At the follow-up visit, she asked me how I was coping with what happened as it was a rather traumatic experience. I replied, “it wasn’t ideal but Aria is fine and I’m still here. It could have been much worse. After what I’ve been through, everything else seems so small in comparison.” Child loss changes your perspective on everything.

The weeks before Aria’s birth, I was feeling pressure to make sure my family members could be with us when she was born. You can’t fully plan for events like this and we had a series of backup plans, but nothing worked out as we hoped. My middle sister was visiting for a week, but I was still pregnant when she left. My grandmother wanted to be there, which I was so excited about, but she decided not to come at the last minute (which I was very thankful for in hindsight). My oldest sister and my niece live close to us and were on their way to the hospital while I was in labour. Once labour started, things progressed very quickly. They walked in 4 minutes after Aria made her grand entrance. Thankfully I have Aria’s arrival on video and our entire family got to see our baby’s birth.

The water birth exceeded my expectations, although I was only in the pool for 8 minutes before Aria was born. The water didn’t make the contractions less painful but I was able to relax between them, which allowed me to be fully present. (I highly recommend a water birth!) Shortly after Aria was born, I was helped out of the pool onto the bed, the exact place where I gave birth to Bella. Suddenly, it seemed as though I was reliving the past.

My family stood off to the side, Aria in her daddy’s arms, and I knew by the looks on their faces that something was wrong. I’ve seen these looks before, right after Bella was born, but I knew it was worse this time. The bleeding started and my placenta wasn’t coming out. My mind began to get foggy and I don’t remember the details very well. I know there was a lot of blood. My placenta needed to come out before they could give me medication to stop the bleeding.

After many failed attempts to push the placenta out, our midwife realized it was stuck. A part of it would not detach from my uterus. I remember her talking about sedating me so she could manually extract it, or giving me medication for pain, but I didn’t want to be medicated. Our midwife decided to see what I could tolerate. She was inside of me up to her elbow and I have no idea how I managed to allow her to do that without being medicated, but she was able to pull the placenta out. Apparently I have an incredibly high pain tolerance.

Once the placenta was out, I was given a lot of medication to stop the bleeding, but I was scared when I kept feeling large gushes of blood pour out of me. My blood pressure dropped to 50/32 and I could feel myself fading; my sight was cloudy, the room was spinning and felt nauseous. I feared that if the cloud took over that I would die, so I fought hard to not float away. This was when I asked Bella for help. Our midwife kept working my uterus (with her hands over my abdomen) and finally the bleeding was slowing down. My blood pressure slowly started to rise. I was safe.

I was told that I shouldn’t have remained conscious when my blood pressure was so low. I was mentally prepared for the probability of needing a blood transfusion. I lost 2 litres of blood and the transfusion would help me recover faster. When my bloodwork came back the next day, my hemoglobin was incredibly only down to 88. I didn’t need the blood transfusion!

It took me a while to get back on my feet after Aria was born and I was on bed rest for 2 weeks. I also hemorrhaged after Bella was born, but it wasn’t nearly as severe. We had discussed the possibility of a hemorrhage when we reviewed my birth plan, but I never expected it to happen again. I am thankful we left for the hospital when we did. If it weren’t for the snow storm, I would have insisted on staying home longer. Chances are we would have left for the hospital when my sister and niece did as that was when my contractions were getting stronger and were real contractions (labour had started). I can’t help but wonder if we would have made it to the hospital on time.

A few weeks before Aria was born, I reminded myself that it doesn’t matter what our intentions are when the Universe has other plans. At times, we need to learn to let go and trust that everything happens for a reason and that all will work out the way it is meant to. Our ideal is rarely our reality and to accept this is to be resilient. I accept this experience as my reality. I choose to #StayStrong❤️

I would like to thank our incredible midwives for the level of care they provided. I felt safe in their care. They were quick and efficient and I couldn’t have been in better hands. Thank you!!!