What's It Like for a Husband to Catch His Own Baby at a Home Birth?

Rowan is a buddy of mine. Our families are both living on Syros, Greece right now, and a few weeks ago we were walking down the hill after school drop-off when he mentioned, almost in passing, that his wife Genine had two home births. I told him we had to sit down and talk.

Their son Jack and daughter Frankie were both born at home in Australia, in two different states. Rowan went into the first birth as a man who trusted hospitals. By the second, he was the one with his hands in the birth pool. Here's our full conversation, and below it, the parts I think every husband should hear.

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Whose idea was the home birth?

Genine's, completely. Rowan didn't hedge on that.

She's a researcher by nature, he said, and when she got pregnant with Jack she read everything she could find about the safest ways to give birth and how a child's earliest moments shape them. That led her to home birth and to hypnobirthing, which she trained in.

Rowan came at it from the other side. "I'm a believer in medicine and safety and the way it's been done for a long time," he told me. He'd heard the horror stories and felt the stigma. But he landed where a lot of us eventually land. "The choice is Genine's. It's her body." He admits he had no idea what birth would put her through.

If you're the husband who's still unsure, I wrote about that first conversation with your wife.

What put his fears to rest?

Their midwife, Mary Young. She was fully trained, came out of the hospital system, and was endorsed by the local obstetricians. They also happened to live in a city close to major hospitals.

What mattered most to Rowan was that Mary gave them a plan. Instead of being told what to do by whatever staff the hospital assigned, he felt that he and Genine owned the process. If they had a question, Mary picked up the phone.

She also ran a weekly hypnobirthing group. Every week Rowan sat with other couples at the same stage of pregnancy, other dads included, and asked whatever was on his mind. He called it enlightening. I'd add that it's rare. Most of us walk into a birth having never talked to another man who's been there.

Rowan believes home birth is as safe as the hospital for a healthy pregnancy. The research is more nuanced than that, and I walk through it in Is Home Birth Safe?

What did he actually do during the first birth?

Jack's labor ran about three and a half hours. Mary kept Genine up and moving, kneeling and rocking on the birth ball. When things slowed down, Mary figured out why: Jack had turned the wrong way, going 270 degrees around instead of 90. "So he likes to do things differently," Rowan said. Mary had Genine put one foot up on the ball and swing her hips to help him turn. There was never any panic in her voice. Between checks, she was in the kitchen making tea.

Genine's mom was there too, which added its own pressure, and Rowan found himself keeping the peace. The rest was small stuff. Enya playing, candles lit, cups of tea and glasses of water. When it was time for the birth pool, he helped Genine in and held her hand.

The biggest thing, he thinks, was being her focal point. "Just present," he said. "Someone where she could focus her attention." Look at me. Breathe.

Then he laughed. "I might be talking my role up a lot. Genine might just be like, 'No.'"

I told him what I'll tell you. At our first two births, in the hospital, I didn't know what I was supposed to do either. I held Katie's hand and tried not to pass out. Being the steady face she can look at counts for a lot.

What's it like to catch your own baby?

Frankie came about three years later, and her birth was a different animal. They were in Melbourne by then, and only a few weeks before her due date, Genine called Footscray Hospital, which ran a home birth program through the hospital. The answer was no, too late. Then Genine mentioned her first home birth with Mary Young, and they took her on.

Frankie's labor lasted about thirty minutes.

Rowan and Genine were alone in the room with the birth pool when Genine said she thought she was ready. Rowan went to the kitchen to get the midwife, who finished some paperwork and came in. Genine got in the water. About five minutes later, the midwife turned to Rowan.

"Do you wanna catch the baby under the water?"

He said sure. Then he noticed she was waiting on him. Like, now? The baby's there now?

So he put his hands in the water. He couldn't see much, so he found the umbilical cord. "I know which end's attached," he said, "so by default the other end should be attached to Frankie."

He found her. Just as the midwife started to say don't lift her out of the water, he lifted her straight out of the water, behind Genine, who was on her hands and knees and now had to swing her leg over her newborn. Rowan calls it his stupid dad moment. He's pretty sure the midwife looked at him with some disdain.

I don't think it was stupid. Nobody tells you any of this. Most of us don't even know we're allowed to catch our own baby until someone asks.

What would he do differently?

Get more involved before the birth. "I feel like I let Genine run the show, and that's to be understood," he said. "But I could've contributed more in the pre-birth phase."

He also talked about the weeks after. Those early days are mostly mother and baby, and he saw how easy it would be for a dad to hang back, the way his father's generation often did. So he and Genine worked out a system. When the baby woke at night, Rowan picked the baby up and brought her to Genine to feed. When she was done, Genine would jab him in the ribs and he'd put the baby back down, in a bed almost next to theirs. It didn't save her many steps. It gave him a real part in that relationship from day one.

What's his advice for a husband who isn't sure?

"Do the research. Do that exploration with your wife. Do it together." Ask questions, he said, and find a community.

He was careful about who it's right for: a healthy wife with a healthy pregnancy, in a healthy relationship. He also wants men to show up more for this. "Generationally, I think we need to be more involved, as a support for our wives, and to have a valid opinion and take an interest."

Then he said the line I'll remember. "I'm converted."

What's the husband's job at a home birth?

Rowan has a name for it. Before each birth, he and Genine agreed on the rules: what she wanted, what she didn't, and what they'd do if something changed. In the room, his job was to hold the line on those rules so she didn't have to.

"I am the sheriff. I enforce the rules, 'cause we've discussed between me and Genine what the rules are."

Rowan, father of two home-born kids

It gave him a purpose, he said, other than being "a shag on a rock," which I've learned is Australian for standing around useless.

When I asked for one word to describe their home births, he paused for a long time and said: sacred. A hospital, he felt, can strip the beauty out of birth and make it clinical. At home it was the two of them, with the midwives staying back until they were needed.

I felt that the night Amani was born in our bedroom, in a tub. It was the first time I understood what people mean when they say birth is beautiful. Chapter 6 of the book is about finding your place in that room. Rowan found his by the second birth. You can find yours before the first.