Midwives are awesome - due dates, not so much

Today I went with my midwife Cathy to visit my other midwife, I'll call her R. For those of you that don't know, some midwives attend home births, some attend birth center births, and some attend hospital births. I am sure there are some that also attend a combination of those, but most of the ones I know only attend births in one type of location. Cathy attends home births, and she is the one that will be catching my baby. R only attends hospital births. She is the one that works for my back-up OB, and is the one that I have been seeing here in AZ before Cathy came into town.

I had this fantasy in my head that I would love for Cathy and R to meet each other. I didn't ever voice this, because I didn't know how that scenario would play out. But when you are working with two women that are caring and open and awesome, then there should be no reason to fear. I still never said anything about this idea, but one day Cathy and I were on the phone and she mentioned that she would love to meet R. I got so excited, and at my next appointment with R I asked how she would feel about meeting Cathy. Of course, R said that would be wonderful. Today it finally worked out that they were able to meet each other and it was seriously a dream come true. I have so much trust in both of these women, which means the world when you are on such a beautiful journey with them.

Before the visit, Cathy had said she wanted to look at the results of my 19-week ultrasound that was done with my previous OB (the one that I left immediately after the ultrasound). We asked R if they had a copy of it, and thankfully it had been sent over from the other OB and was in my chart. On the ultrasound, the tech had written that the baby was measuring about a week younger than the due date based on my cycle. The old OB said he wasn't going to change the date though.

R and Cathy asked if I had had any other ultrasounds. I told them I had one early on in the first trimester when I had a scare and went to the ER. They asked if the old OB ever reviewed that ultrasound with me, and I told them no. R went looking through my chart, and sure enough the results from January were in there too. The ultrasound showed the baby was over a week younger than my cycle predicted. I was so shocked that the old OB didn't bother to look at that when the second ultrasound was off. But then again, that was the time when I mentioned the words "home birth" to the old OB and he washed his hands of me right away. The new OB had trusted the old OBs due date.

So here we are, thinking I am almost a week overdue and really the baby is right on time. Cathy loves the moon, so we are changing my due date to Tuesday, August 24. That is the night of the full moon.

I am so grateful for midwives that don't rush to medically induce labor, that allow the baby to grow at her own pace. I am grateful to my Heavenly Father, who has provided inspiration to them and comfort to Joe and I, to know that this baby is safe and coming at the right time. I am so glad that Cathy likes going over the history "with a fine-tooth comb" when the baby is overdue, just to make sure that the baby really is overdue.

R mentioned during my appointment that she has never seen a home birth and would love to be able to watch one. I asked her if she wanted to come to mine as a friend, not as a practitioner (I know her malpractice insurance would drop her in an instant if she participated at all). She said she would love to make it if she is able to. I asked Cathy how she felt about it, and she was completely fine with having R there too. These two women are truly amazing, and I am lucky to have wonderful people supporting me.