If you’ve read about our other births, you’ll know that we’ve had something ‘interesting’ happen in our previous labor and delivery experiences. We certainly don’t get bored. But this go around I was really hoping… More
Our (Home) Birth Story
MacKenzie Louise Russell was born on September 25 at 10:55 am. I’ve had high hopes of writing a blog post for the past 2 months, but obviously that didn’t happen. Between bonding with baby, (trying to) rest, helping out with church stuff, and returning to work, there has been very little ‘me’ time, and even less ‘me’ time with a functioning brain. It seems we have been going a mile a minute for the past 2 months, and loving every minute of it.
When we first found out we were pregnant, I automatically called my OBGYN to schedule an appointment. I didn’t even hesitate to make that call. That’s what you do; it’s what the women in my family have always done. But a couple of weeks before that appointment, I started looking at birthing centers and midwives around me. I started thinking about having a home-birth way back when I was in college, and at the beginning of 2018 it was still on my mind. As I was looking at different options, I decided to message Doran at Grace Midwifery just to get a little information. I ‘knew’ Doran through Facebook as a Holy Yoga sister, so I felt comfortable consulting her. On a whim, I went ahead and scheduled an appointment for Dennis and I to meet with her and her team to learn more about home-birthing, particularly Christian-based home-birthing. By the end of our appointment, Dennis and I were ready to sign all of the paperwork and have the Grace Midwifery team walk alongside us through our pregnancy.
Fast-forward to September 24 and 40 weeks and 1 day pregnant. It was our 2-year wedding anniversary. Dennis and I started the day by going out for a breakfast date. Then he headed to work and I began my first day of maternity leave. I spent the day doing little things around the house, then went for a walk through the mall with my in-laws. We did several laps then returned home for a delicious salmon dinner prepared by my mother-in-law. We finally opened a bottle of wine we’d gotten as a wedding present. Full and sleepy, Dennis and I went to bed early that night and I was asleep by about 9. Around 11:45pm, I woke up with contractions. I was able to go back to sleep a couple of times, but by 5am I was up & functioning on about 4 hours of sleep. I had been communicating with Doran periodically, and at that point she advised me to try to take a shower and eat something while Dennis and I waited for the Grace team to arrive. I did not want to leave the shower, and by the time I made it to the bedroom I could barely swallow the bagel Dennis had made for me. While I had been in the shower, Dennis had been transforming our room for labor, and once I was upstairs in our bedroom he continued running around the house tidying up our construction zone of a house and making sure I had everything I needed.
Unbeknownst to me, Dennis had asked some of the women in our lives to create affirmation cards for me. We had read them together the day before, but in labor I had a hard time focusing enough to read them, so I relaxed into Dennis and he read them to me. The team (Doran, Jodi, and Elizabeth) arrived around 7:30am and by 8/8:30am I had progressed to a 6 and transitioning to active labor. Within another half-hour my body was already pushing. Jodi came in to be with me as the pushing progressed, soon joined by Doran and Elizabeth. I knelt beside the bed with Dennis sitting beside me, and soon Jodi saw what she thought was baby’s head. We were so excited! This was real, we would meet our baby soon, and everything seemed to be going smoothly and according to plan. Until it wasn’t.
Things got scary really quickly Dennis would tell me a few days later that Jodi and Doran were silently communicating behind me so as not to worry me. After consulting each other, they told us: that wasn’t baby’s head, it was baby’s bum and she was going to be delivered breech. This was a huge surprise to us because for several months baby had been in a head-first position. But in the days prior to labor she had been particularly active and had plenty of room to move around (due to her smaller size). While this news was a surprise, it wasn’t really scary until the midwives informed us that they are required to call 911, even if we decided to try to deliver at home. They gave us a choice: call 911 and go to the hospital where they would perform a C-section OR we could try a home birth and if there were complications the squad would be just outside waiting to take us to the hospital.
