Birth story - Jo and baby Sofia

I had a simple labour and delivery with my first child and everything went to plan but I felt I was very reliant on ‘being told what to do’ by the midwife. I ended up lying on my side on the bed feeling very awkward and stuck and being coached to push. Unsurprisingly, my pushing stage was very long. Once we started thinking about having a second child, I thought that there must be a better way. I wanted to have a greater understanding of birth and take more control of my delivery this time. This is when I came across the positive birth company and hypnobirthing.

At 37 weeks I started getting period like cramps and feeling nauseous every morning but it would settle down around midday for the rest of the day. I kept thinking this could be early labour and I considered asking my midwife at my appointment that week to check if my cervix had begun to make changes but instead kept reminding myself that my baby will come when she is ready.

On the Thursday evening I put my 3 year old to bed as normal, watched tv with my husband Jon and went to bed about 11pm with no inkling of what was about to come. I woke up about 1:30am with stomach cramp that was quite uncomfortable but not painful. It was a constant cramp that felt like a combination of a stomach bug and period cramps so I stayed in bed and tried to relax and sleep. After half an hour of drifting in and out of sleep I tried putting on the relaxation mp3 to see if it would help me stay asleep. Around 2am I decided to see if going to the toilet would help. I managed to poo and felt much better so tried to go back to bed but the cramp soon came back.

At 2:30am I really couldn’t sleep and decided I was probably in labour so went downstairs and started listening to my positive affiliations and some music whilst sitting in my birthing ball. This whole time there had been no surges just a constant cramp so I hadn’t woken Jon as I assumed there was a long while yet to go. Around 3:30am I went to the toilet again and this time, once I managed to poo, instead of the cramps going away they changed into gentle surges which I began to time. They were coming every 5 minutes and lasting around 45 seconds but felt low intensity.

After a few contractions I was now certain I was in labour so just before 4am woke Jon and he contacted his parents who live about an hour away to come and look after our older daughter. I phoned the midwife unit and they said to come when the in-laws arrived but to let them know if it all settled back down and we didn’t need to come in yet.

After the call the surges suddenly changed to being 30 seconds long but coming every 2 minutes. But they were still low intensity so I pushed aside the nagging feeling that this was happening very quickly. After about 15mins of this, the surges suddenly ramped up massively in intensity and I could feel them through my whole stomach and back. At this stage I needed to use my up breathing which helped massively. I was very grateful for the gaps between surges as each one felt exhausting. I also realised I hadn’t eaten since dinner but couldn’t manage food so had a glucose tablet.

All of a sudden my surges stopped and a massive wave of emotion ran over me. I had to bury my head on my birthing ball and manage my breathing as it was such an overwhelming feeling. Once this passed I started to feel the baby moving down and realised she was coming now and I was going to have her at home. At this point I remembered reading an unplanned home birth story on this page and that memory helped me feel confident that I could do it and it would be ok.

I told Jon the baby was coming and he needed to get some towels. He really wanted to go to the hospital but I was adamant that I couldn’t wait for his parents to arrive and I wasn’t going to be able to sit down in the car. I crawled up the stairs to the bathroom to find he had got out the nice guest towels 🤦🏻‍♀️ and made him swap them for old towels.

Despite being in denial, Jon phoned the midwife unit who told him call an ambulance. With the ambulance on the way, the phone operator stayed on the phone to guide Jon. He said I needed to lie on my back, which there was no way I was going to do. I knew I needed to be UFO so had already got myself into a comfortable and what I felt was the most appropriate position. This was in essence kneeling with my bottom low and leaning forward to rest my arms and head on the toilet lid.

I had been feeling really sick since my intense surges and at this point I vomited quite a lot. Suddenly a massive urge to push came over my body. There was no thought process to it, my body was doing this by itself and I just had to go with it. I could hear myself making what I can only describe as a deep toned scream and hoped that my 3 year was not going to wake up as we had enough to deal with!

The phone operator kept asking Jon if he could see the head, but given the size of our bathroom and my position this was not very easy. My waters broke on my second or third push, then the head started to bulge and Jon was guided to support with his hands. The head was out on the 5th push and then there seemed like ages before the final push. The operator kept telling Jon to tell me to push and I was laughing trying to explain I couldn’t just push as I had to wait for my body to do it!

Sofia was born at 5:14am and caught by daddy after less than 4 hours of labour 🙈 She was very quiet and a little blue looking. I think it was the first time in the process that we both were a little nervous. She then started to cry and Jon passed her to me for some skin to skin. About 5 minutes after she was born the ambulance arrived and the paramedics checked us over.

There was some concern that I had not delivered my placenta, but with my first daughter I had no surges to deliver it and just before I was going to be given the injection to speed up the process, the midwife realised it was detached and pulled it out. So knowing this I stood up a little and the placenta fell out 😂

During the paramedic checks my in-laws arrived and were making everyone cups of tea. The paramedics explained that if the midwives couldn’t come out to me we would have to transfer to hospital for the final checks. My older daughter was still asleep in my bed (thankfully) so I got into her bunk bed and had a cup of tea and toast. The midwives were available and after 2 stitches for a small perineal tear they were happy with everything and gradually everyone started to leave.

At one point there were 3 paramedics and 3 midwives in the house, as both teams had trainees with them that night. Just after the final midwife left at around 7am, my 3 year old woke up and came to look for me. She was very confused that I was in her bed and then surprised to see her sister had arrived 😂

We had planned on a water birth in the midwife led unit but even despite the circumstances, I loved my home birth. It was great to be able to get straight into bed, have all my home comforts and not have to go anywhere. If I have anymore I will definitely decide on a home birth and not just because of how quick my labour might be!

The midwives said that I made the right choice in staying at home as they had attended a birth which had happened in a car the previous week. The couple had tried to rush to get to hospital but had to park in a car park and deliver the baby.

Thank you so much to the positive birth company. Watching the videos gave me exactly the information and knowledge I was looking for, and more, and the birth stories on this page were invaluable in helping me with my expected turn of events.