All in Due Time:

An Excerpt from First Delivery

by Egina and Jimmy Beldon

This clip is from the beginning of their talk about their deliveries. Here is the description from the CD for the complete clip.

Egina and Jimmy describe the process of their child?s first birth, including their initial desires to have a natural delivery, and how Egina ended up being induced and having a C-section. Processes discussed include: Induction via IV, Epidural anasthesia, C-Section. (12:19)

This segment describes finding out about their first pregnancy and their lack of certainty about what to do.

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An Excerpt from Going to the Hospital for Delivery

by Heidi and Jeff Branch

This clip is from the middle of their description of deciding to go into the hospital. It focuses on the last stage of labor and the delivery. Here's the description from the CD for the complete clip.

Heidi and Jeff describe when they knew they had to go to the hospital and the process for delivery. Technical processes discussed include: epidural injection, c-section, an episiotomy. (4:35)

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Second Child

with Christine and Roger Kraft

Christine and Roger discuss the birth of their second child, which happened on Thanksgiving. (2:02)

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Finding Out

with Stacie and Scott Miller

Scott and Stacie explain the process for discovering that they were pregnant. (1:24)

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Second Child

with Brandi and Tim Rarus

Brandi describes their second birth which included induction of labor through IV (1:30)

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An Excerpt from Birth Story

with Melody and Russell Stein

This clip is from the beginning of their description of the birth of their children. It focuses on Melody's first pregnancy and their preparations for birth. Here's the description from the CD for the complete clip.

Melody and Russell talk about preparation and events related to the birth of their two children. Processes discussed include: perpsectives on working with an interpreter and nursing staff and epidural anesthesia. (6:35)

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Summary of First Delivery Excerpt

Jimmy and Egina have 5 children, between 1- 8 years old. Egina explains that they have 3 girls (one of whom is hearing) and 2 boys. Jimmy clarifies the birth order and gender of the kids, explaining that Egina “lost count” of which child is which (an understandable error!).

Egina always knew she wanted children. When she and Jimmy married, they planned to wait 2 years before starting a family. They became pregnant on their honeymoon (an “oops” baby, as Jimmy calls it). Egina was worried about what they would do.

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Summary of Going to the Hospital for Delivery Excerpt

Heidi eventually got to 10 cm. A couple of procedures she wanted to avoid were having an episiotomy or a c-section. In her discussions prior, she had made an agreement on that. But knowing that the doctor might go ahead with those procedures, she was glad the interpreter knew her preferences. During actual labor, she was so affected by the medications she wasn't able to express herself clearly, but the interpreter played the role of advocate in reminding the doctor about those prior agreements.

When it was the time of the actual birth, she was struggling because her pelvis was too small. She went through a 2 hour struggle, and the doctor finally decided they needed to go with a c-section. But before that, they tried an episiotomy and were able to deliver. In hindsight, Heidi wondered about having gone with the episiotomy earlier, but was glad that she tried without giving up right away. (Even if she failed to prevent that procedure.) She was glad that the episiotomy worked and she was able to avoid the c-section. In addition, she was thrilled to have a son with red hair. The 22 hours was worth it for a beautiful son…to which Jeff concurs.

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Summary of Second Child

When they got pregnant with their second baby, Roger was working in Fargo, North Dakota. Christine was still in Wisconsin trying to sell their house so she could afford to quit her job and move up with him. Calvin was 1 and Christine had to manage him and the house. She had an agreement with her boss to spend two weeks at work and then two weeks with Roger. It was a crazy time. They would be lonely for two weeks, together for two weeks and she had to keep the house ready for prospective buyers while taking care of a one year-old. When they finally sold the house they celebrated and ended up making a baby. By the time the baby was due, they had left Fargo and moved to Souix Falls.

The baby was born on Thanksgiving day. Christine's parents came in the day before, knowing the baby was due around that time. Actually, the baby was a week late, which was annoying to Christine. The first one was a week early and she had expected the second to be the same. By the time that week went by she was all over the doctor to explain when this baby would come. The doctors said she was actually just due, not overdue, even though it felt like it to her. At that time, the doctor didn't want to induce labor because she was not overdue and because it was a holiday. But it turned out the baby came on the holiday anyway. So they had Thanksgiving dinner in the hospital and then had a real Thanksgiving meal the next day when they went home. Calvin went with his grandparents to a buffet of some kind on Thanksgiving Day. So they all had a bit of a weird holiday that year.

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Summary of Finding Out

The Millers married in Minneapolis and went to Maui for their honeymoon. That is where they got pregnant. Stacie found out she was pregnant on January 12. She will always remember the day because it was so emotional. She was shocked, scared, excited… very emotional. Stacie had suspected she was pregnant because her period was late and she didn't feel like herself. Scott didn't believe her at first. When she took the pregnancy test and found it was positive, she skipped up to Scott (who was on the couch) and told him. He wouldn't believe it until she showed him the test stick with the plus sign on it. They were both surprised and a little shaken by getting pregnant so soon after they married.

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Summary of Second Child

Brandi became pregnant naturally the second time. They don't know why it was different, but were excited about the pregnancy. They knew this baby was a boy (they didn't know the sex of the first baby until it was born). They were still in Texas at the time, so Brandi had the same doctor as the first pregnancy and told him that she knew she would want to induce again because she could not stand to be inactive that long. She also got sick with the second pregnancy. She was sick for about 4 months.

In addition, for the first 12 weeks she was terribly depressed (something she?d never experienced before). On her due date, she went into the hospital at 6 a.m. to induce labor. This time, she was not dilated at all when she went in. After the IV was in for 20 minutes or so, she dilated to 4 cm. Things went very fast again and her baby was born about 9:30.

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Summary of Birth Story Excerpt

When they got pregnant the first time, the Steins were living in an apartment and had a dog. Melody was concerned about their dog, which got all their attention. She learned that dogs can start to bite once a new baby is brought into the house. The moved into a house with more room for a family. The pregnancy was really awful. She really felt helpless a lot and that was not something she cared for. She had morning sickness for 6 months. She missed a lot of work. Then she went back to California for a friend's wedding and suddenly felt better. She teased Russ and said that it was being back home that did the trick. She continued to tease Russ and told him they had to move back there. Russ thinks it's because she got out of the meat and potatoes Midwest and to San Francisco where she could get some good Asian food. Melody agrees that it's hard to get Chinese food in South Dakota.

Around her 9th month, she began to experience morning sickness again. For the first time, she was scared and unsure about what to expect. She wanted to know how she would know when she was ready to have the baby. She asked an interpreter who worked nights at relay what she should expect because the interpreter had a lot of experience with labor and delivery. The interpreter was going to interpret for the delivery. Russ explains that the reason they were feeling so uninformed is because they never took Lamaze class. Because Melody went to California, the timing was never right to schedule classes. They did schedule
a date and time for a class late in the pregnancy and ironically, that was the day she ended up having the baby. So they ended up not needing it after all.

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