To Homebirth or Not To Homebirth....that is the question

So this has been a problem weighing on my mind ever since I found out I was pregnant...to have a homebirth or not. I had the most incredible, wonderful, amazing homebirth with Kobe. What I want is just to have that same experience again with Kaleb. The problem is that we are in a different situation now that I have to be realistic about the risks it presents. In College Station we lived literally less than 10 minutes from the hospital so if there was a critical emergency that popped up, we could be in the ER in a matter of minutes. I felt that by having a homebirth I was not putting Kobe or myself at any additional risk whatsoever because of that fact. The risk of something happening that would require transfer to the hospital are extremely rare (like less than 2%), coupled with our proximity to the hospital I felt very secure in my decision to have a homebirth. I feel very strongly that birth is a natural process not an "illness" that should be medically managed. If you let your body do what it was made to do, most of the time things will work out for the best for you and your baby. I hate the unnecessary interventions that hospitals love to push and just really enjoy being in a peaceful, relaxed environment to give birth in the most natural way possible. Here is the problem, I am due at the end of Feb/beginning of March which is the snowiest time of year here and I live in the mountains about 45 minutes away from the closest hospital (with clear roads - in a snow storm it could take hours). By choosing to have this baby at home, I feel that I am introducing a higher risk because in the rare chance that something does goes wrong and the baby needs to be out in a matter of minutes to save his life, well we just wouldn't be able to get to the hospital in time.

After losing Kyle I joined several grief and loss groups and through those groups I met other parents who had lost children. So many of them had lost their children during birth and I learned of so many different ways a child can die during birth...prolapsed cord, cord around the neck, baby is too big and gets stuck, the list goes on. So while I know the risk of any of those things happening is incredibly low, I also know what it is like to be on the wrong side of incredibly low odds and when it happens to you and it's your child that dies, it doesn't matter what the odds were. So I feel like I have to decide between having the birth experience that I want or doing the absolute safest thing for Kaleb. What is more important? Me having a relaxing birth experience or my child's safety? When I think about it like that, it's a no brainer, I have to do what is going to present the least risk to my baby. Having him in Feb, in the mountains, 45 min. away from the nearest hospital just doesn't seem to be smart if his health and safety are my #1 concern. If we lived down in Denver, close to a hospital, this wouldn't be a concern at all, I would have a homebirth for sure. It's just that living where we live and the time of year I'm due present risks that I'm starting to think are just not acceptable. If something did happen right at the last minute and the cord was presenting first or his heart rate started dropping and he needed to get out immediately in order to save his life and we couldn't get to the hospital in time because of where we live and "my" desire to have a homebirth, well I know I couldn't live with that guilt. It's hard enough losing child and knowing there was something you could have done to save him but just didn't know about it....but losing a child and knowing that you knew ahead of time you were putting him at risk, I don't want to live with that. I can't bear losing another child and especially not in a way that could have been prevented but wasn't because of "my" choices. I really wish we would have considered this before moving up here, but it honestly didn't even cross my mind until after we had already bought the house and moved in. Short of trying to sell our house and move to the city, I think my only option is to give up on having the homebirth I want and find another option that is less risky.

The good news is that I found a midwifery group in Evergreen that delivers at a hospital down in Denver that has jacuzzi tubs in each room so at least I could be seen by a midwife and have my labor in the water but still be in the hospital in the event of an emergency. I'm not looking forward to having to get up in the middle of my labor and drive somewhere and then have to stay in a hospital and turn around and drive home with a brand new baby, staying home in your own bed is so much nicer and I'm now going to have the stress of making sure that the hospital doesn't try to do anything to him that I don't want (circumcision, vaccines at birth, etc.) but I guess it's a good compromise and I will still get to have a lot of things I want without putting Kaleb at risk during birth. So I think at this point that is what I have decided to do.