Category Archive

Birth stories

This is our archive of birth stories from our sister site, Offbeat Families. We have at-home births, hospital births, and c-section births — we love them all!

A premature baby can change your entire birth plan

Our baby, Jasper, was born on 27 March 2009 in Portland, Oregon. My husband and I moved to Portland in December of 2008, and I hooked up with the nurse midwives at OHSU for our birth shortly thereafter. Before going into his birth story, let me preface this by saying that my husband, Sean, and […]

A fast and furious second home birth

July 18th, 2009 – the day I had guessed my baby would make her grand entrance, and by 5pm I was showing no signs of labor whatsoever and feeling pretty discouraged. I was only six days overdue, as I had fully expected, but my parents had to travel back to Wisconsin the next morning, and […]

I had a horrible pregnancy, and I can’t wait to try again!

A lot of women I know talk about having the perfect pregnancy, the perfect birth, the perfect baby. I was one of them. In the beginning of my pregnancy, everything WAS perfect. I was healthy, my growing baby boy was healthy, my hubby, Devin, was amazing, our families were thrilled, friends were ecstatic, life couldn’t […]

Yes, it IS possible to not know you were pregnant

The woman started the ultrasound and said, “Yeah, there is a heart beat.” My doctor in the ER asked how far along I was, and that’s when it all started to sink in. The ultrasound tech said 38 to 39 weeks. I kind of understood what they were saying, and I soon realized I was going to need to tell my parents they were going to be grandparents that very day.

Breech babies and birthing plans

Let’s backtrack to the 37th week, two weeks before Alice was born. Henry and I went to my weekly check-up together, to have “The Talk” with our doctor.

An open-adoption birthmother’s ode to a supposedly 7 pound baby

He was 9lbs 10oz, 23 inches long, 10 fingers, 10 toes. Perfect. His adoptive parents cut his umbilical cord together, his adoptive mother was the first to hold him after me.

HunnyDu’s birth story

Daddy and Lyra are cuddling on the couch together, so I’m taking the time while I have it to tell of my birth adventure. My original plan was to have a natural birth, at Kaiser, with midwives and a doula. I boned up hard for this test, took classes, read books, did birth affirmations daily, […]