Meeting the Love of our Lives

Our birth story began the night before our due date, with my uterine seal and membranes releasing at 9:30pm. We headed to the hospital assuming we’d be home not long after to progress through labour at our own pace. With car packed, Nath put on the Rainbow Relaxation through the car speakers and setup calming oils in our portable diffuser, while I shut my eyes and went in to my zone.

We arrived at the hospital, had a check over with a midwife, and within the hour of being there had quickly progressed in to active labour. All through this Nath continued to keep me calm, hydrated and full of encouragement that we were going to be amazing at this!

We were admitted into the birth suite just before midnight, with surges at this stage that were coming regularly and increasing in pressure. We settled in, and I continued my surge breaths leant over the bed seated on a birthing ball, while Nath addressed our birth plan with our assigned midwife.

Surges continued, I moved around the suite between the bed, toilet, shower and birthing ball as I felt comfortable and necessary, Nath continuing to care for my every need (including back and forth plugging our phones on to charge so we had our meditation playlist going through out the night). With the unexpected quick progression of things, we had left our bags in the car and were without our HypnoBirthing scripts and a few other things we had intended to bring in to the birth suite, but Nath was never short on affirmations which kept my mind at ease as the pressure grew stronger and the temptation to give up became at times a valid option.

I could feel my body progressing through each surge and each stage of my labour, conscious of where our baby boy was moving down towards my birth path ready to make his debut. Regardless of the discomfort at times, I felt so empowered to keep going at my body and our baby’s pace.

In the early hours of the morning, I made my way in to the bath, with Naths encouraging words that we were so close to meeting the love of our lives! I began doing our birth breaths and was amazed by how well my body was moving our baby through without me trying to push. Everything was happening all on its own. I had never trusted my body in such a deeply intimate way.

At 8:47am, our baby boy was born in to the water, perfect in every way and full of life (and loud loud cries!). Nath and I basked in our baby’s beauty and the experience we had just had. It was nothing short of miraculous.

Disclaimer, this was by no means a pain free birth. There was definitely a lot, I repeat, A LOT of pressure and discomfort. Despite my best efforts to prepare my body for birth, I did manage a second degree tear. BUT none of these things felt like a failure, if anything I’m only more in amazement of what my body is capable of.

The first midwife we had in our birth suite meant well, but Nath found himself continually having to intervene, referring her back to our birth plan and stopping her from trying to disturb me to ask questions we had already addressed (including the continual offer of pain relief, suggestions of intervention and asking me about my pain). But I am so grateful for a husband who was present through out every moment and took the reigns when I needed him to.

We had another midwife change over in the wee hours of the morning, she read our birth plan and was amazing at letting us do our thing, even commenting on how in control we were of our labour.

HypnoBirthing empowered both Nath and I to achieve the birth of our dreams. Even if we didn’t get to use all of what we had learnt, what we did was invaluable and we are acutely aware of how different our story could have been had we not made the decision to inform and engage ourselves.