Birth story - Rachael and baby girl

A bit of background: my first was a very long delivery and after 2 hours of pushing ended in intervention/ ventouse, episiotomy. Day 3 post birth, my stitches broke and I ended up with a very slow recovery and a corrective procedure at 4months for over granulation.

Suffice to say, 3 years later, whilst pregnant with my 2nd, I happily discovered through the Unmummsy Mum on Instagram, the digital pack and thought I had nothing to lose. Through watching the videos I not only learnt the breathing exercises but also began to understand what happened in my first delivery that perhaps was the reason it ended in intervention.

My beautiful daughter was born on 25 September (41 weeks) a completely natural water-birth, with gas and air. I arrived at Norwich’s MLBU at 00:00, where, when examined, I was only 2-3cm, she was born at 3.45am at a very healthy 8lb 8oz.

The digital pack really put me in the correct mindset for birth and gave me the confidence to trust that my body knows how to birth my baby. I started pushing and using the breathing down exercises when my body told me to - even though no one expected that to happen so soon. But I felt like I was battling my body when I tried to do the upbreathing whereas the down breathing made me feel so much better. I am especially grateful to my midwife who also told me to trust my body and do what I wanted to without checking me.

My waters didn’t break until I was minutes from pushing the head out. In fact, the water had got too murky for the midwife to see so she asked if I could feel the head and waters a couple of time - first time I could feel the waters with the head behind, the next time they had gone and it was just the head.

I got the skin to skin contact immediately and at least 4/5 minutes before cord clamping. (I chose for the injection to deliver the placenta as I just wanted it out and to be able to concentrate on cuddling my baby) She fed straight away and we had a good lovely few hours of cuddling and bonding that was amazing.

I am immensely grateful for the digital pack and proud I was able to have the birth I wanted and would 100% recommend the pack to everyone I know who’s pregnant! (In fact I already have).