fast delivery.

Fifteen minutes later, the cord stopped pulsating, and they were ready to cut it. Once the cord was cut, Bobby came and took Caleb from me while the midwives helped deliver the placenta and helped me clean up and get to the bed. Now the birth was completed! A very easy labor, fast birth, and a beautiful healthy boy, it was time to just relax and enjoy a new family member!

Looking back, I am so proud of myself and my husband for trusting this wonderful birth process the way the Lord intended it to work so naturally and beautifully. In the peaceful calm environment of our bedroom, we labored for a short time holding one another, in the candlelight, anticipating our second child. We then welcomed our child into a quiet, calm, dimly lit atmosphere, and for those moments, time just stopped and the whole world was ours.