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I don't know every detail of the story, but her labor was pretty long. She requested an epidural, but the anesthesiologist took so long to show up that by the time he got there it was too late and she had to deliver naturally. She is not happy to this day about that. Afterwards, she developed extreme PPD that became biploar disorder. She has been hospitalized for it, on lots of medication, therapy, and treatment ever since.

She wasn't able to go on to have any more children because the medicine wasn't safe for pregnancy and she couldn't stay stable without it.

So, her birth story isn't something we reflect on with great joy in my family

She had me in a hospital. Her regular doctor wasn't there, and the young doctor who was on call was not very pro-natural and made her very upset. She was in labor for 36 hours (no epidural) and finally had me vaginally even though the OB had been pushing a c-section for several hours.

For my little sister, she went with a midwife and decided to have a home birth. She woke up early in the morning with contractions and called the midwife, and she told her to take a bath and try to relax and she was on her way. My dad caught my little sister in the bathtub half an hour later, before the midwife arrived. The entire labor from first contraction to baby was two hours. Midwife got there ten minutes later.

My mom was very sick while she was pregnant with me. She couldn't do anything during the first half of it because getting out of bed was too difficult. She eventually got better and put on some weight. She said by the time she was due her stomach was so big that all she could wear was my dad's sweats. I was a week or more late and her water broke with a huge gush. She gave birth at a teaching hospital and shared a labor, delivery, and postpartum room with a 14 year old girl. She said the girl screamed through her entire delivery, had no one there with her, and my mom helped her take care of her baby during their stay. She did get an epidural but had a bad reaction to it afterwards. She started shaking so bad and couldn't control it. My Mema and dad climbed in the bed with her to keep her from shaking off of it!

My Mema likes to tell a story about the day I was born. She was in the waiting room with the rest of the family and my dad came running out and yelled "it's a girl!" She said she had never seen him happier than in that moment. She said the air around him was glowing and it was like he had a halo. I always tear up when she tells me that.

Natural birth, in hospital. She was also a huge La Leche League-r. When my sister and I became interested in natural birth (pregnant at the same time) we learned that ton of the women in our family had been interested in natural birth and breastfeeding and all that in the 70s and 80, when it was so much rarer. It was so cool to be able to bond with them about something that was really subversive and underground in their era.

Only really know my birth story with an exception of a few stories told about my four younger brothers.

My mom was in labor for 17 hours. She told me she laying on the couch in pain with contractions while everyone else was having dinner. They laugh about it now, but she was pretty upset at the time. My grandmom told me "there was no need to rush. They would have just sent her home anyways." During delivery - I decided that I wanted to come out shoulder first. They had a hard time repositioning me and I came out sunny side up (face upwards). My aunt always says "and the first thing I saw was a piece of your carrot red hair sticking up! It's was the first thing I pointed out."

I'm not sure if she had any medication or not.

When my mom was pregnant with me, all I allowed her to eat was steak and seafood. She also went bowling every week up until birth week! She had a really long labor with me before they decided to have a c-section. I apparently showed preference on which side of her belly I stayed in because her belly was super lopsided.

When my mom was pregnant, they didn't do ultrasounds until late in the pregnancy. Well, she went into labor the night before her ultrasound. She was only 30 weeks pregnant. She started having contractions around 11, water broke and 12 and had my sister shortly after 2. Of course, she was still in horrible pain and asked what was going on. Little did she know she was pregnant with twins! I came out 5 minutes later. She didn't have any pain meds or anything like that, but we were really small anyway.

@hergreenapples: Right? I hope I have an easy labor like my mom or some of these other moms!

My mum's birth story is just plan weird!! I'm not really sure what to make of it all!

She smoked 80 cigarettes a day (I know, right, how?!!) and ate only cornflakes while she was pregnant with me (she says it was the happiest she's ever been and I resist the urge to say "how could you do this?"). She developed GD and a few other problems so they hospitalised her at 7 months pregnant.

A couple of weeks later, she was watching Roots (you know, that very serious series about slavery) and says she was laughing so hard (I know right? Plain weird) and that made her go into labour.

I was born 6 weeks premature, at 5lb something, bright yellow with jaundice and had to be whipped away for a blood transfusion for some reason or other. My mum still doesn't know why, she never thought to ask. I was put in an incubator in the neonatal unit....

Anyway, she then decided I wasn't her baby and refused to hold me or feed me. Days went by and the nurses looked after me while my mum cried and cried (I guess it was PPD but they didn't talk about that kind of thing back then). Then, one night, in the middle of the night, a really strict nurse went to my mum's bed and woke her up, saying "Your baby is crying. She needs you". My mum protested that I wasn't actually her baby because she felt no bond etc and the nurse wouldn't take no for an answer - she wheeled my mum down to the Neonatal unit in a wheelchair, put me in my mum's arms and left us. I stopped crying and my mum said "Hello. I'm your mum". I cry every time she tells me that bit.

@BabyBear: Her name was Nurse Dan (back then you called them by their last names). My mum said she was really strict - but she's never forgotten her. I suppose we're both grateful, really.

My mom was in labor with me for something insane like 2 days. She tried all the fancy (at the time) things like a birthing chair and a birthing ball but nothing worked. She remembers all the TV shows she watched at the hospital. She ended up having to have a C-section but by that time she was relieved to have me out! She had a scheduled C with my brother.

@cokiezombie: that's basically my mom's story for me! Had to drive clear on the other side of town during evening rush hour and was 10 cm when she got to the hospital!

She said my oldest brothers' births (twins) were traumatic because one was breech and posterior. The other twin came out first and the doctor reached in, grabbed the foot of the other one and pulled him out! And she had no drugs with any of us.

She said my other brother's birth is hazy, just remembers that it was really fast.

ETA: Oh, and I was 18 days late!

With me, my mom got out of bed in the morning and her water broke. She and my dad went to the hospital, and she was admitted. She labored for a long time, and for whatever reason she just wasn't able to push me out. They had to do a c-section (which she wasn't expecting).

With my brother, they scheduled her for a c-section, so she actually picked his birthday. She told me a long time ago that having a c-section was great, because she hated laboring!

My parents went to Lamaze class and the teacher jokingly told them not to eat pizza in early labor because in her opinion, barfing is common during labor and barfed up pizza smells the worst. I wasn't due to arrive for about 3 more weeks, so my mom had pizza for lunch and liver and onions for dinner. Right after dinner, she went into labor. When they got to the hospital, my mom was throwing up and she swears that all the nurses left the room while she was barfing. My dad went to run too, but she gave him "the eye". She labored hard for over 30 hours before I was born. I was just under 5lbs but she said my birth was much harder and more painful than my brother; who was a big old bruiser of a baby. My mom hemroged after I was born and needed an emergency blood transfusion. Even though I was little I didn't have to go to the NICU.

I was baby number two and I came before my scheduled c-section date in a snowstorm long story short, my mom was hit by a school bus while riding her bike as a little girl..and had her pelvic area destroyed making her unable to ever deliver vaginally. They let her try with her first but it was a no go, so they just had me cesarian.

I'm not 100% sure, I was adopted, but I have met my birth mother. She was 16 when she had me, and she said I came very quickly. In fact, all her children have been very fast births, so hopefully I got that gene!

I asked my mom about this tonight and it sounds like it her recovery was awful. She had a triple whammy...scheduled C-section, had her tubes tied and her appendix removed at the same time. Yikes!