Fiona & Nathan: Ada’s birth
We did the calmbirth course Leading up to Adeline’s birth. I had a challenging birth with my first baby being posterior, having a long labour that ended in fauceps and tearing with a botched stitching job that gave me pain for months afterwards. I was highly anxious about my second birth and was even advised by my GP to have an elective ceasar. We did the calm birth course when I was about 32 weeks and it honestly changed my life. I still practice the breathing and calming techniques in many different situations. So, here’s our story…
At about 34 weeks, I started measuring small, this was not cause for concern initially (my first baby was the same and measured aprox 2 weeks under for the last few weeks of the pregnancy). Our obstetrician monitored us and did regular CTG’s so we knew the baby was OK. At 36 weeks, growth had not increased & just plateaued. Our obstetrician told us at this visit we wouldn’t be going past 38 weeks as the risk was too great and the baby would do better on the outside. This was at first alarming to us, we didn’t want to unnecessarily intervene or be induction-happy, but the camlbirth strategies really assisted us to address our fear (not just for our child, but fear of intervention), and to trust our birth team who we had chosen for their experience, expertise and approach to care. We adjusted our pathway quickly and looked at as many of the positive things we could, like meeting our baby earlier than expected, and having a date/time for our labour. At 37 weeks, things were still the same with no real growth and I was now measuring 8 weeks behind. It was clear to us that our baby did need to come out and we knew this was the right decision.
The day before I was 38 weeks, I noticed over that last 48 hours a change in foetal movement. I was not panicking but felt it prudent to go to the hospital for a CTG. They monitored the baby & the heart-rate was wonderful, but this time, the midwives called the obstetrician to come in and talk to us (our on-call obstetrician as our usual one was away). I knew this meant they were more concerned than usual. Our obstetrician was very reassuring when he arrived, but our bub was still measuring 8 weeks behind. He booked us in to the hospital Monday morning, advising us he would talk to our obstetrician on Sunday to bring him up to speed.
The rest of that day, I felt anxious and nervous (fearful for the baby and of induction), so Saturday night we did some meditations, massage, practiced our breathing and just had a lovely time talking about meeting our little girl. I acknowledged my fears, talking through them, but moving past the fear to accept that on the journey to meeting our baby, we may take unexpected paths: none is better or worse than the other, just different.
By Sunday I had much less anxiety and was feeling calm and excited. We caught up with friends and went for a walk together. I had some lovely time with my 3 year old daughter during the day and my sister and I went and saw a movie that night. Nath and I had a great night sleep and we felt prepared for the induction on Monday.
Monday morning, we arrived at the hospital keen to discuss options with our obstetrician. We monitored bub on the CTG, who was still small but happy! Our obstetrician was aware that we are keen to avoid unnecessary intervention and as I was already 3cm dilated, he recommended a stretch-and-sweep, then coming back on Tuesday if nothing happened naturally.
We went home and spend the day with my Sister (our labour support person who is a midwife). It was really special, we went for a long walk, practiced our breathing, practiced acupressure points, and I got some acupuncture done too.
By early evening, I was getting slight contractions about 20-30 minutes apart, I believed it was likely this would gain momentum overnight and we would wind up having the baby without induction. I went to bed, did a calmbirth meditation and fell asleep. Nothing happened overnight and by morning, I was getting no contractions at all! So off we went, knowing we wouldn’t be leaving hospital this time without our new little girl with us.
Thanks to our calmbirth prep, we had some great discussions with our obstetrician weeks before regarding birth preferences, particularly that we wished to avoid intervention unless it was necessary. I believe because he knew our wishes for a calmbirth, he took a gentle approach to intervention and gave us every chance to go into labour on our own. He broke my waters at 8am and suggested we went for a walk in the hospital. He did a VE and said I was still 3cm dilated and would check in with the midwife at 12. This would be my one and only VE for the whole labour because I had asked to keep it to necessary VE’s only!
The 3 of us went for a big walk, up & down the hospital stairwell (5 floors). During this time (about an hour), we talked, laughed, enjoyed each others company. It was actually relaxing and fun. I remember getting a little worried at one point about having to be put on the syntocin (I had this in my first labour which for many reasons was very challenging); my husband said “there’s no point worrying about the 5th floor while you’re still walking up the 2nd floor”. This advice and metaphor was something I used many times that day and many days since when I find myself getting anxious about something (#calmbirthforlife).
