My name is Rachel.
And my children are Benjamin and Micah. And they were both born by cesarean.
With my first son, I was in labor and after a number of hours he was not descending and so they decided that I had to have a cesarean.
When I got the anesthesia on the table in the O.R., I started shaking very intensely and then got really nauseous and ended up throwing up. And then, you know, they got the baby out. And this moment that I had anticipated being very excited about, seeing my baby for the first time, wasn't that great.
At the beginning of my second pregnancy, I really wanted to try for a VBAC.
There wasn't any reason that anybody could tell me that I shouldn't try for the VBAC.
And my understanding is that it's still better for mom and baby to have a VBAC than a scheduled C-section.
I think the reason I changed my mind ultimately was that the unknown factor was less with a scheduled C-section.
I didn't want to end up having the same sort of experience I had the first time.
And I knew that I had to come home and take care of two people.
And that was what I was the most concerned about was feeling like I had more control and was in a better place to take care of myself and my family than I would have been if I had gone through the same experience a second time.
So I put questions out to an online forum that I'm on of moms.
And when I spoke to other women who had had planned C-sections they all pretty much told me that it was a very different experience than having an unplanned C-section.
You go in, it's much more controlled, it's not as traumatic.
I was aware that more C-sections put me at higher risk if I were to have future pregnancies.
I talked about that with my doctor and my midwife.
But I don't think I want to have any more kids.
I'm pretty happy with the way that things turned out.