I was terrified. I never imagined that we would be in this situation, and I never imagined that I would have 4 pairs of eyes looking at me, asking me to make this decision. I knew that ultimately I had to be the one to make the decision, and that Dennis would support me either way. But I was scared; it felt like my worst nightmare was actually happening. I knew that if I ended up in an ambulance, I would be sobbing and a complete wreck. I was already in a tremendous amount of pain and couldn’t bear the thought of having to ride in an ambulance and prolong the pain. I also couldn’t bear the idea of being forced to have a C-section. So, I chose to stay at home. I was terrified that I wasn’t going to be able to do it, that I just wanted to quit and for it all to be over. I couldn’t voice those fears because I knew I would break if I admitted any of that. So instead I just kept pushing and praying.
Doran called 911 and talked to them as I continued to push. As the call went through, baby girl started coming out, bum first followed by hips, torso, legs, & finally head. Doran was still on the phone, but we were already welcoming MacKenzie Louise to our world. Due to the circumstances of MacKenzie’s birth, Dennis didn’t get to catch her. Instead, Jodi caught her and handed her to me. We hadn’t found out the gender during our ultrasounds, but we were crazy surprised to see that we had a baby GIRL! The team started to work on checking vitals and getting myself and MacKenzie cleaned up, and once we were okayed Dennis read scripture over our precious girl.
MacKenzie’s birth was ALL God. It was not mine or Dennis’ strength. There was every chance working against us, but a lot of prayer and a whole lot of God were totally for us. Everything turned out the absolute best it could given the situation. Labor was fairly short, MacKenzie was in the easiest of breech positions, and we both came out of it healthy and strong.
We also had the best possible team to help us throughout pregnancy and an unexpected delivery. One of the big reasons that I got through a breech birth at home was because I knew that these women were doing everything they could to help us have a positive outcome. I never doubted that they were surrounding us with love, supporting us and giving us solid advice and encouragement. Dennis and I felt confident going under their care from the moment we first met with them, and after our experience I am even more confident that I want this team to be with me for future pregnancies.
Our Journey to Pregnancy
This post has been a long time coming. I mean, come on, we’re 24.5 weeks in. The third trimester is gonna be here real soon, and I’m just getting around to writing this? Yup, the blog has definitely taken the back burner these last few months. Life happens, and for the Russell family that looks like 3 jobs, starting a church, home renovations, finishing a degree, teaching yoga classes, getting 2 new yoga certifications, and making sure we eat and sleep sometime in between. Needless to say, as with so many things, this time is going so. fast.
At this point, it’s a bit late to try to play pregnancy catch-up and go into the details of the past months and trimesters. Plus, that’s just more information than I want to share with y’all, and hopefully information you would rather not hear about.
BUT, I do want to share the seemingly long and arduous journey Dennis and I traveled to get here. It took us 16 months to conceive. Now, I realize 16 months is nothing compared to the multiple years and various procedures that many couples go through. But I also know that those 16 months were not ‘just’ 16 months. They were no less painful and heartbreaking. And I want to share this post because I know that there are so many women who struggle to conceive, some who are never able to, and others who lose a precious baby in the process. Even if our journey was ‘only’ 16 months, there may be somebody out there who has hit the year mark and needs some hope or reassurance that they can get through it.
Long before Dennis and I were together, God placed the desire on our hearts to have a large family. I have wanted to be a wife and mother since I was a little girl (think 4 or 5 years old playing with Barbie dolls). That is just something that has always naturally been a part of me. And when Dennis and I started our ‘courtship’ and engagement, we were both on the same page about trying to start a family right away. This is not for everyone. I repeat, this is not for everyone. But we are both of the mindset that God will bless us with children when and how He wants, regardless of whether or not we use birth control. And I had a really awful experience with my brief use of birth control, so I have completely sworn it off for myself. Again, this is not for everyone.
