Hope you are all well. Sorry it’s taken a while to get round to sending this, but wanted to let you all know that baby Jessica was born on
March 10th, 7lb, all healthy, pink and screaming!We were so close to our perfect home birth, but in the end it wasn’t meant to be – I successfully laboured at home, got to 10 cm dilated, and waters broke, with lovely midwife, who fully embraced the hypnobirthing
techniques: she was quiet and discreet, and only examined me twice, and helped with the gentle touch massage (when Riaan had to go outside and rescue the dustbins halfway through the night – it was the night of the really big storm!)!!. Riaan was brilliant and I have to say all the practice really paid off, we were both calm and relaxed, and what surprised me the most was how powerful all the affirmations were – anytime I felt tired or any doubts crept into my mind, there were the affirmations popping into my head to keep me back on track.
Sadly however, exactly the same thing happened with my last labour, once waters broke, my contractions slowed down and I didn’t get the
urge to push. As there was some meconium in the waters, and she was presenting back to back and face up, they suggested I go into hospital. The midwife was happy to wait another hour or so to see if something would happen, but in the end nothing did so we went in. At the hospital, the midwife there was brilliant, listened to what we wanted, turned the lights off, we plugged in the CD, and just carried on as if we were at home. She let me carry on for another 2 hours, without letting anyone, including the doctor in the room, and without examining me, she just knelt beside me holding a sonicaid on my belly, so I really can’t fault them at all and we stayed relaxed. In the end
though, I wasn’t getting anywhere apart from knackered, despite trying some birth breathing too. So I ended up having to have an epidural, have the baby turned, and a ventouse delivery (which I’d had for baby no.1). The whole time however we did feel in control of what was happening and able to make decisions without being forced into things. I did get Jessica skin to skin on my chest almost immediately she came out too, which was great. (Quite why I didn’t get the urge to push again is a bit of a mystery, the first time I put it down to being frightened, but I know I wasn’t this time round; since the birth I’ve spoken to a midwife and my osteopath who reckon the baby didn’t get far enough down to hit the nerve endings that trigger the expulsive reflex, and this could just be the way I’m built, nothing more than that. I will never know anyway!)
All in all Riaan and I both agree, although things weren’t perfect, it was a very positive birth experience for both of us, a million times better than the first, and definitely thanks to Hypnobirthing, so thank you Katharine very much. I’ve definitely recovered much quicker too. Jessica had a very calm and peaceful first 2 weeks, however is now making her presence felt a bit more!
Thanks once again, and good luck to everyone else.
Jackie, Riaan, Ashley and Jessica x