I found the 3,2,1 and 10-1 countdown most useful and my husband said them to me during contractions- he was an awesome birth partner and they really kept me focused and calm. They had a big impact each time he did them, I gave him a tap when I was ready for him to start them, and another tap if I wanted to hear it again in the same contraction. The midwife said I was super chilled! 

I needed a kiwi cup to help deliver my little one in the end, but went with the guidance of all the professionals around me and just focused on pushing and getting to meet my little girl. One thing I’ve enjoyed is using some of the tracks and affirmations now she is here on longer nights, I feel they’ve still been helpful to me now. 

I’m here!

Bec’s Birth Story – First Baby Home Birth with Hypnobirthing

Before the birth – preparation

When I first got pregnant, I was surprised to find I wasn’t feeling nervous about birth at all; that it was just part of the rite of passage of having a baby.  I thought to myself, if I could keep this level of calm for the birth, everything would go well.  After a lot of research, I decided on a home birth, but I felt that in order to pull it off, I needed to do a lot of mental preparation.

Fairly early on in my pregnancy I had stumbled across a hypnobirthing video – it focused on the mother in a pool, alone, and showed her breathing deeply and calmly at the latter stages of labour.  I was stunned – I wanted to give birth like this!  How had she stayed so calm?  Every time I heard the term “hypnobirthing” from then on, I heard a positive story.

I read Marie Mongan’s and Sophie Fletcher’s hypnobirthing books, downloaded the Mindful Mamma meditation MP3s (which I listened to most nights to help me drift off to sleep), and also booked onto a Mindful Mamma course to get some practical techniques to use.  Not only was the workshop useful for me to learn how to apply the techniques, it also gave my husband Andy something practical and proactive to do during labour.

I also prepared for my birth choice by going to a local home birth group, which increased my confidence in feeling that home birth was the right choice for me, and with support from hypnobirthing, I could do it.

As we approached the birth, Andy and I gathered everything we had learnt together.  I picked out the techniques from the course and books that I liked the best and thought would work and talked them through with Andy.  We started thinking about the birth space – our kitchen – and how to set up a pool in there and make it really relaxing (which meant leaving up the Christmas fairy lights!).  Soon my kitchen was covered in visual and mental aids – mantras, paperwork with tips for labour, scan pictures and pictures to remind me of the meditations I’d covered.

As my due date approached, I was ready but not desperate for my baby to be born.  One of the mantras I’d found during hypnobirthing was “my baby knows the right time to be born” and therefore I trusted him/her to arrive when they were ready.  So instead of worrying or being impatient, I channelled my energy into enjoying maternity leave instead.

The night before I went into labour, I told a close friend that I felt suspicious that night that something would happen – and it did!

Labour

I woke up on the 10^th January at 4am with what I described to myself as “painful bowel movements”.  I tried to go back to sleep, but I kept feeling the same uncomfortable sensation so eventually around 5am decided to get up and eat something.  Having never experienced labour at this point, I wasn’t yet convinced that this was it.  I warned Andy that I was feeling something, but decided to wait until 7am to wake him up properly in case it was all for nothing.

As time went on, the feeling was starting to become more of a period-pain like cramp rather than bowel movements, and quite frequent but irregular.  To take my mind off things I picked up my knitting, listened to my meditation MP3s and labour playlist, and also tried out some deep breathing.  I started to become more convinced something real was happening, so just in case, I began to prep and de-clutter the kitchen, turned on the fairy lights, moved the fold-out mattress and my birth ball into the kitchen, and woke up Andy with a cup of tea.  I also set my oven timer to display 0:00 so that I didn’t clock-watch throughout the day as I wanted to experience the “time-distortion” that can happen with deep meditation.

Whilst Andy finished prepping the kitchen by bringing out the pool and mats, I started to think about using the TENS machine I had bought to see what it was like and if it did anything, and told a friend of mine (who was a big fan of TENS).  Her response was “do you really need it?” – and this really caught me in my tracks.  If I tried the TENS now, would this lead to a spiralling of different types of pain management and a different direction to where I wanted to go in?  As I didn’t *need* it, I decided against trying it out and I really thank that friend for catching me there and then!

After timing the sensations I was feeling, Andy suggested we call the midwife as I was still having 3 of them in 10 minutes.  Still not really believing I was in labour, I agreed that he should call them, but tell them it’s probably nothing.  When the midwife turned up at around 10am and did the first internal examination, I was 4cm dilated! I couldn’t believe it.

