Bringing Baby Hayes Earth Side
Hayes Nolan Fisher was born on December 14th, 2025 at 11:21pm. I recorded my birth story podcast episode 40 hours after labor when I was riding the adrenaline high of finally getting to meet this beautiful boy. I was so excited to share his arrival with the world that I temporarily overcame the new parent exhaustion and got the episode published. You can listen to it here, in the Spotify app, or apple podcast app.
I’m grateful to have that initial reflection capsuled because I knew that as time passed, my perception of the experience would warp. My entire life, I’ve heard women say that they forget the pain of childbirth and I knew that must hold some truth otherwise women wouldn’t keep having babies again and again. It’s now been 8 weeks since he was born and I already relate. The love I feel for this little human is unlike anything I’ve ever known. No matter how tired or overwhelmed I am, I find the strength and joy to keep giving to him - feeding with cracked and bleeding nipples, soothing him when I haven’t showered or brushed my teeth, and staring into his deep blue eyes while a mountain of tasks pile up on my to do list.
He’s perfect, exactly as I dreamed, and fits right into our lives. It’s not that the last two months have been easy - we’ve certainly had our challenges - but being a mom is way better than I imagined. It feels so natural. Watching Clay grow into a dad has also filled my heart with even more love for him than before.
I’ve never been comfortable in hospital settings, so when I found out I was pregnant, I really wanted to have a home birth with a midwife. I researched, prepped and planned this for months. I read books, I went to prenatal classes, attended workshops, had the home birth pool ready, and regularly meditated on this outcome.
My due date was November 30th, and with each day that passed, the anticipation continued to build. Any first time mom that has gone past her due date knows what I mean. It’s the craziest experience knowing that at any moment, your life will change but you have no idea when that moment will come. Each night you fall asleep wondering if it’ll be the last with just you and your partner. Then you wake up, and it’s just another normal day. Everyone checking in, hopeful and curious, to see if you went into labor. You reply, “no not yet.”
Physically, I felt good. I was still walking, biking, going to yoga, and living life as normal. However, as I neared 42 weeks, the mental wait began to feel heavier and heavier. I started to get nervous that everything was okay and wondered if there was something wrong with my body.
The Dutch health care system is primarily midwife led. If the pregnancy is going well without complications, then you plan for a home birth. However, it’s standard policy that once you go beyond 42 weeks, even if the pregnancy was healthy, you’ll be admitted to the hospital from the onset of labor. Since I had a lot of fear around giving birth in a hospital, I did everything possible to induce labor naturally. Each day, I tried various combinations of old wives’ tales from curb walking to spicy food to sex to acupressure… but baby boy was happy hanging out in his first home.
To ensure Hayes’ safety, we went in for monitoring everyday from 40+4 onward. These check ins provided good peace of mind knowing that baby was healthy and there was plenty of amniotic fluid - but they were also exhausting and emotionally straining.
My original birth plan had no medical interventions, but as time passed, I slowly had to let go of my wishes. Above all else, I just wanted Hayes to be okay.
On 41+4, my cervix was only 2 cm dilated so I got a foley balloon put in to help me dilate further. The next morning, a midwife came over to our home and took it out. After the cervical check, the foley balloon only got to me 3 cm. It’s quite an uncomfortable process so I was apprehensive to get another balloon in. I spent the day trying more natural induction methods, resting and visualizing. Again, no progress.
On 41+6, I got another foley balloon inserted. The hope was that it could dilate me to 4 or 5 cm so that they could break my water. That night I hardly slept. I was told that once they break my water, then it’s show time as there’s no going back and I’d need to have the baby one way or another within 24-48 hours.
When the midwife came over on 42 weeks (Sunday morning, December 14th), she took out the second foley balloon. This time, the cervical check revealed that I was finally at 4 to 5 cm dilated so she could break my water as planned. This news was simultaneously underwhelming and also stunned me. I knew this meant I was going to finally be going into labor soon but after waiting so long, it felt too good to be true so I was honestly quite numb. Me, Clay and the midwife discussed options and possibilities.
