Birth story - Karine and baby Milena

*Trigger warning* - Use of the word contraction as not negative for me

First birth:

I had my first baby back in June 2020 just as lockdown started to be lifted. I had purchased the Hypnobirthing Digital pack and the Freya app at the time and had a really positive birth experience but never got around writing my birth story. I was in labour over 3 days and gave birth on dry land (I was also aiming for a water birth but the pushing stage took so long I had to get out of the pool for it to be refilled and ended up delivering my baby boy on a hospital bed). I had a second degree tear and it was a slow recovery but overall very straight forward pregnancy and birth!

Fast forward a couple years and we got pregnant with our second baby. This time we decided to keep the gender a surprise I had a pretty straight forward pregnancy apart from sickness up to 22 weeks (I only had morning sickness up to 13 weeks with my first!) and sciatica the last few weeks.

I am so happy that I got around writing my birth story and share it with this community. I loved reading everyone else's birth stories

Here is mine:

At around 8pm on the 5th of October, I went for a wee and heard and felt what looked/sounded like a "pop". I assumed it was my waters but wasn't entirely sure.

I had a quick Google and decided to lie on my side for 20-30min to see if there would be any waters leaking when I stood up.

My contractions started pretty much there and then and I started timing them with the Freya app. 10min in and the app was indicating I was already in established labour with contractions coming thick and fast every couple minutes and growing in intensity. I couldn't quite believe things were happening so quickly so told my fiancé to wait a bit before letting his mother know (she was supposed to come in to look after our toddler - luckily he was fast asleep in his bed at this stage).

I decided to run a bath to take the edge off a bit and had a paracetamol. The warm water helped a bit but contractions were getting very intense already. I was very focused on my up breathing to go through them and my fiancé called the hospital to let them know there were 3 contractions in 10minutes lasting between 45 seconds and 70 seconds.

I asked about the birth pool which was being used at the time so they suggested to stay at home in the bath for a bit longer and call back when we felt intensity had increased.

In the meantime, my fiancé decided to call his mum (she is 45min away) so I waited for her to arrive while focusing on my up breathing in the bath.

Just before she arrived, I could fell the water was no longer helping with the pain and decided to come out to put on my tens machine and start getting ready to go to the hospital (we live literally around the corner).

It took me a little while as I was moving in between contractions and they kept coming in every 2 minutes and lasting over a minute.

When she arrived we jumped into her car and my father in law dropped us off at the hospital.

To my despair, the main entrance was closed and we had to walk all the way around while stopping every couple minutes with each contraction.

We finally made it to the delivery suite and I was really starting to struggle with the intensity. We got into a room and I instinctively climbed into the bed so I could stay in an upright position (up until this point I had made sure to keep an upright position during every contraction by lying against a bed, a wall, anything available with my head against my crossed arms).

The midwife offered gas and air that I took instantly. I had a little wobble then and told them I couldn't do it. I was making mooing noises and felt like I really needed a poo with a lot of pressure on my bum, I instinctively started pushing and figured I was already transitioning - we had just been given the room so couldn't believe I was already ready to push!!

The midwife asked if she could examine me and I painfully switched position to lie on my back for the examination. I was fully dilated or 9.5cm as she said but assured I should listen to my body and push with the next contraction.

The pushing stage felt long, it took a few attempts and I quickly felt the head crowning. I was waiting for every new contraction to push and breathing in the gas and air in between. I had switched to down breathing and could feel the baby's head coming out. Another push and the head was out. I waited for the next contraction to birth the rest of the body.

Our baby girl was born at 22:55 on the 5th of October, just under 2 and a half hours from first contractions. The whole experience felt unreal and I definitely wasn't expecting things to happen so quickly.

I had been expressing colostrum all day (morning, lunch, dinner time) to try to bring on labour naturally through nipples stimulation. I was very fed up with being pregnant and feel like that might have contributed to the speed of things.

When we got to the room, I did ask about the birthing pool again (after the midwife examined me) but she said it was still in use and she wouldn't have the time to run it anyway.

I asked again afterwards to see if the lady using it had her water birth and she did.

I was quite looking forward to a water birth this time and didn't get the opportunity but I am so proud of my experience, it was incredibly intense and I managed to stay upright all the way through and got through it with my up breathing (and god sent tens machine!). I wouldn't have had it any other way.

I ended up having a tiny first degree tear this time around so no stitches required which felt like a huge win (with my first born I had a second degree tear that took over 8 weeks to heal).

I felt much more exhausted after delivering my daughter, I believe I lost a bit more blood this time (not alarming but expected in subsequent births according to the midwife).

They suggested to send us back home pretty much straight away as baby was feeding okay and I didn't require any further care.

We left the hospital by 2:30am.

I will always remember the moment I birthed the body of my daughter and she was passed to me. I lifted the umbilical cord to check the gender (still unknown at this stage) to discover it was a baby girl. My partner then cut the umbilical cord.

I was planning to wait to birth the placenta naturally but I was so exhausted at this stage and had already lost quite a bit of blood that I agreed to get the injection to deliver it quicker. I delivered it just a few minutes after and had skin to skin with my daughter. She latched on straight away and has been feeding a lot ever since! A little boob monster.

It was an incredible experience and I am so grateful for all the hypnobirthing tools that helped me stay in control throughout.

Now time to rest and enjoy the newborn snuggles!