The next few hours were mostly tea and chat whilst the birth pool was filled.  I continued to bounce on the birth ball or laid down during what I now knew were contractions.  I was still mostly using long inhalations and exhalations to get through them, but occasionally led by Andy who did the 3-2-1-relax-relax-relax exercise and helped me visualise blowing a feather across a lake.  I remember smiling at the end of each contraction and reminding myself that each one would be bringing my baby closer to me.

By 1.30pm I was 6cm dilated and the half-filled birth pool was starting to look enticing.  Once it was full and I got in, I immediately relaxed into it and it gave me a chance to have a breather as things slowed down for a while (as generally happens in a pool).  I also found that I now had control over when I had a contraction.  If I stayed still, I didn’t have a contraction and could relax and rest. When I decided to change position, it triggered another contraction.  I used this benefit of the pool to pace myself for a while.

I was still using long in and out breaths to breathe through contractions at this point.  My helpers had been feeding me water and fizzy Lucozade – I soon asked for the fizz to be taken out of the Lucozade as it made me burp when I was trying to breathe deeply!

Another breathing technique I used was breathing through the phrasing of the music of the tracks on my labour playlist, which had been playing quietly in the background.  My choice of tracks was based on slow, relaxing songs and music with deep personal connections to me – such as our first dance song and some of my all-time favourite tracks.  Each track made me smile for different reasons – and I remember smiling after most of my contractions.  If a part of the music I really loved came on during a contraction, I really went with it, allowed myself to get lost in the sound for a moment and breathed along with the tune.

After an hour or so in the pool, the midwife suggested I get out for a while to get things moving along again.  After having gained control over my contractions in the pool, I was reluctant to get out at first as I knew they’d start coming fast again, but I also didn’t want things to slow down to the point they stopped.  I decided to get out and got dressed, and sure enough they started up quickly again.

My next check was at 5.30pm and at this inspection I was 8cm dilated but the midwife managed to stretch me to 9cm.  My waters still hadn’t broken at this point but were bulging and ready to go any second.  I could feel the pressure myself and could feel some frustration building.  There was some talk about the midwife breaking them for me, but because they were so close, we decided to wait.  Sure enough, as I was stood by the pool, they finally gave way and the pressure and frustration subsided quickly.

After that, it was time for me to get back in the pool again and back to having control over my contractions.  I began to think about what other breathing techniques I had covered in my preparation, and remembered watching a useful video about sounds women make during labour.  I decided to try out some “mooing”, conscious that the video had explained that the deeper the noise was, the better – so I focused on trying to keep the noise I was making relaxed and deep.  I “mooed” my way through the next couple of hours through to the pushing stage.  I also had my first “urge to push” soon after getting back into the pool – it took me by surprise as my body did just take over me for a second and there was nothing I could do about it.

At around 9.30pm, the midwife explained to me the “purple line” some women have on their lower backs when they are fully dilated, and that I had a very clear one showing in the pool, so there was no need to do another internal examination or get out of the pool again.

As things progressed further and I started feeling the urge to push again, I switched to balloon breath (clenching my fist and blowing into it), which I loved as a technique and had practiced before going into labour – I liked the fact you could feel that breathing that way changed the feeling of the out-breath internally, and would help during pushing.  My body switched from letting me have control over contractions to doing what it needed to do – it told me when to push, and using balloon breath, I just had to guide it, hold it and go with it.  I spent most of my time in the pool at this point on all fours/kneeling with my arms over my side as it felt the most comfortable, though I was recommended to “squat” a couple of times to allow gravity to give a little helping hand.

I started to feel like the head was beginning to come, and the midwife was really encouraging and guiding me at this point, telling me how “open” my body was, to go with the breaths and what my body was trying to do.  She seemed to completely get what I was aiming to do with my birth and birth plan.  Andy was using the mantras “we’re going to have a baby soon” and “we get to find out if it is a boy or a girl”, and we also used another anchoring technique we’d developed where our foreheads touched and sometimes making eye contact.  It really helped me engage with him and what we were doing.

