Birth story - Eleanor and baby Emily

*Trigger warning* - use of word contraction, mention of tear.

I was 41 weeks exactly, and went for a very tearful routine midwife appointment. Despite trying to be brave and composed, I sat and cried in front of my midwife for half an hour at the prospect of having to book my induction for the following Friday (at 42 weeks) and possibly a sweep before then too, on Wednesday (41 weeks plus 5 days).

At just after 6pm, my husband Andy and I ate dinner, and then sat down to snuggle up on the sofa and watch come dine with me, and planned to switch off and relax for the evening.

At 8.30, I was bouncing on my yoga ball when I felt what I can only describe as a strong period pain in my back which seemed to come in a wave although I wasn't entirely sure.

I went to the toilet, and my bloody show was very clearly visible in the toilet, which I had been looking out for for weeks without any sign of! I called Andy in to look, and he too was certain my mucus plug had come away! So we were both super excited, but knew it didn't mean labour was imminent.

I got back on my yoga ball and around 9pm I felt another strong period pain in my back, again coming in a wave. I told Andy and neither of us were sure if they were real contractions. There was no feelings or tightenings in my tummy (spoiler - none of my contractions were ever felt In my tummy!)

At just before 10pm, I got settled in bed. Laying in bed, I felt more of the contractions I'd been feeling downstairs on my yoga ball so I decided to track them using the Freya app. They were about once every 25 minutes, lasting just under 1 minute each. During this time I was desperately trying to get to sleep, but wasn't having much luck, despite the meditation I put on, tv on the background, and mindless games I played on my phone.

Following this, the pains appeared to come more regularly and were getting more obvious, so I finally accepted they were contractions. I kept tracking them, and they quickly accelerated to one contraction around every 10-15 mins by midnight.

Andy came to bed to try and get some sleep, and I wanted him to get as much as possible so laboured as silently as I could, breathing through each contraction whilst laying in bed, to the count of 4 on the in breath, and 8 on the out breath. Following the up breathing technique I'd learnt from the Hypnobirthing course.

They were getting more intense and painful, and Andy woke up and kept reminding me to breathe and that I was strong enough and brave enough to do this, and was doing fantastically. He reminded me of my positive affirmations, which was a huge help.

At around 2am my contractions began to hit the criteria of 3 in 10 minutes, lasting 45 seconds or more each.

Andy called the labour ward and explained we were booked for home birth and asked if someone would come out to us. Unfortunately, they told us that due to staff levels, they had suspended home births for the night and that no one could come put until 8am when the home birth service was expected to resume. The thought of having 6 hours to labour at home alone with no pain relief other than paracetamol and no midwife to oversee my progress was daunting. But the midwives at the labour ward were really nice and suggested I stay home for a while, so I wasn't just checked and sent home again, and that I could always call back and go in at any point if I felt I needed more pain relief or wanted to be checked.

So, deciding to stay home for the time being, I ran a bath and I got in. The water was lovely and warm and gave me a lot of relief. By now, my contractions were consistently 3 in 10 and getting stronger.

He encouraged me to eat to keep my energy levels up, so gave me a blueberry muffin nakd bar and some lucozade. I was as happy as I could be labouring in the bath with my snacks!

Although the bath was lovely, I didn't have enough space to move around and get comfortable during contractions, so I occasionally switched between the bath and sitting on the toilet.

This eventually became difficult too, and Andy brought up my birth ball to lean over on the bathroom floor. By now it was very cramped in the bathroom, with my ball, hospital bags, puppy pads everywhere and Me and Andy! But it worked for a while.

I started to get worn out from the contractions and decided to dry off and lay on the bed. My contractions were still getting stronger, and still 3 in 10, but laying on the bed felt comforting and nice. I even managed to doze off in between contractions for what felt like about 15-20 minutes at a time, but as I was tracking every contraction on my Freya app, I knew that actually, I was only napping for a couple of minutes between each surge!

Andy put on our birth playlist and I laid in bed labouring listening to our birth playlist for quite some time, and despite the contraction pains, I was so chilled and so happy.

8am rolled around and we called labour ward again to ask for a midwife to be sent out to us at home. They told us they were doing their handovers, and would call us back with a plan, depending on whether the home birth service had resumed or not.

