Birth story - Megan and baby River

Pregnancy Journey:

First 3 months suffered with sickness day and night struggled to stomach anything other then fruit, pastries and watermelon ice lollies. From there on had a really healthy pregnancy journey felt really active right up until days before giving birth. I did lots of walking, yoga and went on a nice holiday in Spain at 34 weeks pregnant which was lovely. I was offered, and politely declined, the GBS test at 35 weeks after using my brain and researching/analysing the statistics and risks. I bought the digital hypnobirthing pack that myself and my partner sat and completed over a few days which taught us so much invaluable information, learning what your body is doing when going through labour/birth helped myself and my partner stay calm and collected during the whole process and taught us how to use our BRAIN to stay in control of the situation and make decisions that were right for us and our baby.

Latent Phase:

This started the day before River arrived. I started having mild surges which came and went throughout the day before, I was able to stay mobile and go about my normal day to day. I did a trip to Sainsbury’s for snacks and posted some Vinted parcels haha. Felt these purely in my lower back and they would come in a wave motion and pulse for a short period before fading away again. Partner continued to work for the day and we had a nice chilled evening together binging GOT. Decided to have a nice bath and an early night as I had suspicions things would ramp up during the early hours. I contacted Midwife triage at Worthing hospital to let them know things were starting to progress as the midwives had requested. As they didn’t have a designated homebirth team, I would only be able to have my homebirth if they had the midwifes available at the time. Giving them a call to let them know things were progressing gave them a heads up so they could plan. Midwife led unit was my back up plan if my plan A wasn’t possible.

Active Labour:

I woke up to more intense surges at around 3am which really got my bowels going I spent a good few hours sat on the toilet as that was were I felt most comfortable using my up breathing. I sat with my hand in the sink next to me with cold water running and a cold water soaked towel over my shoulders which I found really helped keep me focus and able to deal with the intense surges. My partner called triage to let them know things were progressing quite quickly and I let my partner know I thought it was time to go set up the pool downstairs and prepare the space. After a few hours of sitting and labouring on the toilet I decided to try lay on the bed and rest which is when I heard a slight pop and trickle of water - an indication my waters had broke. I then moved back onto the toilet which is when, after wiping, I had my bloody show, I continued to bleed quite regularly from that point right up until I gave birth something I wasn’t aware could happen and although my partner was a little freaked at this point I felt fully in control and calm in the moment as I felt fully in tune with my body and what was happening. I could feel things were progressing quickly and the constant bleeding was due to quick progression. Again, my partner called triage for advice and they confirmed this also.

I decided to start using the tens machine for pain relief which really helped. I’m glad I left using this till later on as it really helped bring relief with the more intense surges. By around 7am my surges were coming in 3 in 5 and lasting over a minute - my partner was on the phone to the midwife and they said the first midwife would start making her way over. Shortly after my partner got off the phone I could feel my body transitioning and feeling the involuntary pushing sensation, my body was completely taking over and by this point I thought I was going to freebirth haha.

After the longest 20 minutes of my life the first lovely midwife arrived and took my notes and birth preferences I had printed out into the bedroom and read through everything. She then politely asked if I could lay on the bed so she could check how dilated I was, which I consented to and struggled massively to actually lay down, my partner had to physically support my back as I physically couldn’t get myself to lay down as it was so painful. After a quick check the midwife confirmed I was fully dilated and his head was right there! She turned round to me and said “you knew didn’t you” I ABSOLUTELY DID! haha and off I went down to get into the pool.

My partner had mastered getting the pool set up and set the room up beautifully with fairy lights, my favourite smells spritzed around and my calming birth playlist playing on the Alexa. As I got into the pool I can’t explain the feeling of relief that the pool gave, I was quite scared about taking off the tens machine but the pool did wonders I had to really tune into when I was getting a surge and focus on the down breathing as the pool relieved so much of the pain. The second midwife then shortly arrived and they both sat on the sofa and, as I requested in my birth preferences, they left me and my partner uninterrupted and cheered me on with lots of positive affirmations from the side-lines! After a good 40 minutes of down breathing on all fours and baby making his way down rocking back and forth massaging everything slowly my legs started to cramp and I started to get tired. I asked the midwife how much longer she thought I had and, at this point, she suggested maybe we start some active pushing which I agreed to. After 20 minutes of some active pushing my little water babe shot out so quickly no one was expecting it, the midwife floated him through my legs and I picked him up and unravelled his legs and burst into tears of joy - it’s a boy!

Placenta Delivery/After Birth:

After about 5 minutes I could feel my body getting another surge which I asked the midwife should I push? So I did and out came the placenta! Felt like I lost 5 stone in 2 seconds lol. I then enjoyed a glorious amount of skin to skin with him and my partner in the pool and we also opted for delayed cord clamping and my partner cut the cord. After this I made my way out of the pool and sat on the sofa with my little babe and partner and enjoyed some more skin to skin whilst the midwives were sorting some paperwork. Shortly after they did their checks on myself and River and to my surprise I managed to walk away with no tearing at all just a few grazes - I really put this down to the warm water and down breathing technique which helped stretch me gradually. River then had his vitamin k shot and my partner had some lovely skin to skin time whilst I sorted myself out a bit. The midwives wrapped up and went on their way leaving myself and my new little family to enjoy our day as a 3.

My partner unfortunately had the job of tidying/cleaning up the pool etc for about 3 hours after whilst I sat upstairs with River enjoying our first feed together. After that was done with we snuggled up on the sofa together and enjoyed a subway.

The whole experience was euphoric and I enjoyed every second I felt completely at ease and in tune with my body every step of the way thanks to the hypnobirthing course and a supportive birth partner that fully channelled his gatekeeper role ensuring a safe space was kept at all times and all my choices were adhered to. Not to forget mentioning how amazing the midwives were in taking on board all of my birth preferences and fully supporting me in all my decisions throughout my pregnancy ensuring I had all the information I needed to make informed decisions. 🖤