My breathing at that point was switching between balloon and deep breathing, and when I felt the stretch as the head started to come, I remember it made me gasp (like stepping on something sharp) – but I still managed to maintain control.  As the cycle of the head coming out and contracting continued, I got to a point where I could “hold” the breath and push to stop it retracting in so far again, and each contraction then made the next push and stretch a little stronger and motivated me to keep going – our baby would be here soon if I kept doing this.

As the stretch got bigger and bigger, eventually there was one more “argh” from me, and the head came out.  I was encouraged to give one more little push to get the chin out, and remember it felt like a little “pop” as it was born.  Andy remembers that seeing the head there staring out of the water was a very strange experience!  With one more big push, the baby came out and was guided straight up onto my chest and wrapped in towels in the water.

I asked the time and was surprised it was still the 10^th January, at 11.29pm – I thought I’d laboured into the next day.  At this point, I was sitting back in the pool and Andy was round me, with the baby on my left side.  We looked at each other and then I held the baby back slightly so we could see – and as we suspected (and secretly wanted, but wouldn’t admit it), he was a boy!

Benjamin David More was born on 7th December (8 days overdue) weighing exactly 7lb. We are besotted!

A huge thank you for all your help in the lead up to his birth. Sorry for the delay in writing this but, here’s my birth story…

My birth story

About half way through my pregnancy I started to feel very anxious about The Birth! I’d binged watched One Born Every Minute and decided I did not want my birth to be as horrific as some I’d seen on there. So, I researched hypnobirthing and decided I wanted a completely unassisted birth without any medical intervention. I practised ‘Mindful Hypnobirthing’ and Nerissa’s pregnancy yoga.

Friday 1^st December 2017

I lost my mucous plug! I hoped labour was imminent, as I was overdue by 3 days and felt very ready to meet our baby.

Wednesday 6th December 2017

10am – I heard dripping on the bathroom floor, looked down and my waters had finally broken! Whilst showering, I noticed the fluid didn’t look right. It was cloudy with steaks of green. I feared meconium was present. I called the hospital and was advised to come in straight away.

12pm – I arrived at LRI.  On examination, I was already 1-2cm dilated but was not yet experiencing contractions. A speculum examination confirmed meconium in my waters. I was told I would need to be induced ASAP, as the baby could be in distress.

I was so upset. All my hopes for a totally natural birth evaporated. I stressed to the doctor and midwives that I did not wish to be confined to a bed. I wanted to use the movement and breathing techniques I’d been practising for weeks.

They explained I would need to be attached to a drip and connected to monitors, meaning any movement would be very restricted. They were so understanding though and agreed I could move around as much as possible by the side of the bed, even though this would make life much more difficult for them, as they would need to move with me to keep track of the baby’s heart rate.

3pm – The cannula for the induction was placed.

5pm – I was transferred to delivery suite and the syntocinon drip (induction) was initiated.

7pm – Contractions began. At this point they felt like waves of energy moving through me and there was plenty of space between them. I actually enjoyed the rush feeling they gave me. No food was allowed so I rested in bed, lying on my side to try and conserve energy before labour intensified.

9pm – Contractions stepped up a gear. The hypnobirthing and Nerissa’s yoga tracks were playing on loop in the background, “This is youuurrrr birth…each contraction will end…”. I used my TENS machine on a very low setting and inhaled lavender oil on a tissue during each contraction wave. The lighting was low.

I could not lie down any more, especially not on my back. It was just far too uncomfortable. I rocked on my birthing ball beside the bed for a while and focused on my breath, “I breath in I relax…I breathe out I let go”.  When the ball became uncomfortable, I stood, using the side of the bed for support whilst I swayed back and forth and round and round.

10pm – I started to feel very shaky and shivery. It felt like a sugar low so my husband fetched me a sugary drink. I immediately vomited. I’ve since learned that the oxytocin hormone can cause this. My cervix was now 4cm dilated.

Thursday 7th December 2017

12am – Contractions became more intense with less space to recover between them. I cranked up the TENS machine and was more and more vocal with my exhalations. My husband had to remind me a couple of times to keep the sounds low. I hummed and ha’d a lot!

1am – I started to feel very tired and doubted myself being able to continue without any help. I felt like a needed to poo really badly so the midwife brought me a bed pan but it just wouldn’t come. I begged her to examine me, as I felt the urge to push. To my absolute relief she was surprised to say I was fully dilated! This was just what I needed to hear and I regained my energy and focus. I since recognised that I was in transition.

