I can't resist telling whoever will listen about my kids' birth stories. We studied the Bradley Birth methods when I was pregnant with Arlo, which involved "husband coached birthing" and essentially provided a lot of great info all about what was happening during the birth, what might happen during the birth, how to have a natural birth, how to relax and cope with the pain, and of course a lot about pregnancy health so both mom and baby are well prepared.
Arlo and Magnus were both born in a birth center - Bay Area Midwifery - with only midwives and Sam present. In both of their births I was in the same room, which is set up like a bedroom with a big tall four poster bed in it and a bathroom attached with a large jacuzzi tub (where I spent most of my time). The center is in a medical center which is attached to the hospital in Annapolis, which is great in case of emergency. However, this birth center is completely independent of the hospital so I never had to deal with any doctors or the hospital itself (since both times everything went great). This is the closest experience to a home birth without being at home - I guess I just wasn't that keen on all the cleanup and liked the extra safety of going to the center. The midwives have been great there and I couldn't be happier with the decision we made to work with them - it allowed me to have beautiful birth experiences with both my boys.
Another similarity with Arlo's and Magnus's births is the fact that my water broke before anything else was happening. In Magnus's case, it broke about 4 in the morning and woke me up (last Sunday night / Monday morning). Contractions started pretty quickly and we got up and got to work - Sam was cleaning and vacuuming and preparing food for Arlo to take to our friends' home. Arlo woke up early too and got in on the morning surge of energy. I double checked my bags, emailed my boss that I wouldn't be in, and gathered up everything we wanted to take.
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