Birth story - Ali and baby boy

The PREGANACY journey:

The hypnobirthing course gave me many tools, which I practiced weekly from about 3 months into my pregnancy. The first four months were challenging due to my intense nausea, throwing up and very low energy, but after month 4, I started gaining my energy back. I practiced yoga throughout my pregnancy as well, but my yoga practice really took off after 4 months when my energy was back. In my 3rd trimester, I encountered spinning babies and incorporated many of exercises and recommendations into my daily practice, where I did a minimum of 30 min movement every day. I incorporated a special pregnancy herbal tea in my daily intake, which was made out of nettle, yellow dock, raspberry leaves, rosehip, and goji berry. At week 37 I started breast massage and acupuncture to support my body when my labor would start.

The LABOR journey:

At 3am I woke up starting to feel light surges. After 15 min the surges intensified, and I woke up my husband and 2nd birth partner. My 2nd birth partner (aka my soul sister) started setting up the space and my husband was supporting me as I did my breathing. My husband helped by giving me light stroke massages, counting with me in upbreath breathing when a surge came, and timing my surges. When he had to leave to help my birth partner, I used the app, Freya. I was very present and focused on being in the moment, so I don't know what time things happened. At some point, my husband called the midwife, as he sensed it was time, and she asked us to call again when the surges were more frequent. I think about 30 min later he called and the midwife said she was on her way. When she arrived she set up her space and checked me and she said I was already 7 cm open.

I then went into the bathtub together with my husband, where he gave me positive affirmations, light massage and reminded me to relax and breathe. After some time I started to feel the urge to push. It was then that my water broke and it felt like a release. After some more pushing, I felt his head descending. It felt like I was there for a long time, but my partners said it went really fast. His head was out after a few pushes, and with the last push, his body came out and he arrived at 8.18 in the morning.

We took him out of the water where we lay together skin to skin, helping him with finding my breast. About 20min later the placenta was birth. We waited with cutting the cord until all blood had left. After a while, my husband took him and my midwife stitched me up as I had two 1st degree cuts and one 2nd degree cut that needed stitching. The midwife said I didnt loose a lot of blood, and everything looked very good. The midwife made sure we were all ok, showed us some breastfeeding techniques, and left at around 1pm in the afternoon.

REFLECTIONS:

It was such a magical and empowering experience to give birth in this way. I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to have everything go so well and have such love and support around me. It was the birth I dreamt about, and both hypnobirthing and spinning babies course really helped prepare my mind and body to be able to go through this birth without fear, but rather with empowerment and complete trust in my body. Hypnobirthing actually helped as a pain release or when I felt very mentally overwhelmed during my last months. What I realized is that there will be pain, but the method allowed me to be deeply relaxed in the pain and allow my body to do its thing. It made the birthing process MUCH more tolerable and incredibly empowering, because I realized what I was capable of. I remember when I was deeply in my labour, having intense surges, I had a thought to my self ‘this is actually not so bad’ I can definitely do this again. I didnt use any external pain release other than just hypnobirthing techniques.

I am so excited about the new journey of parenthood.