2am – My midwife was struggling to keep track of the foetal heart rate. She wasn’t sure if it kept dropping because the baby was in distress or if all my movements meant she just lost contact with it.

She insisted she would direct me with pushing as she wanted the baby out quickly. I agreed. I leant over the side of the bed and after about 4 or 5 deep, powerful roars out came the head – and a hand! I never expected I would give birth standing up but this is just what my body wanted me to do.  One more push and the baby popped out and was handed to me at 2.36am. In all the excitement, I almost tripped over the umbilical cord which was hanging down like a skipping rope. My beautiful baby boy was finally here and in my arms.

Even though my birth didn’t go as planned, I still felt I had an amazing birth experience. I needed no pain relief other than TENS. I truly believe that this was down to the hypnosis and yoga techniques I’d learned and also the fact the midwives and doctors were so accommodating to my wishes.

I was offered gas and air for the placenta delivery which I was very grateful for, as I was too exhausted to rely on breathing alone anymore! I needed stiches for the 2nd degree tears due to him coming out like superman (compound presentation) and the hurried pushing.

Then Ben was given back to me and he latched on to my breast straight away. What an incredible feeling!

Lots of love, Nick, Rachel and Baby Ben xxx

Here is her story….

Photograph courtesy of Rachel Jane Photography

“My hypnobirthing story! I’m not sure if I’d recommend hypnobirthing or not mainly because I was so calm I had an unplanned home birth!

I was monitored more in my second pregnancy due to high blood pressure during my 1st labour where I was given lots of medication, had a very stressful labour and suffered with PND for months after. I knew my raised blood pressure was white coat syndrome and panic not pre-eclampsia but doctors would not agree.

I decided to use Sophie’s hypnobirthing audio book so I could listen to it before and during hospital appointments and labour, it worked so well got signed off to give birth in the birthing centre and was delighted as I could try a water birth and less intervention.

My baby had still not arrived at 41weeks and a induction date was looming, I kept calm listening to the book and making a visualisation board and phrases, I was so calm I agreed to my husband having a work night out an hour away!

I went to my mums house so I wasn’t alone just incase and my 3yr old could stay the night. I started getting a little uncomfortable about 7pm and had a bath, sat on my birth in ball and listened to the book, by 9pm I was calm and talking to my parents but asked my husband to come home and get me on the way. We arrived home at 11pm and I had a shower, contractions started and we decided to time them! 5mins apart 1min long. So we called the birthing centre who suggested having a bath as my waters hadn’t broken.

In the bath my contractions became intense and continuous so I got out and dressed to go in. By the time I got downstairs I needed to push! Yes really called my husband down as he was getting the hospital bags. Laid on the sofa we could feel her head and sac still intact so he called an ambulance which arrived 7 minutes later and my 6lb 12oz baby girl was born in her waters 6mins after they arrived!

I felt calm, in control and concentrated on my breathing and visualisations so managed without any pain relief in a rather quick and unplanned home birth . Baby Daisy is now 5 months old and I’ve enjoyed every minute of it this time. Even now when I hear Sophie’s voice I feel a sense of calm “

I just wanted to send through a note to express my gratitude for your influence and role in the wonderful birth I experienced on the 13th October, when we gently welcomed our son Monty to the world.

I completed the Mindful Mamma course with the lovely Ann back in July, having stumbled across the Mindful Hypnobirthing book and audio and completely loving the philosophy and techniques. I’d been listening to the tracks and reading and re-reading the book right from 16 weeks, however the course was invaluable in including my husband in the pregnancy and preparation for birth – he arrived at the course secretly a little sceptical but supportive, and left feeling empowered and having lost that feeling of being ‘in the way’. This totally carried through when our time came to labour, and he was a fantastic advocate and support.

My birth:

I’d found out at 12 weeks that I had Step B, which had been a consistent source of anxiety for me during pregnancy – not necessarily just because of any risk to the Baby, but also because I was extremely fearful that this automatically put me on the ‘high risk’ list and under consultant care. I was really nervous, right up to going into hospital that I was going to have a constant battle with the consultancy team to avoid intervention – something very important to me as I wanted to keep the birth as calm and natural as possible.