At about 11, I jumped in the bath and stayed there for well over an hour. We had the music on and Nath, my sister, our midwife (who is also a friend), and I just sat and enjoyed the peacefulness. It was again; a really beautiful, special time where we laughed, talked about Ada & her journey to us (she is an IVF baby), talked about some of our “special places” that we’d already discussed from the calmbirth prep. I remember thinking at the time that our midwife was totally on-board with our calm approach. She monitored my contractions and didn’t say anything about progress; didn’t ask about pain relief and didn’t do VE’s. After a while, I knew that I hadn’t progressed enough on my own and that they would be hooking me up to the syntocin. Even though I was expecting it, when the midwife told me the time had come and we needed to hook up to the drip, I started to freak out a little. We had to move rooms, so we organized that and remained positive, not letting a more “clinical” room ruin our zen. Once in the room, I had a little cry and vocalized my fear of the drip; I was worried that I would feel more pain and not cope with the intensity of labour. My sister really addressed the fear logically, as did the midwife, and they both assured me that the pain would be no different to a non-induced labour, it would just happen a little sooner. They were great at acknowledging and validating my fears, which helped me to then stop “fortune telling” (XYZ will happen because of this….) and move back into my calm place. My husband reminded me that we were on a journey to our baby and we just had to take a different path, but we would be holding our girl by the end of the day.
Instead of starting us on the normal beginning dosage for the syntocin, we were put on half that amount. That stimulated some mild contractions but I had to be bumped up gently another 2 times before anything serious happened. Nath hooked me up to the TENS machine once contractions were regular, which helped a little physically and definitely mentally. With every contraction, Nath held my hand or rubbed my shoulders and counted me through the working breath, which made the world of difference. I coped really well, going into my own little space and at one point my midwife told me and showed me on the monitor that during each contraction, my heart rate was going lower, not higher; because of my breathing techniques. I felt so encouraged and empowered. I asked to use the remifentinal and had one dose every 3rd contraction just to take the edge off. I believe I was in latent labour for about 3 or 4 hours, but we covered the clocks so I can’t be sure.
At one point, I went to the toiled and had 3 contractions in the space of about 10 minutes, I’d been sitting on the birthing ball for a few hours but started to feel really heavy. The midwife told me afterwards, this is when she believed I “transitioned” but I had no mental/emotional symptoms of this, I just stayed calm and focused the whole time. Not once did I think it was too much or I wanted to quit. Once getting back to the ball, I don’t remember how long or at what point it was, but I just decided I should stand up and try having a little push. The birthing team knew I wanted to push intuitively and without direction unless necessary, so I didn’t even tell them I’d started gently having a push with 2 contractions. Then I got up on the bed, on my knees and really felt like giving a good push. I pushed twice in this position, then my obstetrician walked in and asked me to turn around (we had planned this ahead of time, as my perineum was very damaged from a botched stitch up job from my first birth. I had agreed to being in a position where he could see better and support me to protect the perineum as we were pretty determined to be in-tact this time!). It was VERY difficult turning around (I was squatting on the bed, leaning back with my husband and sister supporting me, holding my hands), and once I did, they realized that the baby’s head was about to crown. I pushed once, and her head was out, then her body just followed without me really needing to push! During this time, I felt no “ring of fire” and can’t even remember any pain from the crowning. My husband spoke all the positive visualizing things we had practiced and I felt none of the anxiety I had previously about my perineum tearing. Afterwards, my husband told me throughout all the active labour, I was silent through my contractions and didn’t make a sound when I was pushing either.
And so, just like that, our little 2.4 kilo princess was delivered onto my chest.
I sobbed and laughed, a mixture of absolute relief, elation, and shock; I even said to my obstetrician at the time “that was SO easy!” After that, it’s all just a blissful blurr of crying and looking at our baby. They let us stay in the birthing suite for hours, my Mum and Dad even came in with our daughter while we were still in the birthing suite so the two girls could meet for the first time. I went into shock immediately after the birth and shook a lot, but once that wore off, I felt amazing.
I can honestly say, calmbirth gave us the tools to have a beautiful birth, which in turn made me exponentially more relaxed and happy following the birth, I’ve dealt with having a newborn so much better than I did with my first. I’m feeling amazing because I was able to avoid stitches (except for a superficial graze which healed in a few days), I’ve been able to exercise and enjoy going for walks with the family and was even running at the park with my toddler a week after giving birth!
The calmbirth approach has given me skills I will continue to use in many aspects of life. I didn’t aim for a silent birth or to lower my heart-rate during contractions – these things just happened as a result of using my strategies. Reflecting back, I really feel like I went into another world during labour, I was present but it’s like nothing and nobody else existed except me and Adeline.
So here’s a snapshot of birth:
Spent about 6 hours chilling at hospital waiting for something to happen…
1st stage: 2.30 hours
2nd stage: 0.25 hours
3rd stage: 0.07 hours (in comparision to over 2 hours with my first labour!)
What was different & better because of calmbirth:
Nathan knew what to say & had some great strategies to help me, he was more empowered.
I only had one VE the whole day.
I had no panic, my obstetrician was very particular about what happened when to ensure a relaxed atmosphere.