I let her break my water around 9:30am. Unfortunately, the water did have meconium (baby’s first stool) in it. We expected this because the likelihood is quite high this far along in pregnancy as the baby is more mature. As I was 42 weeks AND there was meconium, this meant that I had to be transferred to the hospital for birth. The midwife called the hospital in our city. They were incredibly busy due to many planned inductions for women who didn’t want to have their babies too close to Christmas, so I almost had to go to another city.
Thankfully, they were able to get me a room. Clay and I started packing up our hospital bags. My mom came over from her hotel to stay with Peaches (our dog). The Uber picked us up around 12pm and we arrived at the hospital around 12:15pm.
As we got settled into our hospital room, we were pleasantly surprised to find that a midwife team would still be taking care of us. The lead midwife was so kind and compassionate. She read in my file that I was afraid of hospitals, so to calm my nerves she took off her white coat and sat down on the stool next to my bed. She assured me that she would do everything she could to honor my birth plan and help me feel safe.
At 2:30pm, they hooked me up to an IV. I hate needles so this was quite traumatic because nothing was going how I hoped. I had to grasp this reality very quickly which was overwhelming for my nervous system. I hated seeing the IV going into my skin. One of the nurses taped a baby diaper around my wrist so that I couldn’t see it.
Contractions began shortly and I was laboring on hands and knees for a few hours. At 5:30pm, they did another cervical check and I was only at 6 cm dilated. They said they wanted to see 1 cm per hour… “so I wasn’t progressing quickly enough.” Again, we weighed the options in front of us. Although I was having fairly intense contractions, they weren’t efficient enough in moving baby down. The midwife team was worried that I would wear myself out before getting to 10 cm and not have enough energy to push. For me, a c-section was worst case scenario, so I was willing to explore other options to avoid it.
I opted to allow the lowest dose (0.2 mUnit/min) of Pitocin. It was added to the IV around 6pm and immediately… shit got real. Those contractions hit me like a freight train. Waiting for them to fill up the birth pool felt like an eternity. Once I was finally able to get in, the relief was instantaneous. I labored “comfortably” in there for about 30 minutes. Then the contractions amped up further and I felt extremely ungrounded in the water. I needed my feet on something hard so that I could brace myself during the peak of the contractions.
Around 7pm, I moved into the shower and that worked much better for me. I was able to grip the handrail, while the warm water sprayed on my back and Clay gave counter pressure. I may have set a record for the amount of food consumed during labor. I remember having Clay bring all of my snacks onto the shower ledge. Between contractions, I ate a container of blueberries, a container of dried mangos, a bunch of almonds, probably 20 quarter sized gingerbread cookies, a glass of orange juice, and a few bites of potatoes. The nurses were warning me that if I ate too much, I could throw up. I was like, “I am in extreme pain and these cold blueberries are the only thing getting me through so if I throw up, so be it” lol. (somehow I never did?!)
After about an hour in the shower, I started to get really tired from standing and needed a break. I moved back to the bed and they did another cervical check. Around 8pm, I was 8 cm dilated, which was super encouraging. Around this point, I was transported into labor land because I don’t really remember having the conversation but they upped the Pitocin to 0.4 mUnit/min. Laboring on the bed was horrible. I was trying to grab the side rails and have Clay push on my back, but without my feet pushing on anything, my body felt uncontrollable.
I didn’t know what I needed but I wanted a change. I asked to get back into the birth pool and they said they had drained it. I was frantic so Clay and a group of nurses filled it up as quickly as possible. However, once I got in, it wasn’t the relief that I felt the first time. The contractions were so much stronger and I was having a hard time breathing methodically through them. One nurse was pouring water on my back, while Clay was halfway in the pool trying to give me relief. Another nurse was holding my hands and saying encouraging affirmations. I felt a bit helpless, so again, I wanted a change but didn’t know what.