Once we were married, we immediately started trying to conceive. And even when we weren’t ‘trying’ per se, we weren’t NOT trying. Now, I was 24 when we got married and I’m now almost 26. My body should have been a prime baby-making machine. But it wasn’t happening. I handled that pretty well for the first few months. But around 4 or 5 months, things started to get really hard. You see, a mere month before our wedding I had gone to the ER for severe cramps. I thought they were GI related, as the cramps normally flared up around gluten. But the doctor ordered an ultrasound and found out that I had cysts on both of my ovaries. At that point, the cysts were almost gone, but the pain I had been experiencing for months was most likely due to them. Fast forward to 4 or 5 months of marriage, and I was dealing with similar pains. Worse than that, around that time I also started to experience early pregnancy symptoms. Worse than that? Why worse than that? Because I wasn’t pregnant. I had literally every early pregnancy symptom I had ever read about. And then I would get my period. The worst part? That happened nearly every month for the rest of that first year of marriage.
Every month, I would get my hopes up thinking, “Maybe this time it’s real.” And every month I had to face the reality and deal with the heartbreak. The heartbreak of knowing “not yet”, but also wondering “not ever?”
Eventually, as we neared our 1st anniversary, I made the difficult decision to be gentler to my body. That shouldn’t have been difficult, but for someone with body control and disordered eating in their past it was incredibly difficult. I am a runner; I love running. But I traded in running for yoga more often than not. And I started making myself eat more and try not to watch the calories add up to a number I had never seen before. When those changes didn’t ‘fix’ me, I started tackling the stressors in our lives. We had a lot of things going on in the first 1.5 years of our marriage. And all of them were out of my control. I had to give up a lot of control. I’m still working on giving up control. But in October, I spent a solid week and a half on the mountaintop with Papa. And it changed everything.
For 4 days in October, Dennis and I attended a conference that we go to every 6 months. The leaders and participants have become family to us. When we were there in October, we asked for healing prayer. We spent over an hour in prayer and I was in tears for a lot of it. But when I left there, I had started on my journey of giving up control. I flew directly from that conference to Lost Canyon, Arizona to complete my Holy Yoga certification at a week long Holy Yoga retreat. God pulled some stuff out of me that I didn’t even know was there. He’s pretty good at that. He showed me that my definition of who I was needed to change. He showed me where relationships had failed me, and that it wasn’t my fault. He taught me to be His precious little child again. And each night as we Holy Yogis met in our small groups, we were invited to let go of the baggage we had brought with us to retreat. And each night, I let go a little bit more, and a little bit more, and continued my journey of giving up control.
I returned home to a tumultuous situation at the church we were serving, but Dennis and I were both at peace with the pending outcome. I spent November and December in surprising bliss, completely stress free, even with future unemployment hanging over our heads. I didn’t think much about pregnancy for those 2 months. Until Christmas Eve service. And let me tell you, the waterworks started pouring as I listened to Dennis read about the angel’s visit to Mary. And they wouldn’t stop. I felt like I had a giant baby-sized hole in my heart. The only way I got through the rest of that service was prayer. I carried it all to the cross, and Jesus took a piece of Himself, literally took a piece of His own flesh, and filled the hole in my heart.
A week later, the first week of January, I went to my gynecologist to talk about infertility. I left that appointment feeling totally defeated. How was this part of my life? I came home in tears with paperwork to have blood work done, and a sperm cup for my husband. I was instructed to take an ovulation test and once it read positive to go to the hospital and get my blood drawn. I felt so overwhelmed and defeated. I didn’t want to have to go through this process. The next day, tragedy struck and Dennis and I had to make an emergency trip up to New York to be with his family, and I knew it would be weeks before I would able to get my blood work done. While in New York, I had numerous conversations about pregnancy, and 2 people even told me to take a pregnancy test as soon as we got back home, to which I responded, “There’s no way.” But by the time we got back home, I knew it was just a waiting game to see if I would be peeing on an ovulation stick or a pregnancy stick.
3 weeks into January, I nervously took a pregnancy test and found out that Dennis and I are parents. And it didn’t take 16 months. It took a whole lot of God, and a whole lot less of me.
