The Birth of Autumn Grace (From Both Perspectives)

Amanda: I would like to share with you the journey of Autumn's arrival! It was a difficult, but beautiful day in our lives.

The night before she came, Rachel Wells and I had a night out at Reverie, to drink lattes and color in our coloring books. We both needed and enjoyed it! Looking back on that night, I'm thankful the caffeine didn't affect me too strongly and I got at least 5 hours of sleep (sorry Rachel, I know you had a bit more trouble sleeping...)

Throughout the earlier part of the night I kept tossing and turning and needing to get up to pee. When I got up I noticed my stomach felt a little tight, but figured they were more practice contractions. Around 2am Josh had gotten up to let our cats inside and I was for sure it was probably 5am because I felt wide awake. This is when I realized I had been having somewhat regular contractions about every 8-10 minutes or so. They were pretty light, but still noticeable. I still wasn't sure if this was it or not, and since I could no longer sleep, I got up to move around and see if they would either increase or go away.

They kept coming! For the next two & half hours, I cleaned up some things, had a snack, drank some raspberry leaf tea, spent some time in God's Word, got ready in case it really was the day (I still wasn't 100% sure), tried distracting my mind by watching Psych, all the while still timing the contractions. They were still coming regularly, so about 4:30am I decided to let Josh know. 

Joshua: I was surprisingly woken up at 4:30am with the news that Amanda was having some steady contractions. Since they weren't too strong yet, she graciously allowed me to go back to sleep... but I didn't really sleep because I was too busy thinking about the fact that Autumn might be coming today! So about 5:30am I decided to get up and tried to start going about the day as I normally would (We still weren't sure how close she actually was). 

Between 6 and 6:30am we realized that the contractions were about 3-5 minutes apart so we began making phone calls to let people know Autumn was on her way! Rachel came to get Jeremiah, and we started preparing the house for Autumn's arrival. Around 7:45am Deidre's assistant Sarah showed up to see how we were doing and to help us spur labor along. At first it was kind of hard for me because I wanted to be Amanda's only help, but then I realized that she had some good ideas and help that I might not have thought of.

Amanda: Sarah suggested we go on a walk, so we put on some light layers and headed out! About 5-10 minutes into the walk my water broke! So we went back to the house and the contractions kicked up a notch. Shortly afterwards, Jessica and Deidre arrived and began setting everything up and getting ready! The contractions kept getting harder and stronger. Most of what I remember from that point is how difficult it was getting for me. They checked me at one point but it wasn't time to push, so they encouraged me to keep moving around and trying different positions. I just wanted to either hit pause and sleep a couple hours or get to the pushing part and get her out.

Josh: For those few hours, it was just a lot of waiting and trying to help Amanda relax through the contractions. I felt a little useless at times, like I wasn't able to do much to actually help. 

Amanda: But simply being there, helping support me and encourage me was incredibly helpful! I probably would have given up without Joshua's support. I was also encouraged by Deidre, she took time to pray for me and play some worship music for me to calm my mind as I got through some contractions.

Josh: There was a little comic relief when we tried figuring out how Amanda's camera worked while she was laboring. Then finally, after a good chunk of time, we had a green light for Amanda to start pushing whenever she felt ready. She pushed for about 20 minutes and Autumn arrived very quickly! As soon as she came out we knew that she was Amanda's daughter, she looked exactly like her.

Amanda's baby picture

We were also thankful for a huge answer to prayer that Amanda's bleeding stopped after Autumn arrived. With Jeremiah, Amanda had a postpartum hemorrhage, and we were concerned it would happen again.

Through the whole process, I felt a lot more relaxed and at ease. It felt more like a natural event than an emergency situation. It was an enjoyable experience (well, for me lol).

Amanda: It's amazing how in the midst of pain, it often seems like you can no longer handle it, you can't possibly keep going, and yet you really have more strength and capability than you realized. Although the labor was much more difficult this time around, the pushing was a whole lot easier! By the time she was born, all of that pain was in the background and no longer mattered. Also it was such a neat experience to do it all in the comfort of our own home. There was a beautiful freedom in it all. Afterwards I had much more energy than I had with Jeremiah and was able to enjoy this beautiful baby girl. She came in at 8# 9oz and 20in long with a head full of hair! We were so very blessed to have Deidre, Jessica and Sarah there with us, guiding us through this amazing event.  And we are blessed to have this baby girl, Autumn Grace.