Birth Story - Jenny and baby Robyn

I gave birth to our little girl Robyn April Desmond on Monday 23rd at 5.15pm and it really was the best day ever! I never ever thought I would say this but I actually really enjoyed the experience and am in total awe of the female body now. 

My waters broke at 8pm the night before and I was totally elated that I knew baby was coming but also concerned that I was perhaps going to have to be induced as my contractions had not yet started. After a quick visit to the hospital to check things over, they said that I would be booked in for an induction at 5pm the next day if my Labour didn’t advance. 

I felt apprehensive about induction but I was on this crazy ride now and how ever things were going to happen I comforted by the knowing my baby would arrive soon. By the time we returned home at 12am the surges had started coming and going to bed was not an option. So Des ran me a bath, put the hot water tank into over drive, lit the candles and played my birthing playlist (spent a good week working on this and I think it was a great help as music is such an emotional trigger for me) After a night breathing through my surges, Des counting and timing, at around 4.30am I felt the surges were frequent enough to go to the hospital. I was also keen to hear I would no longer need to be induced. After agreeing to an examination on arrival I found out I was 2cms, I didn’t feel disheartened by my progress but was a little confused as to why the midwife seemed so assured that we would be back to be induced later that day at 5pm as I very much felt like the baby was well on it way. The midwife gave us the option of staying at the hospital in the ward. But we decided to back and so pleased we returned home. I got straight back into the bath and Des helped me breathe through surge after surge. I got so in the zone I was pretty much managing to fall asleep between the surge for a minute or two. The bathroom became by little safe zone, candles, music and Des sitting on the loo next to bath counting for around 12 hours 😂 He was amazing. 

Come 2pm I started to feel an increase in power of the surges. I told Des to call and ask them to get the pool ready. He called and they asked us to come to the triage ward not delivery but we went with the flow and by the time we got upstairs in the hospital and they examined me I was 6cm and started to feel like I needed to push. We went straight down to delivery. 

In delivery we were greeted by our midwife Rebecca, she was so reassuring. She had read all our birth plan and got to work on kicking the other midwives out the room and getting the pool filled. It’s a bit of blur but I think I was only in the delivery suite for about 45 minutes before giving birth. I sat on the birthing stool with the Des crouched next to me, I was offered gas & air which I struggled to get to grips with at first as I had to introduce this into my breathing pattern. But then I soon heard the word which made me so very happy. ‘You can get in the pool now Jenny’ the instant relief I felt getting back in the water was incredible. I got on all fours and by body just did it all. I felt the head move down and up again. I was so focused I didn’t tell the midwife. She touched my arm and assured me, I have no idea what she was saying now but it was comforting. Then the pressure of the baby's head returned again. There was this moment when all the pressure, pain and stinging just seemed to stop for a second and left me totally relaxed, then with a final push my baby was here, the midwife seemed shocked how quickly it all happened as was I. Picking her up out the water it was totally amazing how it had happened. So very proud of myself and the new little lady in my life.