There is one last thing I want to share, something that I have not been able to get over the past few weeks. When I was in Lost Canyon, Arizona, God placed it on my heart to get my Kids Holy Yoga certification. I enrolled for that course in the middle of December, not knowing my body was preparing itself for pregnancy. And now, 5+ months into our pregnancy, I am taking the Kids HY course and God is preparing me for many years and stages of motherhood.
Lent
Call me a weirdo, but I absolutely LOVE the season of Lent. You know how most people feel about Advent and Christmas? Yeah, that’s how much I love Lent and Easter. Easter is handsdown my favorite holiday. While I enjoy the warmth, anticipation, and celebration of our Hope coming into the world in human flesh for the first time, there is something about Christ’s timeless sacrifice that fills me with even more warmth, anticipation, and celebration. We know how the story ‘ends’: Christ dies for us, ALL of us, in our brokenness and Christ rises again. And so I love the Lenten season, as a time of inner reflection and denial to self with the foreknowledge of what is to come on that glorious Easter day.
I think one of the reasons I love Lent so much is because of the transition into Spring. I am not a Winter girl by any means. Bring on the sticky, humid Virginia summer any day! And so I look forward to the changing of the seasons from Winter into Spring. And I enjoy how that transition can so beautifully parallel our own Lenten journey. As we transition into a new season outwardly, we start to shed the layers: the warm winter coats, the bulky sweaters, the snow boots, and various warm accessories. And we come into the new season with less weight to carry as we don lighter clothes and trade in our mittens for unbound and open hands. And as we shed these physical layers and begin to free our bodies just a little bit more, the Lenten season invites us to shed our inner layers.
You see, just like onions and ogres, humans have a lot of layers, too. And those layers can be a good thing; they become a part of us, our character, who we identify as. But they can also create a distance or a block between us and our Savior. So much as we are about to start shedding our outer layers in favor of the lightness and warmth that come with Spring, let’s start coming face-to-face with those raw, inner layers and get rid of whatever is keeping us from fully living into Christ’s sacrifice for us.
One of the best ways we can live into that sacrifice is by being in relationship with God, in all three persons. Most mornings throughout the year I try to spend a dedicated amount of time doing devotions. But often I can get burnt out and start to make it part of yet another routine. During Lent, I usually find a renewed sense of purpose and connection during my devotional time. I rededicate my time, giving it up to His control rather than mine. My favorite Lenten devotional is from She Reads Truth. I have the 2016 version and I have used it for the past 2 years and will continue to use it for at least a few more. There is plenty of space to write notes for each day, and I have loved seeing how my thoughts have changed and grown over the years. This year’s Lenten devo is absolutely stunning, and I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in starting a daily devotional. There are 5 days worth of readings each week, and then a break on the weekends to catch up or meditate on a suggested verse. And don’t worry men, there is also a He Reads Truth version of the Lenten devotional.
My question for you this Shrove/Fat Tuesday is: what are you willing to shed? Or maybe, what do you not want to shed that you know you should?
Transition & Routine
Our lives are in a heavy state of transition. We are just a couple of weeks into the new year, but a couple of weeks can bring a lot of changes. My husband entered this year in a temporary state of unemployment, and while we’re handling it well so far, it has brought little changes to some of our usual habits and my financial mindset. It has also brought a bright new hope into our lives as we strive to start a new church in a spiritually poor area. But the heaviest transition we have had to face thus far in 2018 was the loss of an immediate family member. This death was not anticipated or expected in any regards.
On January 5th, Dennis and I headed up to New York to be with his family. We were there for a full week. A full week of being constantly surrounded by extended family members who I still barely know, constant preparation and cleanup, and not doing anything that I normally do. And let me tell you, it was so healing.
This morning as I sat down to do my devotional, I reflected that I had only done devotionals (and very short ones at that) twice while we were away. I also realized that I only did yoga a few times, and always much shorter than my usual practices. I didn’t even set an alarm most days, and actually managed to sleep in for the first time in months. The more and more I thought about it, the only thing that carried over from my regular morning routine was sitting down with my morning cup of coffee. And now that we’ve returned home, with the old To-Do List still sitting in my planner, with meals to plan and prep, lunches to pack, and shopping to do, I find myself letting go of all the “have to’s” I’ve been holding on to. I finally feel like I’ve let go of the control and rigidity that I have allowed to have a hold on me for the past year. And it’s all because of perspective that has come from this period of transition.
