Birth story - Lydia and baby Sadie

I had heard about hypnobirthing before I was pregnant and knew that when the time came it would definitely be something I'd find out more about. I started the digital pack around 24 weeks and watched all the videos with my husband, who was really supportive and interested.

Thursday 10th January was my penultimate day of work before starting maternity leave and was nice and relaxed as I'd already handed over to the teacher who'd be covering my class. I spent the morning hearing children read and working with small groups. At lunch time I started to feel some discomfort in my lower back intermittently but put it down to constipation. I left school not long after 3pm after talking to various colleagues and parents about how long I had left (another 2 or 3 weeks I reckoned) and showing them a picture of the first baby in our NCT group, who'd been born that morning.

When I got home I had a bath and decided to start timing the period-style cramps I was having just in case. I texted my husband to let him know how I was feeling but didn't really think I could actually be in early labour as we'd been so sure I'd go overdue and I hadn't lost any mucus plug. By the time my husband got home at 6.30pm, the cramps were about 5 minutes apart and lasting about 40 seconds. We decided that even if I was in labour it was still very manageable so we should just carry on with our evening. We had a dinner of fajitas and headed to the pub to meet one of the other NCT couples. We carried on timing under the table but didn't say anything and headed home at 10pm.

In the car on the way home things started to ramp up and my surges (I think I'd finally accepted that this is what they were by this point!) were coming every three minutes. I had another bath, watched some Peep Show and we called the midwife at about 12.30am. At about this point I tried using the TENS machine but didn't like it at all! I used my up breathing and stayed active, alternating between walking, standing and kneeling during surges. We had planned to drop our cat off at a friend's but by this point it was almost 1.00am so he was here to stay and made his presence known by jumping on my back mid-surge, which got him banished to the bedroom!

The midwife arrived soon after and examined me to see how things were progressing. I was disappointed when she told me I was only 2cm dilated and that labour could still stall and start again the next day. She advised me to try to stay active to keep things going, to have a nap if I could and to call if my waters broke, then left us to it. My husband inflated the birthing pool and started filling it up ready.

I carried on walking through the surges, then suddenly got an overwhelming urge to take all my clothes off! I quickly stripped off completely, knelt on the floor and felt my waters go all at once, which relieved some of the pressure I'd been feeling in my back. We called the midwife, who'd just got home, and she headed back over.

When the midwife came back at about 3.30am I think I was already transitioning as she found me on all fours in the kitchen telling my husband that it was too hard and I wasn't going to be able to do it. She didn't examine me again but just listened to the baby's heart and suggested I get in the pool, to my great delight! Debbie, the midwife, was amazingly hands-off the whole time and just told me to listen to what my body was telling me to do. She sat on the settee writing her notes while my husband helped me breathe through each surge, giving me water and telling me how well I was doing. The feeling of the surges had completely changed by this point and I could really feel my body bearing down so I switched to down breathing as I knelt in the pool, leaning on the side. I found this stage of labour much more manageable because I could feel that I was progressing. I had stuck two of my favourite affirmations to the TV unit - 'My surges cannot be stronger than me because they are me' and 'Each surge brings me closer to meeting my baby' - and I kept reading them over and over again between surges which really helped me to stay focused and determined.

After a while I could really feel the urge to push with each surge. Debbie came round to check my progress with a mirror and announced that she could see hair. Soon she asked me to reach down between my legs and when I did I could feel the baby's head so I knew it wouldn't be long. Debbie helped me to slow down my breathing and stay feeling in control, which definitely worked as I didn't end up needing any stitches! At 5.18 am, with one last breath I birthed my baby, reached down and caught her and then brought her straight to my chest. It was the most magical moment.

My husband looked and saw that we had a baby girl, which was a huge shock as we'd both been convinced we were having a boy for months! We had delayed cord clamping and a wonderful Golden Hour while we waited for the placenta. The second midwife arrived about 40 minutes after the birth; I don't think anyone had been expecting me to go from 2cm dilated to giving birth in two hours! My placenta was taking a long time to detach so I had to get out of the water and ended up delivering it on the toilet, while my husband got the chance to have some skin-to-skin time with our daughter.

By 8.00 am, after helping me to get started with breastfeeding, the midwives left and we started our new life as a family of three.

Sadie's birth couldn't have gone any better: we had the home water birth we wanted, the midwife was fantastic and really supportive of our birth preferences, and we got to meet our beautiful little girl nine days before her due date. Thanks to Siobhan for giving me the confidence to have a home birth and for equipping me and my husband with the skills we needed to birth our baby calmly and positively.