My intention was to labour as long as I could at home using my TENS and breathing strategies I learnt at calmbirth. I wanted to remain in the calm and cosy environment of my home for as long as I could and wanted to avoid going to hospital too early and be sent home. I was feeling really empowered about going into labour after attending calmbirth and had full belief in my body and my support person my Husband Ryan.
I felt very supported. My Husband Ryan is super supportive and he learnt a lot also and applied himself in the calmbirth sessions which really helped me feel confident in us as a team to get through the labour and delivery.
A friend recommended Calmbirth and a work colleague had attended Amy’s Calmbirth course and highly recommended it. So grateful for this!
To envision the birth that I wanted and strive for that. Before hearing you encourage that and stating that a marathon runner wouldn’t envision coming third in their training I let myself fully lean into the labour and delivery that I wanted and this allowed me to push all the worry and the worst case scenarios that were running in my head to disappear. I then became really confident in my mind and body and this was vital to me being able to labour how I did.
Definitely, as above I had a significant shift in my mindset and I now fully believed that I could labour naturally and delivery vaginally and me and my baby would be ok. I decided that I wanted to stay home as long as possible and only leave when we really needed to – when Ryan thought we needed to. I was empowered to use my breathing as a big tool in my labour and practised this at home in a cold shower with Ryan holding me to emulate the labour that I envisioned. I did lots of oxytocin inducing activities and really leaned into all of they birth prep that was encouraged. I utilised the weeks of maternity leave prior to the baby coming to nest and prep my home environment and to fill my cup with social activities and date nights.
My waters broke on the 22nd of April at 6:30am when I was 38+5 weeks gestation. I went to the hospital to have an assessment and they confirmed the waters were broken and that if I didnt go into natural labour before 1pm on the 23rd of April then I would have an induction. We then went home and did all the things to try and get the labour going. Only oxytocin activities and discussion. Put on calming music and our labour playlist (here is the link I would highly recommend it, just one we found on, had a delicious dinner, went curb walking, did some spinning babies movements. I had some tightenings (?early contractions) before going to bed but I intentionally didnt make a big fuss and pretended they were just braxton hicks. Fell asleep around 1am and woke up at 4am on the 23rd of April with painful contractions. I lay in bed and breathed through them and tried again to pretend they were just tightenings. By 7am I woke up Ryan as I was then noticing them more regular and higher strength (Calmbirth taught me not to call them painful and this really helped me not feel ‘pain’ of contractions only strength/intensity).
Ryan made breaky and I put my TENS on and we called the hospital to let them know what was going on – by this time I was using the tens and breathing through my contractions. We had the labour playlist on, i moved to different locations around the house from my living room to mainly the bedroom and was using the gym ball and blankets and pillows tog get into different positions. All the lights were off and curtains down to create a very calm space. Ryan thinks by 10:30 i was in active labour and I didnt believe it.. called birth suit again and they said keep going at home if i could. By 1pm ryan thinks I was in transition, i again didnt believe it and thought i was fizzling as the contractions got longer and more spaced apart.. I then had one large contraction and knew we needed to get to the hospital. We let birth suit know we were coming and ryan drove very calmly while i had a few contractions on the way with my eye mask on. Got to the hospital around 1:30pm after having three contractions on the way up to birth suit. They did a vaginal examination and I was 9cm dilated – once again I didn’t really believe I could have achieved that. I then did some pushing as was having stronger contractions, tried for around an hour and then my obstetrician arrived. She examined me and found I wasnt 10cm yet so I had a rest, was using nitrous and tens and breathing at this point. Then had strong urge to push contractions and was 10cm, pushed for ~2 hours in all different positions (leaning on the bed, on all fours on the bed, on my side with one leg up, on my back) but no luck and the baby was having decelerations. Told to empty my bladder which didnt help. Then had and ultrasound and confirmed baby was posterior. Attempted to turn him with no luck. Decision for going to theatre for a trial of forceps +/- caesarean section. Ended up getting bumped from theatre three times and was unable to have an epidural as anaesthetics were busy with emergencies so lay trying not to push when the contractions came still using nitrous/tens/breath. Finally got to theatre at 7:30. Vaginal examination found he was too high for forceps (-2 station if you’re interested haha) and so had a Caesarean Section and George was born at 7:46pm.
I just didnt believe I had progressed as much as I had, but this was also a way that I allowed myself to move through the labour in a relaxed way. Otherwise I was so strong and empowered and the support Ryan and the midwives and my obstetrician gave was incredible, cannot see I could have gone through what we did without them.
Absolutely, it was a very long massive team effort and I now feel so much closer and that our relationship is so so strong after going through it. I know we can tackle anything that comes our way after doing that with him.
