I had always planned to have a home birth. I had diligently scheduled every prenatal appointment, been to an ultrasound and attended a birthing class with my husband. I read story after story of other women's experiences with home births and watched several DVDs. I felt as though we were as prepared as we could be.

I had purchased a birth kit and a birthing ball. What more could I do except wait?

I was due July 7, 2007. That was a very warm summer (at least it felt that way to a very pregnant first-time mom-to-be). Our home did not have air conditioning. However, we had a small air conditioner in the master bedroom. I had arranged ahead to have my big sister with me while I labored since she had already had three natural births (one at home) with the same midwife who was assisting me.

By July 2, when I had no signs of labor and had been dilated to 3 centimeters for over a week, I was beginning to get frustrated. I refused to answer my phone because I was so tired of saying, "No, nothing yet."

It was a Monday morning and I remember getting into the shower and breaking down in a puddle of tears on the shower floor, absolutely certain this baby was just never going to come out. Another day passed with no activity.

By Tuesday evening, I had a little more energy, so my husband and I went for a walk through our neighborhood and along the river. As always, the walk made my back ache and my sides tense. I was beyond even knowing if I was having Braxton Hicks by then. It was just very uncomfortable to walk any distance at all.

When we returned from our walk, you could feel the anticipation in the air as all the kids waited for 4th of July the next day. All our neighbors were having barbeques or parties or preparing for the parties and barbeques to be had the next evening. There were even a few who couldn't wait and lit off a few fireworks a day early in an attempt to quench their children's anticipation.

At bedtime that night I lay down and suddenly felt wet. A little embarrassed, I thought I had lost bladder control, went to the bathroom and lay back down. Through the night, every time I rolled over (which by then seemed to be every half hour) I would get wet. Sometime during the night, I had put a pad on to protect myself from my own inability to hold in my pee. Disgusted, I went back to bed.

I woke up around 7 a.m. to go to the bathroom and make breakfast. As soon as I stood, a fairly small but definitely noticeable gush of water soaked my legs. Then it hit me. Oh. My water broke. Hmmm. I thought about the long walk I had taken the night before and my inability to hold in my pee. Realizing it was amniotic fluid keeping me wet all night and not urine was somehow comforting. The water hadn't all come out at once because my baby's head was so low it was blocking the fluid from leaking, which was why it only leaked when I moved and was lying down.

Slowly realizing what all this meant, I hurried to take a shower, put on my makeup, texted my friend the exciting news and waited for my husband to wake up. He got up at 8 a.m. and I let him know what was going on. We immediately called our midwife, who told me to come in and she would check me.

When we got there around 9 a.m., she told me it hadn't been the amniotic sac that had broken, but a forebag of water that women sometimes have. I was a little disappointed because I had thought this was it.

So she asked if I wanted her to go ahead and break my water to get things moving, or if I wanted to wait it out. My husband answered for me and said, "Let's do it!" So she went ahead with my IV, and broke my water. Then we got in the car and headed home to have a baby!

Contractions took a while to get started. We had time to stop for coffee on the way to my house, and even after we got there my contractions were very mild. Jacob and I decided to go for a walk to see if we couldn't speed the process up. He called my sister to tell her this was the day and she could probably head on over.

We headed out for a walk. Since I had an IV in my arm, my poor husband had to carry the IV bag up over his head while I timed my contractions. They were coming steadily at about two minutes apart, but were not very strong.

After our walk, around 11 a.m., I went up to my room (where the A.C. was blasting to try to fight off the heat) to cool down. I sat on my ball and rocked and rolled. I was doing anything to stay upright to let gravity do its job and pull that baby down. My midwife would periodically look up at me and ask how I was feeling, then go back to reading her novel while my body worked.

Around noon, I went downstairs to go for another walk. While Jacob and I were on our second walk, my sister showed up and caught up with us to get the lowdown on my progress. As we were headed back to the house, I felt something click, and a very strong contraction followed. They were still every two minutes but now were becoming much stronger.

Once back at the house, I thought a movie might take my mind off the pain, so I put in one of my favorites (Father of the Bride) and tried to watch it in between contractions. I knelt on the floor and rested my head on a chair, leaned against the wall while holding my husband's neck, sat down – all in an effort to stay "on top" of the pain.

After about an hour and a half, Nancy (my midwife) came downstairs to inform me it was time to check me again. It was about 2 in the afternoon. I went to the bathroom and went upstairs to be checked. When she checked me I was at about an 8 so I decided I wanted to get into the tub. My husband and sister filled the tub while I leaned on my nightstand to fight the pain.

Once in the tub, I was able to relax between contractions a little better. I held a comb in my hand and squeezed it through every contraction. Also, my husband took a pitcher of water and slowly poured it over my belly through every contraction; each one was lasting about 90 seconds now. I would get them in waves of two or three. Three on top of each other, and then a three-minute break. Then three more contractions one on top of the other, and then a break. Each contraction I had to force myself to remember to relax my belly. Sometimes, my whole body would shake with each wave of pain, but I knew I was almost done.

After an hour in the tub (about 3:20 p.m.) Nancy told me it was time to get out and do some work. My baby was going to come and this is when I really needed to be strong and focused. With my husband's help I got out of the tub, dried off and onto the bed. My sister ran downstairs to get some towels in the dryer to be warm and ready to greet the baby. My husband sat behind me to support my head and my sister and midwife each supported one leg.

With the next contraction, I pushed. I had no control over it; once I started I couldn't stop. Something else much more powerful than I had ever experienced took over and forced the baby down. The worst part was the break in between contractions when I could feel how low he was and I wanted him out but had to wait for the next contraction.

It only took three pushes though, and he came out, very fast! My pushing time only took 15 minutes. He was definitely ready to come. I got a mild tear, which Nancy stitched while Jacob made phone calls and my sister held the baby. He was 8 pounds even and 20 1/2 inches long, born at 3:45 p.m., 2007, on the 4th of July. We named him Thomas Andrew and spent our first night as parents watching fireworks as if the whole country celebrated his arrival.

I am now expecting my second baby 10/24/2009. I only hope labor goes as well as my first did.