Noelle's birth part 1

 I have had about as many varied birth experiences as one person can have. I have had an unplanned c-section, a scheduled c-section, a vbac(vaginal birth after c-section) with an epidural and two vbacs without epidurals, but I feel like I finally got it right(for me) with number 6. With all my previous children I gave birth in a hospital, but this time around I had my baby at a birth center.
To be completely honest, I was a little hesitant about it. It was not my first choice, but now that it is done, I wish I could go back and do all of them this way. You will probably think I'm crazy when I tell you that I drove an hour each way to Park City for all my prenatal exams, but when you find a caregiver who is worth their weight in gold, you hang onto them for dear life. Danielle was referred to me by Pascale, the midwife who delivered Asher.  Pascale was fantastic and I was so sad she was no longer practicing midwifery and wouldn't be delivering Eli, but after I met Danielle, I was just as happy with her as I had been with Pascale. After I had Eli, Danielle joined a practice in Park City and I wasn't willing to find a new midwife when I had the best one in the state within an hours drive. There was only one hang up; she no longer delivered at St Marks and was delivering babies at Better Birth Center just a few minutes from St Marks. This actually weighed on me terribly for the entirety of the pregnancy. I had had two previous c-sections and I knew all the risks. In the back of my mind, however, I felt very strongly that I should stay with Danielle even though I was uneasy about the birth center. You know birth centers are just for hippies, essential oil users and water birthers right?
Anyway, my pregnancy was uncomplicated and the baby(that we didn't know the gender of) was healthy and growing normally so there was no cause for concern. As with all my previous pregnancies, I didn't get very big and was able to hide it until 20 weeks when we finally broke down and told our children, families, neighbors and friends. Everyone was a little shocked because we had such a large space after Eli, but certain family members, who shall remain nameless(oldest sister and maternal grandmother) did come around and were excited to meet the newest family member.
The first two trimesters of this pregnancy were easily the best of any of my pregnancies, but the last trimester hit me like a ton of bricks and more than made up for the easy breezy first two. I threw up all night every night, never sleeping more than a couple of hours at a time. I had kidney stones stuck and I felt like my pelvis was going to split in two with every step I took. These were not my finest months and I felt like I was swinging from the very last knot at the end of my 3rd string rope. In short, it sucked! And I don't use that term lightly. While most people would consider this a dream, I was down nearly 10 pounds from my starting weight when I gave birth and I definitely felt worse for the wear.
As much as I wanted this baby evicted, I did not want it born before December 1st. I did the math and figured out that if I had the baby between November 22nd and 28th, it would have its birthday on Thanksgiving every few years and I certainly didn't want that. Also, we loved the name Noelle for a girl and I didn't feel like we could use it unless she was born after Thanksgiving, but December would be best. I was technically due on December 7th, but have never actually made it to a due date(although I've come close a time or two) so I knew my chances of having it in November were pretty high. Actually, 3 times I have been due during the first week of a month and all 3 times I had the baby the last week of the previous month. My odds for December weren't looking too great. I wasn't overly concerned though. We were pretty sure the baby was a boy so we wouldn't even need to deal with a girls name. Coming up with a boys name was at the top of my priority list. It was also at the top of my mothers list and she would text me almost daily with several name options. We never did settle on a boys name...

Yep, I am totally about 17 weeks pregnant here during our family reunion in Yellowstone and nobody had a clue. I would just go out behind the cabins every night and throw up so no one would hear me throwing up in the toilet :) Glamorous I tell ya...