At 3:45 in the morning my waters went whilst in bed, following just 2 or 3 strong contractions. Once the waters had gone (and they went with a gush!) I was experiencing very strong contractions every 4/5 minutes for about 1/2 an hour. As I had Strep B I’d been asked to call the hospital and go in as soon as my waters went – so we did this and made our way to the hospital, an hours drive away from our rural home. During the journey I managed through my contractions by listening to the Mindful Mamma hypnosis tracks and the Mindful Mamma music – I don’t remember much of the journey!

Once we arrived into hospital we were shown into our room and we waited an hour or so for my midwife to come and check Labour progress. By now my contractions were very strong and coming every 3 mins, and I imagined I was probably around 4/5 cm… so when my midwife said it was more 1 to 2 cm I felt extremely worried and disheartened – if I found the contractions this painful at this point, how on Earth was I going to manage?!

What a relief.. and we didn’t see him again. The following 10 hours were spent calmly labouring in private with my husband and a wonderful midwife, who had taken courses in hypnobirthing and was amazing – most of the time I didn’t notice she was there, until I needed her. I did go through the typical ‘transition’ which Ann warned us about, when I calmly asked for an epidural when I’d got to 7cm. Having been watching me calmly breath through contractions up until this point, my midwife wisely suggested I try some gas and air instead… what a dream!

I feel like I sailed through the last few cm with the help of gas and air, breathing consciously through contractions (Breathe in , I relax, breathe out – I let go!) using the breaks to speak lovingly with my husband, drink water and even snack!

The final stages of labour were the most empowering moments of my life so far, breathing through those ‘pushes’ and feeling totally serene in between, gazing up at my husband and midwife. The midwife has since said it was an absolute privilege to be part of such a calm and loving birth.

Monty joined us at 7pm that evening, following an hour of active pushing (which felt like 10 minutes!) weighing 7lb 2 at 39 weeks.

Our first 3 weeks of parenthood have been beautiful and tough all at the same time – and were thoroughly in love with him! We both found the birth such a hugely positive experience, and I personally feel such a sense of achievement that we managed to have the dream birth which we’d envisaged. I majorly attribute our experience with the way in which we prepared for the birth with Mindful Mamma – and we’ll forever be grateful to Ann and Sophie.

“I would really like to share my birth story with other expectant mothers please as I feel that hypnobirthing allowed me to have the birth I never thought would be possible.”

“This time 3 weeks ago I was  searching for positive hypnobirthing induction birth stories trying to keep a positive frame of mind about my upcoming labour. I had agreed to be induced at 41+5. I am so pleased to now be able to share my own positive birth story!

In the build up to my induction date I tried to kick start my labour as naturally as possible with the usual attempts of eating spicy food, pineapple, clary Sage oil baths and massage, bouncing on my birthing ball, long walks, hypnotherapy, acupressure points- the list goes on. With no success I tried 2 sweeps over week 41 but again, no success.

I had initially started learning hypnobirthing techniques to reduce my fear and anxiety around birth, due to a spinal condition I had been told I was unable to have an epidural and that c-section may be the best method of delivery for me. My partner and I attended Fernanda’s mindful mama course in Loughborough and immediately felt the benefits of viewing pregnancy and birth in a more positive way. My partner and I both felt that Fernanda had a very calming influence on us and so, following the course I asked Fernanda to be my Doula during labour.

I went into hospital on Saturday night and had the first hormone pessary, I ended up having 2 of these over the next 24 hours because they kept on falling out. My body did respond to the hormones and surges built up and slowed back down repeatedly over 2-3 days. This was not the labour I had envisioned or planned. At one stage while being monitored my baby’s heart rate had increased and the midwives needed to find a clear baseline to establish whether or not he was distressed. Using the Mindful hypnobirthing MP3 I managed to calm the baby’s heart rate back to normal. This for me was clear evidence of how a calm mother can help to create a calm baby.

The hypnobirthing techniques I had learned helped me to stay relaxed and maintain an open mind throughout my birthing journey. Fernanda’s knowledge and experience helped us feel in control; she empowered us to make informed decisions during my time in hospital.

At 4pm on the Monday I was taken to the delivery suite and started on the hormone drip, things got intense pretty quickly. I used pregnancy and birth affirmations through headphones, a cooling eye mask to help block out my surroundings and any distractions. I also used a tens machine and gas and air to help manage the discomfort of surges. I listened to the Contraction Wave MP3 when surges became more intense. At 5.17am baby Neo made his arrival weighing 9lb 12oz, I had a natural delivery and extended skin-to-skin contact before my partner cut the cord and Neo was checked over and weighed. He is now 3 weeks old and people regularly comment on what an alert and chilled out baby he is.

