Birth story - Priv and baby Nylah

We found PBC hypnobirthing quite late in our pregnancy, around 33 weeks and wow, how it changed my mindset about childbirth. I was so scared about the prospect of giving birth and my view changed completely as we worked our way through the videos. I listened to the positive affirmations track very morning when I first got up and every evening before I fell asleep. I also alternated between the other tracks on walks and before bed to relax. I loved reading all the positive stories and was reassured by them.

Pregnancy

When I found out I was pregnant, I was actually in shock and had to take multiple tests to confirm. I had no symptoms at all, and much to my husband's dismay, continued to take tests till our 12 week scan. It was a straight forward pregnancy, with only one trip to the hospital for reduced movement due to a UTI just before New Year.

Labour

On 23rd February, around 1pm I started to lose part of my mucus plug. I told my husband that I thought the baby would be coming soon so I decided to take a shower, wash my hair and relax. I didn't have any other signs of labour from then. Once my husband finished work, we decided to put a pizza in the oven and relax by watching my favourite film. We proceeded to watch some funny YouTube videos to release more oxytocin. Around 10pm, I started to get a few cramps and dull aches. I tried to get some sleep but the sheer excitement of possibly meeting our little one very soon and the aches meant I couldn't sleep. I told my husband to sleep and went to the lounge and bounced on my ball. I started recording my surges on the Freya app and put the TV on as a distraction which worked till about 1am. At this point, my surges were about 6mins apart and increased in intensity. I got my husband up who helped me put the TENS machine on and called my parents who were taking us to the birthing centre. I continued to labour at home and at about 3:40am, was exhausted so went to try to lay down. My husband and I were chatting away when I felt a pop and a warm sensation: my waters . At this point my surges got super strong and I started to use up breathing. I called the birthing centre who didn't have enough midwives so I had to go to the MLU attached to the hospital. It took me a while to put clothes on through the surges and leave the house...walking to get examined was a mission. I had to stop to breathe through the surges every few steps.

Eventually we got to the birthing suite at 5am. My husband passed my birthing plan to the midwife who looked through it thoroughly and monitored me from afar. At 5:30am I was examined and I was 5cm! My husband then went and collected our hospital bags from the car while the midwife filled the pool. My husband took charge of the Freya app so I could breathe through my surges. It's so true- the surges are so intense but the relief when one had finished was amazing. At 6am, the pool was full and I got in. It felt AMAZING . My midwife was so nice- she followed my birthing plan and left us to it, only checking baby's heartbeat every 10-15mins. I was in a UFO the whole time. My husband was giving me Lucozade between surges and tried feeding me snacks, but that was the last thing on my mind. I got to a point when I was exhausted and was falling asleep in-between surges but then I felt my baby coming down. I used down breathing and asked the midwife to coach me through this as I was so tired...low and behold, 1.5hrs after getting into the pool, my beautiful baby girl was born into this world. We actually forgot to look at her gender as we were so overwhelmed but was politely reminded by our midwife We had delayed cord clamping and baby was passed to my husband when I got out the pool.

I got on the bed and we had skin to skin and she latched on immediately. I had put in my birthing plan that I wanted to birth the placenta naturally...at this point I was so exhausted, I asked for the injection. We were in our little bubble for just over an hour when I had to be checked. My perineum was intact (YAYYY- I would so recommend doing perineal massage) but I had a second degree vaginal tear and a few grazes that needed stitching.

Honestly, I cannot thank PBC enough and recommend them to as many people as I can. They changed my view on birth and I had such an amazing experience.