I was blessed this week. I was privileged to be included in the birth team at Spartanburg Regional Hospital welcoming Baby JP into the world. When I received THE phone call Monday afternoon, I knew that it was pretty much a “given” that this baby would arrive via a cesarean section. Mom had been diagnosed with preeclampsia and her doctor had sent her to the hospital for an induction.
Mom and Dad had taken my childbirth class, Instinctive Birthing, and had planned and prepared for a normal birth. Their birth plan had been written and edited. Their plan was based on all the things they wanted to do to have an intervention free birth.
When Mom and Dad checked in at the hospital pitocin was started and membranes were ruptured, not part of the plan. When I joined them, the blood pressure cuff was inflating and recording mom’s bp every 15 minutes and she was confined to bed. The bp readings were not good. But we got right to work on relaxing. The lights were dim, calm music was playing in the background, part of the plan, and Mom was clinging to the desire to have a vaginal birth even though it would no longer be intervention free.
Mom focused on relaxing her entire body and used slow abdominal breathing for three minutes before every bp reading and she was able to get those readings down to levels that were acceptable to the doctor. Dad was lovingly supportive and did whatever was needed. Together they did a fantastic job. Mom got through hours of pitocin contractions that were not giving her any rest. Her determination and concentration were amazing. When she was finally so exhausted that she couldn’t focus, she chose to go ahead and have an epidural. Since she had labor as long as she had, the epidural did not slow down her labor. After getting a little bit of rest she was ready to finish the marathon and birth her baby vaginally. She labored–did ALOT of hard work and her hard work prevented the “inevitable.” Congrats to B & J for overcoming many obstacles. You did a fantastic job!! Thanks for allowing me to be your doula.
Susan was kind enough to help me through the birth of my daughter Sophie 4 years’ ago. She was amazing, she spent a long time talking to me and my husband about what kind of birth experience we wanted for our child and together we formulated a birth plan. My main aspiration was to have as natural a birth as is possible nowadays in a …hospital environment without pain relief and with the ability to move around as much as possible. When it came to it, Sophie’s birth was induced 10 days after her due date but despite that, and a consequent very fast delivery, I still managed with nothing more than Susan’s expert encouragement and guidance. Going straight through the process in just over 2 hours, there is no way that I would have held out without the epidural without Susan (and of course my husband Phil). I still have great memories of being able to feel the whole wonderful experience of Sophie’s journey into the world – it was one of the best moments of my life. Thank you Susan.
We were able to use Susan’s post-birth services. Susan was a lifesaver for us. We had our precious little girl “late in life” and as a consequence, we were clueless! Susan clued us in, gave us wonderful suggestions on scheduling and dealing with a colicky baby, and provided me with excellent care so that I could get some much-needed rest.
Susan was a god-send for us. We had just moved to South Carolina from Washington, DC four weeks before I was due with baby #2 and I ended up with an emergency C-section. I was floored! I didn’t know anyone and somehow the stars aligned and brought me Susan. She was INCREDIBLE. The most calm and loving person towards my two sons, and me. Her knowledge, experience, patience, work ethic and overall presence amazed me. I am forever grateful to her for getting me through a tough time (and I wish I still lived in SC to have her for my other births!)
Susan came highly recommended to our twin family from another twin mom. She was extremely professional and caring for our infant sons. She was also a source of encouragement to me as she assisted with tandem nursing and was tremendously influential in helping achieve sleeping babies at 8 weeks of age! Susan commented that she works hard to work herself out of a job (getting babies to sleep through the night) and she lived up to job 
Thanks to Susan I made it through the first three months of having twins with most of my sanity! She was there the first night my babies were home and had such a calming effect on me, my husband and the babies. Susan was a great sounding board for talking through the babies sleep issues and breastfeeding problems and was also very concerned about my health and well being. Hiring Susan was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made!
So, our princess came 3 weeks early and Susan was there for us once again. The 2nd experience with labor of love was night and day from the 1st one. I waited as long as possible to go to the hospital and finally got there at 11:30 am and …she was delivered by 2:17 pm.
Susan kept me calm and I hung on to every words instructed by Susan with each contractions to ease the pain. This was a truly natural birth I was able to experience at the hospital thanks to Susan.
Susan was amazing! My husband was out of the country when I went into labor. My labor of love for our 1st born was over 24 hr. Susan was there the whole time. Dr. wanted to do a C-section and without Susan’s reassurance I might had it under the stress I was in. I had our baby boy as natural as possible thanks to Susan. You were …my lifesaver that whole weekend. Thanks for what you do.
I am more prepared as we will have our 2nd in Jan.
We are so pleased with all the help and support Susan provided us as our labor and postpartum doula. Without Susan’s knowledge and experience our son probably would have been delivered by cesarean as he got stuck in the birth canal for several hours and was becoming stressed. The doctor was strongly leaning toward surgery when Susan skillfully used different techniques to move the baby and was able to motivate me and help me find the strength to deliver our son vaginally as we really hoped to do. In the weeks after William was born her help and suggestions were invaluable to us. She cheerfully put order to chaos and helped me recover quickly from the woes of delivery (stitches, swelling, pain, etc). Our son is now three months old and Susan continues to offer suggestions and resources for issues that come up. The services that Susan provides are worth every penny and we would gladly do it all over again. With her help we had a wonderful birth and got off to a great start!