While waiting for them to call back, Andy and I made our way downstairs to start setting up the lounge for our home birth. I sat on the sofa while Andy inflated the birth pool and an air bed, and laid clear shower curtains down to protect the floor.

At around 8.50, we spoke to labour ward again, who told us that the home birth service had been suspended again, and our only option now was to go into hospital to give birth.

I felt sad about this, but I'd also been labouring for more than 12 hours at this point and was keen to get to hospital before I felt the need to start pushing.

We left the house soon after to start our journey to the hospital. As we sat on the drive in the car about to leave, Andy turned to me and said "next time you come back here, we will have a baby with us". I can't tell you the rush of excitement I felt in that moment.

The car ride was as tough as I'd imagined it would be, but I managed to breathe through every contraction on the way to the hospital. When we arrived, we made our way to the maternity emergency entrance. I remember standing at that door, buzzing the intercom thinking "this is it. This is where I will give birth soon!"

Once we got up to labour ward, it felt empty, which was surprising given the staff said they were busy, but it had a lovely sense of calm and serenity. I was given the choice of whatever labour room I wanted, and I chose one of the pool rooms - one I'd been shown during a labour ward tour earlier in my pregnancy.

It was a really nice room, nothing like a typical hospital room. There was no hospital bed, but instead a futon on the floor with sheets on and a big beanbag to lean against. There were fairy lights pinned to the ceiling, and positive affirmations pinned around the room on the walls. The lighting was dimmed and the blinds were drawn, and it felt like a relaxing space.

We were told to make ourselves comfortable and that a midwife would be I to see us shortly, so I sat on the futon and tried to relax. Andy seemed so excited, and was looking into my eyes with such wonder and love, it kept me going and breathing through every contraction.

A midwife arrived and introduced herself as Annabel. She was so kind and polite, and explained to me all the things she wanted to do to check me (blood pressure, urine test, temperature etc etc) and asked my permission to do everything.

Doing a wee so she could check my urine sample was hard, as every time I moved I seemed to get a contraction and I worried I'd give birth on the bathroom floor by myself! Irrational I know, but I'd read about it happening to someone else in a birth story recently. This didn't happen thank goodness, and I was able to do a wee and get back on the futon semi-comfortably.

Once the midwife had done all her other checks, she asked to do a vaginal examination to see how dilated I was. At this point, seeing how well I was coping with contractions with just breathing alone and no other pain relief, she said to me "I'll check you, and if you're only a few centimetres dilated you may be able to go home and relax for a few more hours". Which was daunting to hear.

But when she checked me, it didn't hurt how I imagined it to, which I guessed meant my cervix was fairly soft. I had a contraction mid examination so Annabel stopped her check and then asked me if I wanted to know how dilated I was. I said yes, and she told me I was 8cm!!!!!

This was such a huge progress, it meant I only had 2cm to go, and had got this far using only breathing techniques and positive thinking. I remember being so proud of myself. Andy told me he was proud too, and when I asked if that meant I was staying at the hospital instead of going home, he told me that our baby would be here probably by lunchtime!

Knowing I was staying, Annabel put a wristband on me and began to fill up the birth pool. I changed positions a few times to try and stay active and off my back, and found leaning over a birth ball to be comfortable. Andy hooked up his phone to the Bluetooth speaker system in the room and played our birth playlist, which gave a really nice chilled and homely atmosphere. At this point, I didn't have a care in the world about this not being a home birth, because the setting and room I was in was perfect.

At this point, I thought about asking for extra pain relief. I was managing absolutley fine with just breathing techniques, and although I could have carried on, it wasn't taking the pain away, just helping me cope with it better, but it was exhausting. I'd said in my birth plan that I didn't want to be offered pain relief because I didn't want to be given the impression I wasn't coping, but that I'd ask for it if I wanted it. I was happy to try gas and air to help make things more comfortable, so Andy suggested it and I agreed. He asked Annabel for gas and air, and she immediately hooked it up for me and showed me how to use it.

Once the pool was full, I put my bikini top on and slowly stepped into the pool.

The feeling of the warm water was so nice and relaxing, an instant painkiller. Aside from the obvious pain of contractions, and fear of what was to come, I was happy and relaxed, and was enjoying the experience.

I spent the next hour or so in the pool, listening to our birth playlist and breathing with gas and air through each contraction. Andy stroked my arms and shoulders each time I had a contraction, and kept me occupied with sips of lucozade and some mccoys salt and vinegar crisps.

