Eight days after Audrey Roloff‘s due date had come and gone, the Little People, Big World cast member was still waiting anxiously for the birth of her first daughter.
Fans of the TLC family got an intimate look at how nervous and uncomfortable Audrey and her husband Jeremy Roloff were leading up the birth of daughter Ember Jean during a birth special of Little People, Big World Tuesday. (The little girl would eventually be born on Sept. 10, 2017.)
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“It’s a really unsettling feeling just knowing that any day I could wake up and go into labor … and just knowing that the most pain I’ve ever experienced is right around the corner,” Roloff admitted at the time. “And mentally and emotionally, the toll it takes on you is kind of exhausting.”
The soon-to-be mom was also afraid that the late arrival of her baby would throw her birth plan off track.
“My plan is to have a natural childbirth, but if I go 12 days past my due date, then that’s when the doctors will want to induce,” she revealed. “I don’t want to be induced, so I’m just really hoping and praying that she’ll come before then.”
Mom Amy Roloff knew that there’s no rushing these things however, and offered her wisdom to her kids: “The baby girl is teaching your first lesson: patience,” she said. “She’s on her own time. Oh I like that, she’s gonna take after her grandma.”
But the night of the ninth day after her due date, Roloff went into labor, suffering excruciating contractions without any kind of epidural or painkiller.
“The closest thing it feels like to me is someone taking a chainsaw to your stomach,” Roloff said.
A natural birth may have been what she wanted, but after an hour of pushing, the laboring mother started to have her doubts.
“I kept thinking, I’m not sure if my body is going to be able to do this,” she confessed.
But in the end, her natural instinct took over, and Ember was born at 9:40 a.m., weighing 7.13 lbs. and measuring 20.25 inches long.
“Seeing her for the first time was crazy,” she said. “Just so exhausted and so full of joy. … It’s just a miracle the way it goes down.”
Little People, Big World airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET on TLC.
Photo Credit: TLC
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