Birth story - Malti and baby Anayah

Firstly I would like to thank Siobhan and the Positive Birth Company for creating such a beautiful and knowledgeable course to help mum's to experience beautiful births and secondly to all those lovely mamas for writing their positive stories and encouraging and motivating other mamas 💖

My pregnancy journey was not that easy, I had SPD since week 11 which I thought was a part of pregnancy, I only found out at week 20 that I was experiencing this condition. I tried so many different techniques and bands to make my life easy but it was really hard to manage even day to day activities. Although I still managed to work until week 36.. I came to know about hypnobirthing through Instagram and bought a course and a book but it didn't really satisfy me until I found hypnobirthing from the Positive Birth Company. Once I was on maternity leave all I did was bounce on my birthing ball and listen to postive affirmations, listen to videos again and again practice breathing techniques.

On my 34 week appointment, my doctor told me baby was on low side with growth but he was not worried he said it's hard to tell exact weight whilst babies are in the womb but he said he won't go more than 40 weeks. So once I got 38 weeks he advised me that it's better we don't go further than 40 weeks and if labor didn't start naturally we will have to look into induction. I was getting a bit anxious from 39 weeks as there was no sign of labor but I lost my mucus plug at start of week 40 but still nothing was happening so finally the day came and I was booked for induction on 31 May.

My husband and I went to the hospital @ 7:30 am and were welcomed by a beautiful midwife Holly, who also used to teach hypnobirthing in UK and was very happy to hear that I was doing hypnobirthing. She also had a student nurse with her, she was such a great help too. Doctor arrived at 8 am and my water was broken and he informed Holly that I was 1 cm dilated and then I was put on to monitor for baby s heart beat and oxytocin drip. I asked the doctor if I could sit on the birthing ball, which they happily agree to, and made all the arrangements to make me comfortable and respecting my preferences. Midwife Holly looked for the wireless monitors but they were not charged so I was still stuck to all the wires. My husband set up the environment he dimmed the lights and got my face washers with lavender oil out and I put my headphones with positive affirmations on.

Holly used all the positive vocabulary throughout her shift and didn't offer me any pain killers. I just breathed through surges as they were getting stronger, with increase in oxytocin, every 30 mins. By 2 pm I start to make mooing sound and I knew that I was close. Midwife offered me a cervix check up which I happily agreed and I was 7 cm dilated and from there within 1 hour I had the urge to use my bowels and my body started pushing and I was fully dilated they didn't check me again. They asked me what position I would prefer and I went with my body and sat on floor in a squatting position holding feet beside the bed.

At this stage I was offered gas and air which I tried but refused to use it, firstly I didn't get the hold of down breathing but eventually I thought of blowing candles and after a bit of struggle I started to push right and I could so feel baby's head coming down and body was born with another push and at 4:17 baby Anayah was born. I did had second degree tear which I got stitches for and I was given local anaesthetic for that but placenta came out soon after the birth. Cord clamping was done by my husband after it stopped pulsating.

The whole labor was 8 hours altogether and our baby came out so alert looking at everyone. We had lovely skin to skin for more than 3 hours. My birth was beautiful and the people involved in it were so helpful and encouraging.