Times of transition can bring out the worst in us. They can cause anxiety and uncertainty that lead to various avenues of control masquerading as stability. But times of transition can also serve as great reset points. And in this transition, for the first time in a long time, I’m choosing to let go of control and welcome the unexpected. I am a creature of habit and routine, but I am excited to see what letting go of my self-expectations and “have-to’s” will do.
New Year’s intentions
Ah yes, it’s that time of year. Time for renewal and rejuvenation. Time to embrace where we’ve been, where we are, and try to be okay with where we’re going. I’m terrible at New Year’s resolutions. I have never had the experience of meeting anyone who has fulfilled more than 30% of their resolutions. New Year’s resolutions set us up for failure in the coming year, and they also encourage feelings of inadequacy for our previous selves. But I have seen many bloggers come up with words of intention for the year. I like the idea of setting an intention to live into a word (inspired by The Word) throughout the year. The ones that have been sticking out to me over the past few weeks are ‘hope’ and ‘joy’. There are a number of things that I am hopeful for, that I have been hopeful for for most of 2017. And yet with each passing day I’ve had to become content with the fact that it might not be time for those hopes to be filled. And that’s where joy comes in. Finding joy in the hard times, in the missing pieces. As we enter and progress through 2018, I know that I will continue to hope and I want to continue being joyous even if those hopes don’t come to fruition or meet my expectations in the new year.
For those who know us, it is no big surprise that Dennis and I will be starting 2018 with some major changes. We are going to be dealing with a lot of unknowns, a major change in our finances, and most likely a lot of feelings of failure and rejection. But I also know that 2018 will be the year that I start regularly teaching Holy Yoga classes. It is also a year for me & Dennis to step out in faith like never before, together and individually. So yes, I am entering 2018 with a lot of hope and a lot of joy. And I want to remind myself of those 2 words as often as I can throughout the year, in the good and the ‘it could be better’ times. That is my intention. That is my New Year’s resolution.
I am so excited to jump start my year and these intentions with the Holy Yoga Experience! It will truly be a culmination of my 2017, and a spiritual renewal for the upcoming year. The Holy Yoga Experience is happening nationwide on January 6th. Whether you’re looking for a physical or a spiritual renewal, you’ll find it at the HY Experience. Bring your mat, bring your Bible, bring your fears and expectations. Let Him meet you where you’re at.
Just another year?
2016 was a whirlwind of a year. For me, it was mostly the year of Dennis & Sarah. The year we started dating, got engaged, and planned a wedding in a matter of months. The year that (almost) all of my dearest girlfriends came together from around the world to be awesome, sassy bridesmaids (#itsquirkyitsfun) and also became new best friends with each other.
It was also a year of incredible peace. Among the busyness and craziness of planning a wedding, job hunting, house hunting, and church activities, life certainly had its stressful moments. But for the first time in my life I felt at peace, a peace I hadn’t realized I was missing. And yes, cheesy as it is, that peace was (and is) mostly thanks to the hubby and God.
Pharaoh Lake hike
St. Mary’s Wilderness
Married life thus far has included numerous runs together and a couple of hikes. We headed up to New York to be with family for Thanksgiving and I got to go on my first hike with my sibling-in-laws! And New Years Day was celebrated with a short hike with good friends.
As we enter the new year, I’m not making any resolutions. I just want to embrace everyday, practicing self-love and selflessness, growing closer to my husband and stronger in my faith. That being said, I do have some plans for this year:
- Run at least 1 half-marathon. I’ve got my eyes on the Park-to-Park half in April. However, we’re also trying to get pregnant over here so I’m cautious to sign up for anything just yet. Any advice from pregnant runners?
- Get my running fitness back to where my weekly mileage is about 25+.
