The Fall

On Friday afternoon, as I was walking outside to bring in some boxes from the car, I slipped on a patch of mud. Normally, slipping on mud would be mostly annoyance and mean a bruise or two. This was not so much the case in this situation. When I slipped, it was somewhat akin to sliding into home plate feet first except that everything my waist up fell with a crunch and a clunk. I fell on my side--thank God I didn't go down on my belly.

I started screaming for Ish when I fell, but he was inside shop-vaccing up the thick blanket of needles left behind by our Christmas tree--needless to say, he didn't hear me. After a minute or two, I managed to get myself up and back inside. In between sobs of pain and fear, I recounted to Ish what had happened. Once I had calmed down some, I tried to continue going about my daily tasks, but I could not shake the feeling that something might have happened our baby.

After tearfully confiding my fear to Ishmael, we decided we should call the Birth Center. As I was still very shaky, Ish made the initial phone call; he reached the answering service who took our information and paged the midwife on call. Within minutes, one of my midwives called back. She was incredibly understanding and arranged for us to meet her in at the Birth Center in less than an hours time.

On the drive to the Birth Center, I was very anxious and shaky; thank God I have a husband who is very calm and easy-going. Upon arriving the midwife used the doppler monitor to listen for the babies heart rate. It took her a few tries, but she found our baby's heart beating a strong and healthy 13o bpm. I have never been so relieved in my life!