Induced labour - Annie’s Calmbirth story.

I was really fortunate to first hear about Calmbirth from Rosie herself; I’ve never forgotten when she told me ‘she loved her births’. For me the notion of ‘loving’ childbirth, was a concept I had never, ever considered. Watching birth videos in year 9 during sex education was a form of contraception as opposed to a notion of ‘love’. But, I took Rosie’s word for it, and the day we found out we were pregnant I was adamant that my husband, Alister and I would invest in Rosie’s Calmbirth course.

Initially, I was quite apprehensive about birth. I deliberately choose not to read too much into it, I thought that would freak me out and that I was better to wait to partake in evidence-based childbirth education classes. Alister and I also took the time to attend the antenatal classes provided at our obstetrician’s clinic over a six week period – we were really fortunate to have a midwife, Julianne take the classes as her approach to childbirth was aligned with Rosie’s, the two forms of education complimented one another beautifully. A key difference between the two classes was that Rosie was able to take the time to explain the process of childbirth in greater detail and provide a broad range of techniques; for someone like me who has many questions, proved very helpful.

After taking the two Calmbirth classes, Alister and I felt really excited for our birth – yes we still felt quite nervous but these nerves weren’t embodied with fear.

I was 39+1 when we went into see our obstetrician, he was more thorough when preforming the ultrasound than other times which lead me to think something was different, and it was, there was barely any fluid around our baby which meant we would need to be induced. We went straight to the hospital where the nurses checked our babies heart rate – cool as a cucumber. I was induced using the gel an hour later and then the ‘niggling’ feeling started, like strange and very unwelcome period cramps.

That night, Al and I hung out in our hospital room as I was monitored throughout the contractions. Thinking back, at the time the niggling contractions were actually quite powerful, but I didn’t want to make a fuss thinking, ‘oh Annie, if you think these are bad now just you wait’. That night I practised the Calmbirth techniques Rosie gave me, lots and lots of breathing, visualising and swaying, so much swaying - movement was crucial for me. Sometimes I slept through the niggling contractions but other times I had to get up and sway. At 6am I was moved to a birthing suite, once set up there it was 7am and my obstetrician came in to check whether or not I was dilated and if we would need to use the ‘balloon’ to get things moving. I was three centimetres, I was so proud of myself as this meant the balloon was not needed, just time to fully dilate. It was at this point that I focused heavily on remaining as calm as I could keeping my body relaxed so as to not let the adrenaline kick in and stop the contractions. With my first round of syntocinon things really ramped up, I could no longer stand still and continued to use movement as much as possible – which was really quite hard as I had cords and monitors connected around my waist and in my arms. Time gets a little blurry here, my contractions were 5 minutes apart within the hour and I started to use the gas, which did help, but more so for my breathing. As time passed I was feeling the intense contractions and no position was comfortable, I was constantly moving on the bed and off the bed again and again trying to find some ‘relief’. Al was amazing, he was so calm timing my contractions and checking in on the monitor, he could see when our baby’s heart started racing and encouraged me to start using the gas to ensure I ‘wasn’t too late’ as the gas is really only effective when taken before a contraction peaks. It was at this point I asked for some pain relief – remifentanil. Upon reflection, I was transitioning because just moments after they administered the drip, I felt a huge urge to push. My midwife was very surprised to see that upon a VE, I was crowning – she looked up with surprise and said I can push if I liked! The relief! Within 20 minutes at 10:18am our beautiful baby girl, Isla Annette was born. I felt so empowered and in awe of our beautiful little baby – it was the most magical moment.

Once back in our room, I was so excited to call Rosie telling her all about our birth and how helpful (at the time I think I used ‘lifesaving’) the Calmbirth techniques were. What an amazing course – we recommend it to everyone.