By 8:30pm, everyone suggested I get back in the shower since that went so well the first round. The shower was better, but I was so deep into labor that nothing felt enjoyable. I asked the staff for an epidural but they said I was too far into labor. Mentally, I was in such a dark place. I remember saying, “I’m going to die, but it’s okay because Clay - you’re going to be a great single dad!” It seems silly now, but at the time, the pain was so big that I truly wanted to die.
The contractions were coming so fast. It felt like I was drowning. Most of the time, I could prepare myself and “ride” the waves, but sometimes they were back to back and I couldn’t “catch” them. After a few bad rounds in a row, I really started panicking. I couldn’t fathom that I still had hours more of this pain. Again, I asked for an epidural. Of course, the answer was still no, but this time they offered me morphine. Desperate for any sort of relief, I said yes.
However, this meant I had to go back to the bed because they needed to put the morphine into the IV and couldn’t do that while I was in the shower. I moved back to the back and received another cervical check. Great news! I was 10 cm dilated.
Around 9:45pm, they added morphine to the IV. It was strange though, because in order for the morphine to be released, I had to click a button on a little handheld device they had given me. I’ve now learned this is a Patient-Controlled Analgesia (PCA) pump system. Upon clicking the button, it would take about 10 seconds for the morphine to be released and then it would only last for a few minutes. To prevent an overdose, the system goes into a “lock-out” period, so even if you click it, nothing will happen. This was a lot to wrap my head around in the moment so I didn’t really understand but the short period I was on morphine was a God send. I was finally able to catch my breath.
However, this “relief” period was short lived because all of a sudden (around 10:30pm), the midwife team recognized that I was approaching the pushing stage, and apparently you can’t be on morphine during pushing because the baby could get sleepy. I was so upset. I was like, “No! Why didn’t you give me a warning?! Please let me have 2 more rounds.” But nope. It was cut off immediately.
To top it off, they said they needed to do a cervical exam during a contraction to ensure that the head was in fact making it’s departure. That cervical check was one of the worst physical experiences I’ve ever had. It hurt so bad. At that point I was so angry and I let everybody know it too. I kept saying, “I’m so mad. This is so unfair.” (specifically thinking about how woman have to do this and men don’t, and that I was having such a big baby)
The midwife confirmed she could feel his head so I had for sure entered the pushing stage. Honestly, I preferred the pushing stage to being 10 cm / transition because it meant the end was near. The birth team guided me to use the contractions to push, so we did 3 pushing rounds each time. That third push each time was tough. I was on my back in the hospital bed, in a position similar to the yoga pose ‘happy baby.’ Clay had my right leg pinned and a nurse had my left. They were instructing me to curl my chin into my stomach to help bring me into a little egg ball shape.
After about 30 minutes of those pushing cycles, they asked if I wanted a mirror. I declined as I knew that would freak me out. Then as his head came out, they asked if I wanted to reach down to feel him. I did and could feel his hair. It was super motivating and made it feel real. I was able to push more effectively knowing how close we were.
Then the midwife said, “after this next round, you’re going to meet your baby.” I was so shocked by that good news that it distracted me and I kind of forgot to push on the next contraction. Then we all locked in, and I really pushed on the next one and sure enough, Hayes came Earth side. Pure euphoria.
There’s no way to properly explain how orgasmic the sensation is when the baby comes out. One moment I’m experiencing the ring of fire, without pain relief, as a near 10 pound baby descends. The pain was more excruciating than I thought was humanly possible. Then poof. The next moment, he’s out and I’m hardly in any pain whatsoever. That stark contrast was out of this world. My stomach churns typing this as I try to recall how it felt.
As they laid Hayes on my chest, Clay and I swooned over him. He didn’t cry at first and it scared me. I had an intrusive thought that alll of this was for nothing, so I asked “is he alive?!” I was terrified that something happened to him. The nurses all chuckled and they were like, “of course!!” After a few moments, he started crying and then my whole body relaxed. The nurses grabbed our phones to take photos. It was so surreal finally meeting this little angel who was with me all along.