As a family we cannot thank Fernanda enough for all her help and support, we now highly recommend hypnobirthing and having a Doula to anyone we know expecting a baby!”

Penelope’s Birth

I just wanted to share how amazing my birth experience was and I truly believe it was down to practicing hynobirthing.

I had a beautiful home water birth on 6 June, delivering our beautiful baby girl, Penelope Rose Aldridge, who weighed in at 9.11.I was 40 plus 5 when she came along. I didn’t require any pain relief, no gas and air and no stitches and I think this is due to how relaxed my body and mind was.

My waters broke at 2am, I stayed calm went back to bed, mild contractions started pretty much straight away. When I woke up I went about my day like normal – went shopping at Tesco, took the dog for a walk and to the in laws for coffee. Around 3pm contractions felt stronger, around 5pm they were less than a min apart – by 10pm I was holding my baby girl in arms! Midwives couldnt believe how quickly I dilated or how controlled I was in labour – the whole experience was so beautiful and empowering!

I’d love for other woman to be influenced by my experience!

Although I wasn’t practising regularly or completely committed in terms of ‘watering the roots of the tree’, I would fall asleep listening to the hypnobirth tracks and reading the book completely changed my perspective on birth and really helped me to feel relaxed and trust my body. My husband got so much out of attending the class as it bought him round to the idea of home birth…and now he can’t understand why anyone would want to be in a hospital! I think that’s the beauty of hypnobirthing you can do as much or as little as you like – whatever helps you change you mindset.

I guess I just wanted to say thank you for making this incredible life event a truly empowering experience!

Grace’s Birth Story

I’m not sure how I came to know about Hypnobirthing, but when I found out I was pregnant with my first baby and started thinking about having a nice pregnancy and birth, I read all about it and knew I wanted to give it a go. In life I’m a pretty chilled person, so felt like it would fit in well with wanting my baby to grow inside a relaxed and happy mummy. I also wanted my birth to be something I looked back on with pride, not horror. I wanted a beautiful experience of birthing my first born.

I attended the workshop and read the book many times, practising and practising my relaxation techniques. If I’m 100% honest, I didn’t religiously do the techniques day in day out, but I certainly did them on a regular basis.

When the time came and I went into labour it was a Sunday lunchtime and I just knew that is wasn’t the usual Braxton hicks. It was actually my due date, too. My latent phase was, unfortunately, quite long! My contractions were manageable and I was using my techniques to breathe through them. They were getting stronger and longer and by Sunday night were around 5-7 mins apart. I couldn’t sleep through them so spent Sunday night on the sofa, listening to my relaxation tracks, and feeling an excitement that I was going to meet my baby very soon.

By Monday late afternoon things hadn’t progressed much. Contractions were all over the place but were really quite long (some up to 2 mins) and were getting uncomfortable, but I felt in control and kept bouncing on my ball, having a walk around, and using my breathing techniques. At around 5pm I had a particularly strong contraction and felt quite wet. Thinking my waters had broken I went to the toilet and I was horrified to see quite a lot of blood. I had had bleeding earlier in my pregnancy and I must admit I did panic and made an emotional call to the hospital to let them know. They asked me to go straight down for a check-up.

As I’d gone in with bleeding all my plans of a water birth were out of the window as the birth centre wouldn’t take me. I was now under consultant care. The doctor examined me and I was 2cm dilated. She then swiftly told me that she was going ‘to get this baby out’! I asked if the baby or I were in any danger. We weren’t. The baby was absolutely fine. She said she’d start me on the oxytocin drip and then go from there. The midwife then said I’d probably need an epidural due to the pain of the induction, so I was devastated that all my plans for a natural birth were unfolding. Remembering everything I had learned from Mindful Mama and knowing that, actually, I didn’t have to just do want was being insisted on, I refused the induction, explained my birth preferences and I was sent up to the ward where I was given until 7am to labour naturally.