- Start journaling again, sometimes prayer journaling, sometimes just reflections.
- Tackle my GI issues once and for all by keeping stress at bay and eating what feels good, not just what tastes good. But also listening to my body and what it needs.
- Become a certified yoga instructor. I’ve been thinking about this for about a year now, and there are a couple of Christian yoga programs I am particularly interested in. I think it would be such a cool outreach/ministry opportunity as well as a way for me to really connect the physical and the spiritual in my life.
- Create our first home together, with a good yoga space and large kitchen. This one should happen sooner rather than later as we are just a couple weeks away from closing on a house.
Well that was a bit of a fail…
So….somehow I’ve only published one post and that was weeks ago. If you read that, you might remember me saying it’s been hard for me to keep at blogging in the past? Obviously still true 
BUT at least I have a reason this time!
Over the past 2 months I’ve been dealing with some serious abdominal pain. My fiance and I went up to NY to visit my future in-laws (I love them!), and I spent half of the trip exhausted and unable to eat much of anything. I did at least manage to scarf down half a slice of NY pizza and 2 NY bagels. After that trip, my fiance and mom made me promise to go to the ER, and when I finally did we found out I had an ovarian cyst and a UTI. Not at all an IBS issue like I thought it was. Apparently these things can happen frequently and without pain…or they can be the most gut-wrenching, I-want-to-die experiences of your life. I’d say I’m somewhere in between.
With all of the body issues going on, as well as 2 bridal showers and just general busyness, I haven’t been running nearly as much. But this week has definitely been better now that my body is feeling better and my appetite is coming back. I have to constantly remind myself to LISTEN TO MY BODY. It’s hard.
The man and I hit up the track early this morning for 3 miles. 6am and there wasn’t even a hint of the sunrise yet. I love these early morning runs and getting to watch the world wake up 🙂
We had 1/2 lb. feta lamb burgers and grilled plantains for dinner last night, and I’m still super stuffed from that so breakfast was light and easy with a banana and my fave Dark Chocolate Dreams from the Peanut Butter Co. This is the best stuff! I always end up going back for ‘just one more’ spoonful.
I’ve been a long time user of Bloglovin’ as a way to follow health and fitness bloggers. Since I’m hoping to actually blog a bit more regularly now, I figured I might as well link my blog to my Bloglovin’ account so you guys can see who I follow and which recipes I’m dying to try!
<a href=”http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/18206311/?claim=hbu2znfdhww”>Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>
Oh hey there
Soooooo I’ve tried this whole blogging thing a number of times, and have just never had the nerve to hit the publish button. There are so many incredible blogs already out there! So many inspiring women who write about running, food, and faith. But I figure, if nothing else, at least this can be a place for me and mine to share and remember for future years.
Right now, my life is kind of all over the place. I love to run. I started running about 4 years ago and have never looked back. But I’ve been dealing with various injuries since last September and had been on a running hiatus. Thankfully, I have been back into running for about 2 months now and I have an incredible, selfless fiancee who joins me for a couple runs each week. Having him there helps me push myself mentally and physically, which is just what I need if I want to get back into the running shape I was in a year ago.
Aside from running, yoga, and (not enough) strength training, I work part-time at my favorite theatre while continuing to search for a full-time museum job. I have a Masters in Museum Studies and I want to use my dang degree!
Oh and that fiancee I mentioned earlier? Yeah, we’re getting married in 2 months!!! It’s a very exciting time, but also stressful. We’re super cheesy and crazy in love. We’ve been together for 5 months, but we both knew within just a few short weeks that we were going to get married. However, we’ve only officially been engaged for a month, so we don’t have a ton of time to plan.
That’s pretty much my life right now. I love to cook (meal prep for the win!) and read when I have extra time, which is rarely these days. I’m working on running more frequently and slightly shorter distances to build up my strength and endurance. Hoping that tomorrow will be a 4 miler morning, as long as I can get up and out before the sun rises. Don’t want to melt away in the humidity.
Que Sera, Sarah 