Our birth story

It all started on Wednesday morning. We took our dogs for a walk and I started getting little pre labour contractions. They would stop me in my tracks, something close to a period pain and throughout the day I just ended up resting (thankfully). I watched some movies and ate as much as I could, I even took a nap which unfortunately only lasted for about 20 minutes, cleaned the house, went for what was my final swim and put what I wanted on my birth altar.

We took ourselves to bed at about 9 o’clock, as I felt exhausted. Ready for a nice sleep and excited for what was to come in the next few days. That was exactly when the contractions started to ramp up so much, that I told Tim to get the pool ready while I laid in bed tossing and turning not being able to get to sleep we filled up the pool and by about 11 o’clock, I ended up getting in the pool. The contractions were starting to really pick up and we got in contact with our Midwife (Claire) just to let her know what was happening. I’d already been in contact with her earlier that day just to let her know that I was in pre-labour, but just decided to update her and we just continued to labour at home. I felt completely capable and in the zone at this point, feeling like I could do this and this felt as though things were progressing. Tim was constantly feeding me coconut water, ginseng and honey, refilling the pool and encouraging me. By about 5 am the contractions were getting really close together and definitely more intense and we decided to call midwife to get her to come. Claire arrived around 5:30-6am and helped me through this stage, but continued to let me labour. I kept getting in and out of the pool to wee as I had heard that it could effect baby dropping down and labour progression, which seemed to get stuck in my head. It was extremely hot but every time I got out of the pool, it caused a contraction as the cool air on my wet skin made my body contract and shiver.

As the sun came up the contractions started to move further and further apart. This really frustrated me and I felt disappointed and disheartened, as I didn’t know when it was going to happen. In my delusional, sleep deprived state I actually remember saying “Is this ever going to happen?”.

I spent the next day still labouring with contractions getting further and further apart. Then as I was also sleep deprived as I hadn’t had a wink of sleep, it was making the contractions extremely difficult to go through and they were feeling a lot more intense, even though they were further apart. I was falling asleep on the bench between contractions and falling into a dream state which felt sickening. The second Midwife (Lou) arrived that day as well and helped me with some different positions, moving around the house now. As every time I went into the pool, the contractions seemed to spread out.

By the end of the day. It’s started to pick up again, but we decided that it was best that we both try to get some sleep, the midwives sent Tim into the other bedroom for some sleep and helped me with some postions to get the baby to spin and move. We ended up doing an internal check and found he was spinning around anticlockwise, rather than just spinning clockwise for about 1cm.

We ended up getting a decent amount of sleep, enough to give us a bit of reprieve, and the midwifes ended up, leaving that morning to go home to get some rest themselves. We had made it to the Friday and I was in better spirits that day. We tried to watch a movie, had our mums pop by, contacted a few close friends, I got some food in because I hadn’t eaten as well and spent the day just connecting trying to create some oxytocin. Lots of kisses, cuddles and an orgasm (which turned into a contraction at the end - safe to say the worst orgasm I’ve ever had). I also spent the day trying to rest as much as possible, napping, lots of breath work and meditation. I wasn’t going to write out my birth story but that day I decided I would as I also spent sometime reading through others stories which helped me immensely, just the knowing that labour could be long. Namely, Karly Raven’s (also a longy) and Jax Cave. That night it picked up again, this time Tim and I were solo. We ended up calling the Midwife again as I was labouring heavy through the night, and things were again, getting more intense, but also contractions were even closer together. Midwife came a similar time as she did on the Wednesday night and similarly yet again as the sun came up, the contractions started to spread apart and lessen in intensity.

Friday morning, I was feeling defeated and confused about when it will happen. We assumed that it would happen at night as that’s what time contractions were ramping up so we felt disappointed that we would have to wait until night again. The midwife and I decided it was best for her to go into town just to get out of our space. This was to see if anything picked up, maybe I was feeling a pressure to perform. When when she got back I was not in a good place mentally, I was feeling extremely over it frustrated and asked again is this actually going to happen? She asked if I was holding onto anything and I cried, wondering if I would connect with my baby, deep down there felt like there was also a disconnection with my body and a trust in my body. She suggested doing a meditation that worked on letting go of that. So I took myself to bed to lay down. Dropping between sleep, contractions and focusing on this meditation. I was again running off no sleep, so felt like I was almost in a delirious, psychedelic state (and not in a good way). At this point the contractions were very intense, so much so that the meditation played over and over again as I couldn’t summon the strength to turn it off, and about every 4 to 5 minutes I was having to roll over and get Tim to press on my back as this is the only thing that was helping with the contractions. Finally I couldn’t bear the meditation any more, and I had to move out to our lounge room which there was a few areas where it was helpful to lean over. Being on my hands and knees was the most helpful for me. I ended up actually getting little carpet burns on my knees and my elbows as I’ve been leaning in these positions for about three days straight.

