Water Baby and My Rebirth

This is my first post and the reason I decided I had something to share.


Like most people, I am in awe of the daily miracles: cicadas buzzing in the twilight, clouds billowing and dissipating in the warm summer sun, laughing children running after evasive, iridescent bubbles. I am also familiar with daily trials: sickness in the family, financial hardships, spiritual battles. So here I am just one, a warrior, a mother and I am trying my best to paint a picture pleasing to My Heavenly Father and healthful and healing to my family. I am painting with prayer.


Nothing exemplifies the remarkable change faith has made in my life like the blessed opportunity I had to birth our third child at home. Some odds for a natural birth were stacked against me. I had gotten pregnant 18 months after a cesarean birth  (the beginning of the recommended window for safe/healthy pregnancy and delivery) and I battled with intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy, or ICP (which some argue requires induction just shy of the full 40 weeks).


Through prayer, I overcame the fears that tried to block me from even trying. We were blessed with a financial gift that made contracting a midwife possible. Elohim guided us to Amanda Prouty who believed so strongly in natural birth that she took on a VBAC and did everything she could to accommodate us.


In the first weeks of pregnancy the battle was spiritual, centered around health concerns, and fear of failure. The final weeks were a battle of a different sort where I often slept only a few hours within a 24 hour period due to itching. It is hard to describe this totally consuming sensation. I had experienced ICP with Elianna (baby #2) but, due to the late onset of the ICP with Zekaryah (baby #3) I decided not to seek the script for Urso to help with the itching. The last few weeks were, in some ways, more difficult than the delivery.


It was a battle. I tried my best to prepare with research, but there was so much I couldn't forsee. Where my power and ability ended Heavenly Father held my hand. I prayed. Friends and family prayed. I waited to see what picture He was painting. I knew many beautiful, righteous, prayerful, healthy ladies who had experienced complications that kept them from being able to complete their home birth as they had desired.


On March 3rd, 2012, after active labor kicked in Baby Zekaryah was born at home.

O como dicen en Español, el dio a luz.<<I love the way it is said in Spanish, directly translated this expression to birth means to give light. Our Creator has animated us with His breath and set His light within ever since the beginning of Creation! And remarkably, there are still simple testaments to Him and His faithfulness in our colloquial conversation. Zach's labor was fast and intense. Though he was the one born in the water I felt I was the one reborn. Though I was elated immediately just holding him and having had the freedom to labor my own way at home there was a much deeper picture, with richer colors that would be painted in the weeks to come. I began to have more faith not just in My Creator, but in His Creation, especially myself. I began to own the strength He has given graciously to all women, particularly mothers. It was a gift that has changed my whole perspective on parenting, discipline (self-discipline included here) and life.

Here I am to tell those of you facing challenges, those of you contemplating a VBAC, or another baby even though you battled through cholestasis before, you can do it! I am no one of great import, but Elohim blessed me in such a way I would go through all the pain and itching all over again for the same result. My prayer is that somehow via this venue I can serve Our Creator YHVH and reach other mothers, friends and homeschoolers.

 May praise to Elohim remain on our lips as surely as His Spirit is a continual companion in our hearts. In the name of His Son, Yahushua (AKA Yeshua, Jesus), who gave everything so that we could be made whole and complete knowing Him in all of our ways, every day, I write this to you in love,