I was so happy that we chose to do hypnobirthing, I was quite nervous about birthing and being in hospital and then we went into lock down and it just amplified all my worries about hospitals.
However we found Kerry on my beautiful births she was amazing explaining things and helping work through all my fears and worries. We were able to have one to one on zoom, this was extremely helpful to get to grips with the breathing techniques.
At 38 weeks I started to slowly try natural methods to induce labour and on the 18th July I tried curb walking, pineapple and used my breast pump that night, Sunday the 19th of July I woke up at 2am with slight tummy cramps and I had the feeling this was the start of our journey to meet out baby. At 2.30 I woke my partner James telling him the baby was on the way, I started getting surges from then on.
I tried to rest and watch friends but the surges were coming very frequently. James timed them so I could focus on my breathing and we called the birth centre the lovely midwife suggested going for a bath and resting I got into and nice warm bath at 3.30am and my surges picked up super quick. James was still monitoring them and suggested that as they were now lasting 1 minute and I had had 3 within 7 minutes that we should ring the birth centre back, they ask us to come in.
Once we arrived at the South Lakes Birth Centre my lovely midwife checked me and confirmed I was 4cm and ask if I would like to get in the pool. I was super happy to be in the pool, it was relaxing and I felt I had my own space. James put on my relaxation music and with gas and air I was able to breath through the surges they were getting stronger not painful but felt powerful.
I was feeling the urges to push, I asked the midwife is it ok that I was pushing and she suggested I be checked so I wasn’t going to hurt myself. I got out the pool and my waters broke and I was now 10cm. As there was meconium in my water I wasn’t able to go back in the pool and baby needed to be monitored. I remember thinking that our beautiful baby would be here soon and I would finally get to hold them.
Even though I was monitored I was still able to try different positions and baby heart beat stayed nice and strong throughout. After 2 hours I was starting to get tired, the surges were coming nice and strong I was able to breath through them with the gas and air and stay calm. The doctor was called in and said they would like to use Forceps to help me out as I was getting tired at this point. I was happy for the help and he said that I was still to push and the forceps would just help to guild baby out. I stayed calm and within 5 minutes at 10.57am our baby was born and placed on my chest for immediate skin to skin contact.
I checked to see the sex of our baby and we had a little boy, we named him Oakley James he was so perfect, we were both so happy. James cut the cord and was able to have skin to skin with him. Once I was sorted I was able to have skin to skin and breastfeeding baby for the first time.
Even though the birth wasn’t what I expected it was the most amazing experience of my life I can’t thank Kerry and hypnobirthing enough.