By 5am I was 7cm and I was delighted as I knew that I didn’t need the interventions planned. Although I couldn’t use the birth centre, my husband made the labour room very relaxing by dimming the lights, putting on the relaxation CD and I felt very calm and in control. However… I was exhausted as I had now been awake nearly 2 days so I did have some diamorphine to help me get some sleep. I totally regret that decision. In my sleep deprived state I felt I needed it, as I didn’t think I’d get through the next few hours due to sheer tiredness. It made me feel sick, made me feel totally out of it and I was pleased when it had worn off by around 9am. Plus, it totally slowed things down for me, I was still 7cm at this point. Looking back I was doing just fine on the gas and air. I was managing my contractions and standing over the bed to help get into the right position…. If only I wasn’t as tired as I was, I would have continued with just the gas and air.
Fast forward to 2.37pm and after quite a lot of pushing my beautiful baby girl was born. I needed a small cut, but other than that everything else I did by myself and I am so proud.

Grace was perfect. She did a little cry and then was so calm. In fact, she was the only baby on the ward who didn’t make one peep!

If I hadn’t been for what I had learnt on the course my birth would have taken a very different path, one which I definitely didn’t want. I look back on my birth with such pride and I honestly cannot wait to do it all again with baby number two. Hopefully next time I’ll get my water birth!

Needless to say, I always recommend Mindful Mama to all my pregnant friends! Thank you so much for helping me to believe I could have the birth I really wanted, even if it didn’t all quite go to plan.

Rita’s sons birth story

As my due date of 1st January was approaching, I was getting more and more determined not to be induced. I planned a natural, unassisted birth and thoughts of any medical interventions totally freaked me out.

I was drinking gallons of raspberry leaf tea and eating 6 dates each morning just as prescribed by ‘google’. I was also walking my dog for at least an hour each day since the start of my maternity leave on 12th December. All to make the baby move down and with intention of going into labour as close to the due date as possible.

My husband has made a note of the first twinges on 30th December around 22.15. I didn’t think much of these sensations as they were more like very minor period cramps; very irregular and inconsistent. Those twinges became more regular at 20 mins apart (although still very weak) on 31st December around 13.00. They lasted for 3-4 hours and didn’t in any way disrupt our day.

In the evening of 31st December, both my husband and I knew that the baby was coming and it’s only a matter of days/hours before things really kicked off.

Having stayed up until just after midnight to meet the New Year- I had a good night sleep. Even if I did experience anything during that night- it certainly wasn’t strong enough to wake me up!

On 1st January we took the dog out for a walk as planned although I opted in for a shorter route as I could feel things starting to progress. We continued with our day as normal, re-checked the hospital bag, installed the car seat etc.

At around 15.00 on 1st January things have started progressing. My contractions were regular and no more than 6 minutes apart. We downloaded the contraction app on the phone and started recording them. They were quite mild between 15.00 and 17.00 however I was still very much aware of them.

At 17.00 we rang the hospital and advised them of the progress. I explained to the midwife that I was keen to stay at home as long as possible and was ideally planning to make way to the hospital when contractions were 2-3 minutes apart. She agreed and asked us to call them again when we were ready to come. At around 18.30 my contractions became closer together with an average frequency of 3.5 minutes. They also became more intense as I was marking them on the app as ‘strong’. I could still continue with the normal tasks, but preferred not to talk during the surges.

At this point, I knew that if things continued to progress as they did, we will be going to the hospital in a couple of hours. I rang my mum and told her that we will be dropping the dog off to her around 20.00 on the way to the hospital (I was determined to stay at home as long as possible and felt that by 20.00 we will have regular and fairly strong contractions every 2 minutes or so)

Just after 20.00 we got in the car, dropped the dog off to my mum’s house and made our way to the hospital. We rang the midwife from the car and advised that we were on our way.

Everyone always describes the car journey as very unpleasant – my journey honestly wasn’t that bad. In fact, I started feeling the contractions slow down and become weaker. It was Sunday and the roads were empty so we reached hospital in less than 20 minutes. I didn’t feel the need to be dropped off at the door so we decided to park the car together and walk to the hospital from the car park. As we were escorted into the birthing suite and my blood pressure/baby’s position checked by the midwife- I was worried that we will be sent back home as my contractions were not as strong as they were prior to leaving home.

