Dear Pip,
I just wanted to let you know that Indy Violette was born last Thursday 15th October. 40 +3 (compared to 42+2 with Ziggy in London!)
It was such a polar opposite of the birth we had with Ziggy so I’m ecstatic!
Things started in the middle of the night (though I think it had been ramping up for a while and I was in denial as I was trying to get jobs crossed off my list! I finished some filing admin at 11pm and by 2.30am I knew we were on!) I didn’t wake John as knew I’d need him to be rested, and just tootled around packing my bag/ writing lists and instructions for my mum and eating toast. By 7.00Am surges were 6 minutes apart lasting for a minute or so, and I was really needing to concentrate on my breathing and trying to relax my jaw/ body etc. I couldn’t lie down and found walking was the best thing.
Ziggy woke up and things slowed down quite a bit. John realised he wasn’t going to work but I think he thought things were going to be slow so he just pottered around , whereas I started to think this may be quicker than I thought.
John’s mum came at about 830-9am and after a while took Ziggy – once I saw him walking to the car the surges kicked back in with oomph (isn’t the body/mind connection amazing)
I then tried to let John know that this was going to be quicker – he was busy tidying and sorting stuff out, so there wasn’t any together hypnobirthing at that stage, but I was just continuing to breathe, and was carrying my phone around with the rainbow relaxation and affirmations rolling continuously.
We had talked to the hospital twice – and once the surges hit 3 mins apart for 1 minute (1030am) we were advised to come in in the next 1-2 hours. I started to get a real sense that I needed to go to the hospital at 11ish and had to say to John we need to go now as it was feeling pretty intense.
Once we got to the hospital John helped me walk in and I just had my eyes closed the whole walk with my phone still playing the hypnobirthing track.
We parked in a 2 hour bay and left everything in the car thinking John would come back and get it.
KEMH were good , though I had to stand in the reception for what seemed like quite a while but I was managing – again with eyes closed which helped a lot, holding onto John.
We had a wonderful midwife who asked in a whispered voice if we were hypnobirthing and she led us to a darkened room, put a mattress on the floor, got a ball etc and was just amazingly respectful and supportive.
At that point it was probably about 12.30. When she had a quick check it turned out I was 9 cm dilated!
We continued on – I found that standing holding on to the end of the bed and swaying my hips/ or stepping from one foot to the other was best.
I was really in the zone and needing every bit of concentration to work through the surges.
At about 3 we had a change in midwives – there were 2 – one student. They were respectful too. At one point they asked if they could put a canula in but I said no (I think for the placenta delivery later) and so glad I did.
I couldn’t do a wee, so we did end up having to put in a quick catheter but it actually helped reduce the back pain a little that I had developed.
John did a great job at keeping my relaxation and affirmations rolling on the phone, and I’d asked him that morning to prompt to “flop” each time a surge came as per your recommendation – it helped so much and was really effective. I also got him to put deep pressure on my upper arms, and was burying my head into his arm.
As things intensified I started to make a bit more noise – I found almost saying shooshhhhh.. was quite good, and just a long gentle aaaahhhhhhh.
But as things got closer I needed to relax my jaw and started to almost sing.
It was really, really intense and just a few times I thought -eeek can I keep going.
I spent some time in high kneeling on the bed, leaning onto the back rest, and then tried a squat on the bed for a while but my legs were pretty fatigued.
By 4:15 the midwife asked if I could push a bit more as she was concerned the doctors were going to come in shortly and she didn’t think we needed them. I really didn’t want to push and just kept with surge/birth breathing but decided to go back to standing which helped.
Then it really ramped up and with the surge her head crowned, I just kept breathing with my surges and almost ignored the midwife, in the next few her head came out (very intense) and then shoulders and then she slipped out with me standing and the midwives passed baby up through my legs – and it was a she!!!
She also came out with the membrane intact – in a bubble.. We didn’t see that but the midwives said she looked amazing.
They gave her a quick little pat/ rub to get her to take a breath/ cry, I sat back on the bed with her on my chest and then soon after she started to crawl herself up to my breast and latched on.
We left the cord for ages and all intervention, a doctor came in after an hour or so and wanted the placenta delivered. Such a different approach to the midwives. I think I pissed him off a bit by really questioning what was he going to do and to “just look”, as it felt like he was giving the cord a bit of a tug. The midwives suggested trying the birthing stool and he seemed to wander off in a huff, so we did that with Indy still latched on, but in the end we went with the non-sick injection (thanks for that tip) so they could give the cord a tug and it came out easily.
So….we did it. No intervention, no pain relief, full hypnobirth experience. No tearing and everything intact. My recovery has been amazing, and the difference I feel compared to Ziggy’s is immeasurable.
Thank you so much for all your advice and the refresher. In the end we didn’t use heaps of techniques, but I just found the few that worked for me.
Feel free to use any of this
Take care
Melinda Shepherdson