Then, the bliss was temporarily interrupted because he kept crying. I got worried again that something was wrong. Because there was meconium in the amniotic fluid, I wanted to be sure that he hadn’t swallowed some. We all agreed to have the pediatrician come for a second look. Unfortunately, in order to be able to take him over to the little rolling bed to examine him closely under the lamp, they needed to disconnect his umbilical cord, and I hadn’t yet delivered my placenta.
Once again, my birth plan wishes had to be compromised, as we wanted to keep him connected to the placenta for at least an hour. The nurses acted quickly and let Clay cut the cord. Then Hayes was taken off my chest and put into the baby bed. The pediatrician put an oxygen mask over his mouth to help him breathe for a few minutes. Clay stayed by Hayes’ side. It was so hard to watch from afar as I wondered and waited. Thankfully nothing was wrong and he was back on my chest within 5 minutes.
We had more good cuddle time. Then at 12:00am, the midwife team said their goodbyes as it was time for a shift change. A new midwife team came in to clean up. The new lead midwife let me know I had one major tear and one minor tear. She planned to stitch the one that went toward the back, and we’d let the one on my labia heal naturally. Being afraid of needles, I was not stoked about this. She did the local anesthesia and started stitching. Honestly though… after pushing Hayes out, the stitches were nothing but it did take her longer than I was expecting. I didn’t think to ask how bad the tear was so to this day I’m not sure.
When she finished around 1am, a nurse came in to help with exams such as weighing him and other paperwork. She let us know that according to Dutch policy, I could only be in the hospital for 4 hours after birth so we’d have to start preparing to leave soon. We were shocked. I asked if there was anyway I could rest and we could leave around 8/9am but since there were no complications with delivery, insurance would not cover us staying past the 4 hours! Wild!
From 1:30am to 2:30am, we we’re on our phones texting our closest loved ones the news. I wasted no time in looking up his astrological birth chart… I needed to know! I immediately sent it to one of my friends who is even more into astrology than me so we could analyze lol. He’s a Sagittarius sun, Libra moon and Virgo rising. If you’re also into astrology then you’ll know how crazy it is that me, Clay and Hayes all have our ascendant (rising) in Virgo… and so does my sister!
Around 2:30am, I handed Clay over to Hayes and they did skin to skin while I took a shower and had a snack. Then around 3am, the nurse helped us get Hayes dressed. Clay took down the string lights and packed up our suitcases. We don’t have a car so our only option was public transportation. We were trying to order an Uber but there were no drivers. At 3:30am, we had to leave the labor room so they could get it turned over, so we went downstairs to a little lobby room with a couch. We waited there for almost an hour waiting for an Uber drive to accept our ride.
Once the driver arrived, I had to walk outside around the hospital building to the pick up spot. As it was December… it was freezing and windy! The whole ordeal was honestly kind of comical. I did not realize they were going to send us home so quickly.
We texted my mom that we were on our way home, so she was awake to greet us at the door when we got there. Even though it was like 4:30am at this point, we were all so giddy and could not sleep. The three of us swooned over baby Hayes for a few hours. Once the adrenaline wore off, tired set in so my mom left, and we got about an hour of sleep.
At 8am, I woke up to call the Kraamzorg, as we were instructed to do. This is a unique Dutch postnatal care system. A professional maternity nurse comes to your home from 9am to 4pm the first week of your baby. I kid you not… at 9am (within the hour of calling), our nurse, Carolien was at our door. Even though we were exhausted, having her help was so reassuring. Neither Clay or I have much experience with babies. Carolien was there to monitor my health and baby’s health. She provided breastfeeding support, checked diapers, weighed him, took tons of notes, taught us how to bathe and shower him, examined my stitches, and cleaned our bathroom daily. Having this support was beyond helpful. We were able to avoid learning many things the hard way.
I’m going to do a separate post on postpartum - recovery, highs and lows so I’ll cover more there about my healing and Hayes’ first weeks.
As I write this reflection on Valentine’s Day morning (and Hayes’ two month birthday), I am so filled with love. Clay has been an incredible dad and partner. I’m enjoying motherhood so much and it feels really natural. My heart is content with our family of 3, but I’m already open to the idea of adding another little human someday.
Thank you for reading <3