We made the hour ride out to Pensacola, Florida, this afternoon for our second appointment with Vicky Taylor, the President and Licensed Midwife of Mama’s Cradle, the birth center we’ve chosen for our coming delivery. Her Center offers a variety of services: Bradley classes, home birth, center birth, water birth, VBAC deliveries, and more. With my dreams of giving birth in our home in New Orleans dashed (several problems: lack of providers and absence of a big tub, for example) Mama’s Cradle became an almost default choice as the closest birth center to New Orleans (3 hours away).
To be a client at Mama’s Cradle, you must show commitment to natural childbirth through proper preparation and diet and plan on breastfeeding. When she gave me the low-down during our first conversation, I quickly realized that this was going to be a great place for us. With every visit, we feel better and better about Vicky and the Center.
The entire service — labs, appointments, labor, delivery, and post-partum visits — is $3800 for a Center birth and $3200 for a home birth. We want to leave the door open for the small chance of a birth closer to home, so Vicky has been charging us accordingly: $200 for our first visit and full work-up labs, $80 for each visit after — to be deducted from our starting amount ($3800) should we deliver with her (something we feel pretty sure about right now). After reading Gwen’s blog about the cost of her pregnancy and delivery (over $12,000 for a non-complicated pregnancy and vaginal delivery) I figure it’s a great deal. The irony is that my c-section and related hospitalization afterwards was well into the $20,000 range — but we never paid a penny. Just think of what they would have saved if providers were trained in breech delivery and covered home birth! We’ll probably end up paying more for this birth than the last, even though this one will be significantly less cost. Still we may have a chance: because Vicky is a licensed midwife within the state of Florida, we are more likely to get reimbursement from insurance.
Today we heard the heartbeat for the first time! With a pulse at about 160 (roughly twice my own at the time) Number Two came through strong and regular. No indications of a Number Three, and although it’s still too early to tell, we remain confident that only one creature is currently making residence in my womb. I got kudos for great iron levels, consistent with pre-pregnancy levels, we talked about more about diet (I’ve been keeping a log), and about upcoming appointments. We decided against the Triple Screen for a variety of reasons (I’ll blog about that decision process later) and instead, will schedule two ultrasounds: one at 20 weeks and one at 30 weeks.
Because I am a VBAC delivery (Vaginal Birth After Cesarean) we’ve had to jump through a few more hoops than usual to show that all is okay. Vicky has a great history and total comfort with VBACs — something hard to find these days — and is just about the greatest advocate around. In the sea of craziness and uncertainity around us these days, it is a relief to feel so good about something!
