Birth story - Neso and baby Elonna

*Trigger Warning* - Use of word contraction (not negative to me), Pelvic Girdle Pain, reduced fetal movement

Pregnancy:

I was fortunate to not have any morning sickness or nausea. The first trimester was pretty much uneventful - I only had an aversion to chicken. Other than that I was exercising 5 times a week and functioning as normal.

By my 2nd trimester, I developed pelvic girdle pain and sciatica. What was an uneventful pregnancy was then riddled with pain - getting in and out of the car and bed, walking, sitting; everything was painful and uncomfortable. I went to the chiropractor three times a week and the physiotherapist gave me some crutches to help take the load off of my pelvis.

By the third trimester, I couldn’t sleep on my side and so I had to sleep sitting upright for 2 months till I had the baby. Luckily I was working from home so it definitely helped that I didn't need to move around too much.

My friend recommended hypnobirthing by PBC and I started the course at 28weeks. My husband and I were well prepared and looking forward to the birth.

Birth:

I should have known better, and learned from PBC, not to get too attached to the due date but because of the discomfort and pain from PGP, I was hopeful that baby would come at 39 weeks or sometime close to the due date. It really set me up for disappointment. Each day felt like a week and each week felt like a trimester.

I started having practice contractions at 37 weeks which felt like the real thing but then they would fizzle away. I read all the birth announcements on September Birth Club and watched the conversations change from pregnancy-related topics to topics about breastfeeding and baby.

Anyway, my due date came and went. In the future, I will not disclose my due date to anyone because friends and family kept calling to see if baby had arrived yet which wasn’t helpful. I went in to triage for reduced movement on the day I turned 40 weeks. Baby was checked and everything was fine. I was also offered induction of labour as they explained that there was a higher risk of still birth at that point in my pregnancy.

We declined because, as much as we wanted the baby to be out so I could sleep lying down again, I wanted an unmediated homebirth more. We had a chat with the doctor who highlighted the risks and wanted to make sure we were aware of the implications of declining the induction. It was a conversation of gloom but with the support of my husband, we stuck to the decision and compromised with booking a sweep instead of going on to a full on medicated induction.

I had 2 sweeps done the next week. Now the conversation about still births ingrained into my mind and so I was overthinking and anxious of baby’s movement. I had started having some contractions but I didn’t want to get excited because of the experience I had at 37weeks. However, I was concerned about baby’s movement again and so we went into triage just to be sure. This was a Thursday night.

We were assessed and Elonna was fine but because it was the second time I was in for movement in a week, they strongly advised an induction again to be done Friday morning. Full of anxiety because I was past 41 weeks, I agreed to the induction but with a compromise that it would be booked for Saturday morning instead of Friday morning. As I said, I was having some contractions so I wanted to give my body the chance to go into labour on the Friday. And if nothing happened, then we would go for the induction.

We had our Covid swabs done and we were booked for a scan the next morning at 10:30 just to triple check baby to be sure everything was fine.

Friday morning, as we were just about to leave for the scan, my waters broke at 9:45am. I called the hospital to let them know I’d be late because my waters broke and I needed to change my clothes. They advised us to go to triage to be assessed instead of coming for the scan.

We went into triage and then it was established that my waters had gone but they still wanted to keep me in for monitoring. Elonna and I were monitored for about 2 hours. While on monitoring I started having contractions that were stronger and closer together. My husband was keeping track on the Freya app. I didn't want to know what the timings were or how dilated I was because I wanted to focus on labouring rather than the metrics of it all.

Then a doctor came in to offer induction of labour for the third time! Baby and I were fine but they insisted I went for the induction to speed things up. Reason was that my waters had gone and there was an increased risk of infection due to it being my first pregnancy and labour could take days. Also, because I had gone in for reduced fetal movement twice within 7 days, they wanted to be extra cautious.

I declined the induction of labour as (1) I was already in labour and (2) I already had an induction booked for the next day. After much ado, we were allowed to go home because there were no concerns from the monitoring.

We got home at about 4pm, I had a nap. The contractions woke me up at 5pm and things had sped up. What kept me going was the affirmation ‘I can do anything for 60 seconds’. That was about the length of each contraction.

My husband called the home birth team, filled the pool and set the living room up for birth. The midwife arrived at 6pm. Bless her she ordered the gas and air as soon as she arrived because it takes a while to get delivered. She tried to test my urine but for some reason I couldn’t go. I felt like it but I just couldn’t. I got into the pool and the water took the edge off the pain. Imagine the feeling of a hot water bottle but all around you! It was magic. I stayed in the knees in calves out position and let my breathing do its thing. Shortly after, the gas and air arrived.

7pm there was a shift change and the new midwives arrived. They did their handover and I was labouring, using the gas and air as needed.

At this point I still couldn't pee. I got out of the pool and the midwife then had to insert a catheter to release the urine. I felt instant relief and got back into the pool.

As soon as I got into the pool, I felt something change, my body was pushing out the baby and so I started down breathing and was quite literally mooing. I don’t know how this was possible but I was napping in between contractions because I could hear myself snoring. The midwives were great, they just let me do my thing and monitored me without interrupting the flow.

They checked and said her head was out. Once I heard this, I woke up and was looking forward to the next contraction so I could meet my baby. I pushed again and I thought baby was out but it turns out she was long and her feet were still in! At the next contraction, I pushed her out and picked up my baby at 11:07pm with no tears

I got out of the pool to deliver the placenta. At that point, I felt the contractions stronger. Perhaps because I didn’t have the incentive of meeting my baby after each contraction. It felt more like a nuisance

The midwives helped clean up and deflate the pool. They left at about 2am.

Birthing her was truly the most magical experience ever! The positive birth company helped demystify labour and birth and gave me the empowerment to ensure I got the birth I wanted. I loved reading all the positive stories before I had Elonna. Reading the positive birth stories and watching positive birth vlogs were truly motivational for me and I hope my birth story does the same for someone else

Elonna is now almost 10 weeks old and babbling away :-)