The birth story of Haisley Rose

I have always believed birth to be a natural part of life and always had visioned how I would birth my children and after my first birth not going “to plan” I knew I needed some reminding and more knowledge the second time around. 

I did my hypnobirthing course around 20 week into my pregnancy, and from then I began mentally to prepare my body for birth again. I put up affirmations around the home, I would go to sleep listening to the music, spend a lot of time in the bath with candles and the hypno tracks( which I believe is what helped the most).

From 37 weeks i began the waiting game, i was trying everything to bring on labour. I couldn't wait to experience it all again. Every Night i would say to my partner “it's happening tonight” but it didn’t for THREE weeks ! As I approached my guess date I started to feel more nervous that I would have to be induced again and having experienced that last time I knew it was something I didn't want to happen but I felt I had more knowledge this time if it was to get there. 

It was Saturday night and we had gone out for dinner with our friends, I was feeling very tight and just a little different. I just wanted to get to my bed. 

Then 2am i woke up with period pain. It lasted for a minute then went, I just layed there waiting to see if it would happen again, it did! I looked at my phone to see the time. After the 3rd time the feeling came and went, they were 10 minutes apart. I grabbed my head phones and tried to stay asleep. I would fall in and out of sleep the feelings being enough to wake me every 10 minutes. It got to about 6am and I was starting to feel uncomfortable so I got out of bed and told my partner what was happening.. From then I couldn't sit down. I paced around the house with surges still 10 minutes apart. I cleaned up and got my daughters things together to go to my mums, I had a shower with the hot water over my back. It was amazing. It got to 8am and my surges were now 7 minutes apart. I set myself up in my bedroom on my ball with pillows on the bed to lean over. My partner took my daughter to my mums and it was nice to have that 20 minutes on my own to really process what was about to happen and that was the last time it was just my daughter and I. When my partner came back he lit a lotus candle and put it next to me, made me some toast and coffee that I managed to get down between surges. I remember thinking it's happening exactly how I imagined it would always be and when people say between surges you can talk and feel ok, it really is like that.

It got to 9am and they were getting a little more intense now so i called my midwife. She told me when they get 4-5 minutes apart, call back. It wasn't long before they were there and I called her and she told me to come up to the hospital. I was dreading the car ride not being able to move but I managed and before I knew it we were in the hospital. It was now 1030am, I felt calm and excited as we entered the hospital not really thinking about what I was in for. I was just going with the flow and trying to enjoy this process as it was going how I imagined. We had to wait for a little while in women’s assessment before we got through into a room where another midwife from my MGP group came to see me as mine wasn't on until 3pm. The surges were feeling stronger as I waited in this little room causing me to now hold onto something and lean forward. My midwife wanted to make sure I was in labour before taking me up to the birthing sweet but soon realized that I definitely was and we walked up. The hospital was very calm and I felt calm moving into the birthing room. As we walked in the midwife said we were getting her favorite room which made me excited to see. First thing I saw was the bath! I had always dreamed of a water birth and not getting that chance with my first it was something I definitely wanted this time but had no expectations that i would be able to have it this time.

We got settled in the room and my midwife set up a mat on the floor with an exercise ball, this bar I could lean on and ran the bath. I moved around the room using the bar and the exercise ball, my surges becoming stronger and my breathing deeper. My partner fed me between surges and I felt completely ok between them. I could see and hear the water running in the bath. It was like it was calling to me but i didn't know how i would go during surges as i was getting relief from being able to move. At this point time was out the window. I kept looking at the bath and decided I was getting in & could always get out if I needed to. The warm water felt so nice and so calming. I had practised a lot of my breathing and the surge of the sea tracks in the bath at home so it felt so right when i felt the water. I tried to be on my knees but that wasn't comfortable so I just layed back. From then I was in my own world. The surges were getting stronger for longer and I would push my feet into the other side of the bath and breathe/moan through the surge then reminding myself to bring my breathing back to normal between them using the feeling of the warm water to bring calmness. I felt little awareness of anything else in the room at this time, my partner sitting next to the bath light touching me and pouring water over me. I wasn't thinking about if my baby was close to earthside because my first labour was long and all these different things happened. I began to make a lot of noise through my surges and moving around the bath to get through them. My midwife came over and asked to take my knickers off as she thought bubs was nearly here. I thought there was no way I still had ages to go. She checked and accidently broke my waters and told me bub's head was just there.

My next couple of surges were so strong and quite close together, I was really pushing against the bath and was vocally very loud! Then the next surge was this pressure and feeling of my insides opening up it was so intense and crazy and all i could think was what the f*** was that ! It's all a bit of a blur here but i remember screaming that i couldn't do it and i was totally thrown off by this feeling/pain. I felt I mentally prepared for the surges but not for this feeling of her coming down. I thought I couldn't do this for an hour like I did the first time but the next surge was crazy strong and just as I thought I was coming down the other side of it, it came on again even stronger and then she was born into the water just like I had always dreamed about. I remember my midwife telling me to open my eyes. Baby’s here!

She put her straight onto my chest with my partner holding me from behind. I just squished my face into my partners thinking what just happened that was crazy ! After calming down and gathering ourselves we looked to see she was a beautiful (hairy) baby girl! 

We moved onto the bed, I birthed my placenta and my midwife checked I was all good. After 4 hours we got to go home which I thought was crazy as we only got to the hospital at 1030am she was born at 115pm and we were home by 6pm that night.

I really do owe this experience to the knowledge and tools I learnt through Nikki!