moriah's birth story~

Fast forward another year :o) Again. We are in the process of building our house and Glen is gone all the time trying to get it built as quickly and inexpensively as possible. We have three little ones four and under and life is very full.

Late January, maybe three weeks after Ethan turned 1, we find out that sure enough, #4 is scheduled to arrive 11 October. My sister-in-law, Joni, had just had her fourth baby a few weeks prior and Dr. Trabue had jokingly asked if I was pregnant. My two other sister-in-laws, Lori and Elizabeth, were also expecting, causing all of us to have babies in nine months.

We had been at Abounding Grace for several years now, so I was very familiar with home birthing, and as my ob was very supportive of it and willing to be my backup doctor, we decided to go for a home birth.

We found out we were expecting another girl, and the only name for her was Moriah. The official meaning of Moriah is "taught of the Lord". It also has strong spiritual connections in other ways for us as well. We had been in a very intense season of truly "being taught of the Lord." Moriah was also the name of the mountain where God told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, and later where David purchased the threshing floor in order to build the temple. The temple was built there, and there the Lord put His Presence. All these things had great meaning for us in that season of our life, and so she stands as a testimony to the Lord's faithfulness to us and His desire to teach us, lead us, and fill us with His Presence.

Glen rushed to finish our house and we moved into in June, with a little over three months to spare. We settled in, Anna started Kindergarten, and I kicked into waiting-for-baby mode.

I didn't have to wait long.

Fifteen days earlier than she was due, on Glen's birthday, I woke up during the night with contractions that were increasingly becoming evident of the real thing. We weren't at all thinking she would be born that soon, and Glen had a customer who had to get some stuff finished up so that his water could be turned back on (or something important like that). He left to run across town and take care of that, and I got out of the bathtub to get Anna ready for school.

The midwife arrived, as well as Joni (who lived down the driveway). My mother-in-law arrived and took the kids down to Joni's house, and Joni stayed with me until Glen could get back. Anna never did make it to school.

This birth was by far the easiest. I labored for awhile in the bath before calling the midwife. It was wonderful. (One of these days I would love to have a water birth.) I got out to get Anna ready for school, and was just walking around getting things done in between contractions. When the midwife arrived, she checked me and said I was a good 7cm and if I didn't want to have the baby before Glen returned, I needed to sit down. So I sat. We talked and laughed between contractions and I never realized I was in transition.

Once Glen finally arrived, I decided to let Heather check me again. She declared me ready to push, and a few minutes later, out popped Moriah. Okay, it wasn't quite that easy, but Joni says you couldn't even tell I was in labor. Now, with her I had the most prounounced "ring of fire" that is so notorious, but it was very quick.

After a couple of turkey and swiss sandwiches, I settled in to be amazed that I had another sweet baby girl that was here much sooner and more easily than I ever imagined.