Midwife asked us to get comfortable and said she would observe me for some time to understand how far along I was. She also read my birth plan at this time. I could feel my contractions get further apart so the midwife advised that I am still in the latent stage and she would be happy for us to go back home. She also mentioned that as the hospital was not very busy- she would also be happy for us to remain. I was worried that going through the car journey again and coming back to the hospital would make everything slow down again so decided to stay at the hospital, make myself comfortable and get things moving. It took us about an hour to get things going again and by 21.30 the contractions were back to 2-3 minutes apart and quite strong. I was on my feet up to this point, swaying my hips during contractions but was getting quite tired and wondered if I should lie down to get some rest. I asked my husband to put the TENS machine on as I could feel things intensifying.

Up till now I am not sure if TENS really made any difference but I ended up having it on all the way till transition. Lying down made contractions a lot more intense and after 3 or 4 of them, I felt my waters break. Looking at my contraction history on the app now, I can see that I must have reached transition around 22.30. The pain got a lot more intense and I started feeling the urge to push. I also started feeling pressure in my lower back although all the way prior to that it was mainly in my lower belly. At this point i was on my knees on the floor leaning over a stool. I requested the midwife to prepare a bath and also asked for gas and air as I thought that at this stage TENS machine was not doing enough to help me cope.

For some reason the midwife was reluctant to give me gas and air at this stage- she either wanted to make sure I was, in fact, transitioning or she wanted to push me further towards a totally unmedicated birth as per my birth plan. 20 mins later and I was in the tub equipped with gas and air. This made the whole thing a lot more manageable.
From what I remember, I started feeling urges to push around 23.00 as I kept wondering if one hour going to be enough and whether the baby will come on his due date; it felt like contractions became further apart as I felt I was getting a lot more rest in between. I was using gas an air with every contraction and around an hour and a half later. at 00.40 on 2nd Jan, my baby was born.

It wasn’t my plan to deliver in the water (although I never discounted it) but I am so glad I did. The water was very soothing and helped an awful lot.

I transferred onto the bed with the cord still intact and the baby skin to skin. My plan was not to clamp the cord until I deliver the placenta however our cord ended up being too short which made it quite uncomfortable to breastfeed and hold the baby whilst still attached to the cord. We clamped the cord about 20 mins after birth and after it stopped pulsing. I later delivered my placenta whilst still holding the baby on my chest.
I wanted for all baby checks to be done at a later stage to allow my initial bonding with him so the midwife left all 3 of us in the room until 5am to sleep and rest. We had all baby checks done that morning after 5am along with a few stitches that I required for a small tear. We were discharged at 10am that same morning.

I feel extremely lucky that my birth went as planned and am very thankful to the midwife for adhering to the birth plan. I did not want any internal examinations and ended up going through the whole labour without having dilation checked once! I wanted limited presence and talking in the room and can only remember midwife being there for the pushing stage. I was given all the time to help me bond with my baby and didn’t at all feel any pressure to do things I didn’t feel comfortable with.

Dear Sophie,

I would like to thank you! My baby girl is three months now and my entire family is still in disbelief! We have two gorgeous boys whose births were incredibly traumatic and my joy at discovering I was expecting again was overshadowed by my intense fear of giving birth again. I also suffered severe pnd after my youngest boy and was unable to bond with him for a long time. My antenatal visits were awful as my midwife was rushed and distracted and seemed to think I was being silly as I was already a mum. At 14 weeks I began to suffer pgp which quickly became so bad I was unable to walk unaided and life was miserable.

Still unsupported by my midwife and terrified of what lay ahead I felt alone and scared, i began to look into hypnobirthing and bought your book. I religiously listened to the MP3 tracks and adjusted my thinking accordingly.

Soon I realised I was in control of my body and my birth and felt confident I could manage the birth. When I went into labour all my fears vanished and my body took over. My husband and I arrived at the birth centre and 1hour and 13 minutes later our beautiful Belle Evangeline was born in the pool!

The wonderful Midwife there couldn’t have been more different from my antenatal one and her only concern was the pool wouldn’t be full in time and in fact I was helped in before they had finished preparing it! No panic and no pain just sensations of my baby moving down and out into my arms it was truly my most proud moment and it was all down to your book and soothing tracks.

I had been so afraid and so alone and you helped me take control so thank you again! Three months in and my baby girl is breastfeeding, healthy and the happiest little thing! And no pnd! Thank you for showing me my greatest fear could become my greatest success and joy.