I was in this position through every contraction and Tims hand pushing on my back

When I moved out to the main area of the house, I was moving from position to position all throughout the house and the contractions were back to back. I remember in a little moment of less intense contracting, leaning over to Tim and saying we are never doing this again, we will be adopting. I had also just gotten a message from a friend about her baby arriving and the jealously overcame me as I felt I was never going to meet my baby. I didn’t express this at the time, but in my head I so desperately wanted to Caesarean, which was against my wishes (hello transition!). I was moving around a lot at this stage. Moving to different areas, positions, adding new cushions. Getting in the shower getting out of the shower with nothing feeling like it was going to help. When I was in the shower I ended up feeling into my vagina and touching my cervix, touching the top of Rudy‘s head. Which was also a little bit of a fear of mine there moving to the actual birth how that was going to feel and for some reason that actual literal connection because Claire did mention might be a good idea to feel into it and see if I could touch and feel baby. So I think this in itself as well, was that hurdle to overcome connecting with my body, trusting my body. We hadn’t use the pool in awhile because it was tending to slow down my contractions. It was helping with the pain, but I was almost getting too comfortable and pulling away and disassociating from the birthing process. So I was avoiding going in the pool. So in the last ditch effort after moving around the different areas, I said to Tim let’s try the pool one more time can you fill it up? I told Tim that I needed to poo around this point as well and as this is a massive sign of being really close to having a baby.

I got into the pool and a few minutes later as I was having a contraction. My water finally burst as it hadn’t actually broken yet, which was helpful because that stopped any risk of infection. As this happened I felt the need to push almost immediately. Tim called Claire and said she’d be on her way. I was told to not actively push if I didn’t need to. That was definitely not gonna happen. Tim is not the best at Medical situations as a lot of men aren’t so he was a little bit freaked out by this, but he didn’t show it to me at all. I had just gone straight into that primal mode, so I wasn’t aware of anything else that was going on around me. He had decided to call my mum as a backup just in case, she’s a nurse to have a little bit of a medical perspective around was helpful and calming. I started to push as my body just started to bare down. Tim was there helping me holding my hand. He mentioned to me that my mum was here and asked if it was okay if she came in. It was something I didn’t know if I wanted I felt the need to be sort of alone in the labour process. It felt very vulnerable and strict. Plus I was fully naked from pretty much the time that I started having contractions, so I felt very vulnerable. But in that moment I welcomed her in, and it was such a beautiful Energy to have there and support. The pushing process felt like it only lasted five minutes. After worrying so much about this portion of the labour, it was in the end, the best part. after series of bushes, I felt the top of Rudy‘s head as I was using that as feedback what was going on to communicate that with Tim and my mum. Both motivating me as I was pushing it was helpful to know that everything was going smoothly, as I could feel his head coming out. The head came out and I called this out then Mum said that this was a hard part done and now I was about to meet my baby. One final round of pushing and Rudy landed into the world. Luckily my mum was there and she checked the time 4:23pm on the 17th of February, just sneaking in Aquarius season like his mum. My mum also asked me to check the names list I had because I had chosen a name for each day (knowing we could veto) as we had so many and Rudy was Saturdays name and it honestly was a last minute throw in, but for some reason he picked the right day and he looked like a Rudy. Lou made it first just after Rudy was born and we tried latching as he did I could feel my placenta drop down. I wasn’t sure but as I got onto the bed one small push and it easily slid out.

I wasn’t sure if I wanted my parents or Tim’s parents to be there initially, but, it was like the moment I transitioned into motherhood, I wanted them to be there. So Tim called his parents and my dad and they were over within 5 minutes. This was super special and feel very lucky that they could celebrate with us. Tims parents bought us Thai food (there is nothing like that first post partum meal after 3 days of hardly any food). Claire and Lou did the final check ups on Rudy, me and my placenta. Everyone left and we were there, lives changed, with our little Rudy.

REFLECTIONS:

I was not prepared for the length of the labour and the amount of sleep deprivation that I would have leading into giving birth. Other than catching up on sleep before hand and napping there’s no other way to prepare.
I wish I had have prepared more gummies and maybe a light broth for birth I actually bought some lolly snakes but I was not interested at the time the only things I consumed were:
- Watermelon gummies
- So much coconut water
- Honey
- Fruit
Having a list next time of supportive practices for my partner to try for me and practicing them before before birth. We had some but not enough under our tool belt.
Having more breath work techniques to work with. I found doing horses breath difficult and it brought me into my head to much.
Have a set of meditations to work with.
Download some playlists and get a set up for chargers as you never know when Spotify will stop streaming.
Get a few nice comfy natural fibre dresses to wear as this was the comfiest thing to wear or get more blinds on my house then I can just be naked.

Vipassana: My full experience.