Andy also gave me a flannel he had sprayed with my wedding perfume, to help boost my oxytocin. I placed this on the side of the pool and inhaled the scent with each contraction.

After a while, I told Andy and Annabel that I could feel a lot of pressure down below and that it felt like I needed to push. By now it was about half 1 in the afternoon. The best way I can describe it is that it felt EXACTLY like I was constipated and needed to do a big poo!

Nobody panicked or rushed around, and Annabel told me to just go with my body and do what it feels like I needed to do.

I began lightly pushing with each contraction but remember being absolutley terrified at this point. The thought that my baby had to come out of my vagina was daunting and I was worried for how this would happen.

The fear started taking over, and I started saying irrational things like I wanted a cesarean because I didn't want to birth vaginally. Obviously this request wasn't agreed to, and instead Andy and Annabel kept motivating me telling me I was doing so well and my baby would be here soon.

After another contraction and another big push, My waters finally broke. They'd been intact up to this point, which in hindsight I was lucky about, because it turned out Emily had done a poo in my waters, meaning I had to get out the pool and be continuously monitored to make sure she was okay. Had my waters broken earlier, I wouldn't have been able to use the pool and arguably had the relaxing labour experience I'd had up that point, so I actually feel very thankful for this.

Annabel asked me to get out the pool, get dried and put my nightie back on, and explained we would need to move to a different room so I could be monitored continuously. I was sad about this, but I also knew my baby was about to be born very soon, and I just wanted this over with.

As I walked down the corridor to a new room, I had a contraction mid-journey, right in front of the labour ward reception desk, so I had to stop and breathe through it, as I had no gas and air with me. My waters leaked all over the floor in the corridor and I remember apologising for the mess I'd made.

Once I got into the new room, I was told to get onto the bed and was given my gas and air back. My memory is a bit of a blur from here, because everything happened so quickly. It must have been around 2.15pm by this point, and with every contraction my body and I pushed to get the baby out.

I felt so overwhelmed and scared to deliver that I started begging for help as I wanted the experience over with. I asked for my options for more pain relief but was told my baby would be here too soon for any further pain relief to even have an effect.

I'd specified in my birth plan that I didn't want any coached pushing, and Annabel had accommodated that and let me do my own thing up to this point. But seeing me struggling and asking for help, she offered to coach me to help get my baby out ASAP. I agreed to this as at that stage it was more important to me that Emily be born as soon as possible, because I was so scared and daunted by the thought of the delivery and didn't want it dragged out.

Annabel began to coach me and I did exactly what she told me to, taking deep breaths in at the start of my contractions and then holding my breath and pushing as hard as I could. I did this and within a couple of pushes I heard her say to Andy "come and look, you can see her head". Andy tells me now about that first sight, and how he saw lots of hair all scooped into a curl on the top of her head.

This was motivating for me, but I was also really scared, knowing her head was just inside my vagina, and I still didn't fully trust how nature would allow for her head and body to come out my vagina intact. (Spoiler, it didn't, and I did tear).

After another few pushes I felt a lot of movement, and I thought she was out. I relaxed with relief momentarily but then Annabel immediately praised me and said the head was out. I remember saying "only the head?! Oh no!" Knowing the rest of the body had to come yet. But I also knew this meant I probably had only one or two more pushes and this would be over.

A push or two later (I don't quite remember as I was so in the zone and determined to get her out) and her body was born. I felt her whole body slide out quickly, and this time the sense of relief was bigger. She was here! Emily had been born!

I later found out that she was born with her left hand up by her face, and shot out in a superman position, which is likely why I tore.

Emily was placed on my chest and I remember just cuddling her non stop. The feeling was so surreal. I couldn't stop looking at her and I kissed the top of her head so many times. My baby, my beautiful little girl, here in my arms. Nothing else mattered at that point.

I want all of you mamas to know that you CAN do this. My birth didn't go to plan, and I never dreamed I could labour for so long with just breathing and positive thinking. I have a very low pain threshold, and if I can do this, you absolutely can! I look back at how calm and chilled my labour was, and want to do it all over again! Enjoy every minute of your labour and birth, it really is an empowering and magical experience, and you'll come out of it feeling so proud and strong, regardless of how it happens!