Mother Gives Birth To 14-Pound Baby  With No Epidural!

14-pound baby natural deliveryAn Iowa mother has given birth naturally to a nearly 14-pound baby.

Vaginally!

Without an epidural!

By choice!

Where to even begin with this one?

For starters, I must commend Kendall Stewardson on her superhuman powers. I personally am all about the epidural I mean, you couldn’t find someone more into epidurals than me. My philosophy has always been, “You have headache, you take a Tylenol. You have a baby, you get an epidural.” That said, I’ve always had great respect for women who choose to deliver without one. So props right there to Stewardson.

Second, Stewardson managed to push out of her vagina a baby nearly double the size of your typical newborn. That is one big baby, folks!

Stewardson and her husband Joshua appeared on Good Morning America today with their giant newborn, Asher, along with Asher’s big brother, 15-month-old Judah (he weighed in at just over 12 pounds and was also delivered naturally). Stewardson, who endured six hours of labor before pushing for a mere six minutes, talked about why the choice was right for her.

“We had decided to research our options before we had Judah… And we thought a lot about doing it naturally. There are a lot of options out there for women but this seemed like the best thing for our family… And so we decided to try and fight for that. Because we wanted to lower my chances of getting a c-section and apparently if you don’t get induced and you don’t get the epidural, your chances decrease significantly for getting a c-section. We just wanted to try and avoid any unnecessary procedures,” Stewardson said. “I mean, there are a lot of times where they’re necessary and I would never tell a woman not to do what’s necessary for her family. But for our family, that is  just what…made sense.”

I admire Stewardson for respecting other people’s choices and for not judging. Too often I find that some women are quick to judge others for their chosen method of delivery and, at the end, it means nothing. All that’s important is a healthy baby and healthy mom not much else.

Anyway, the best part of the Good Morning America segment, which you can view below, is seeing how distracted the Stewardsons are with their 15-month-old shuffling around. That, too me, is a true portrait of parenthood more so than any birthing story. Though, I won’t lie, my jaw is still on the floor over this whole natural-birth thing. We’re talking about a 14-pounder here, people!

(Photo: Associated Press)

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