Calmbirth Birth Story - Bec, Jordan and Baby Hazel - "Informed decisions and understanding the rationale behind interventions"

I woke up in labour at 3am on Tuesday the 29th of October. I was 40+6 weeks pregnant and I was in denial that labour had finally started.

(The day before, after being a hermit and relaxing at home for two weeks, I had a super lovely day seeing friends and chatting to family. It got the oxytocin flowing and I remember going to bed feeling really happy and relaxed.)

I started timing my contractions and they were 5 minutes apart. I tried to go back to sleep but I was too excited.

I knew from doing the Calmbirth course that early labour could last a while, so I got up to make sure I didn’t disturb Jordan. It was really important to me that he was well rested so that he had the energy to support me.

I woke Jordan up eventually and we had a quick moment taking it all in before he started panic tidying the house. I rang my midwife and put my TENs machine on. The game plan was to stay at home for as long as I felt comfortable. I had in my head that l might not give birth until the next day and I think this really helped me stay patient, calm and just let labour happen.

Unfortunately, our next door neighbour’s house was being demolished. I got a bit frustrated and could feel labour fizzling out. I popped on my birth playlist and sat on my birthing ball to try and keep labour going and thankfully it did!

As the day went on, Jordan and I just relaxed together. We watched a movie, Jordan took some awful selfies and we just enjoyed each other’s company. We definitely kept the oxytocin going!

 

At about 3pm, I went to the toilet and passed my mucous plug. I remember thinking it was a funny colour and was contemplating calling our midwife. I went and sat on our bed and suddenly felt my water break. I rushed back to the toilet and when I checked my pad my waters were heavily stained with meconium. I knew this might mean that baby was distressed and thoughts of a cesarean crossed my mind. Jordan rang our midwife and she told us to head to the hospital as we’d need to be monitored until baby arrived.

 

We got to the hospital and baby’s heart rate wasn’t as variable as the doctor would like. Our midwife did a cervical exam and I was 4cm dilated. I was pretty happy to have gotten to 4cm after 12 hours and I was hopeful active labour would be a bit faster.
Unfortunately, baby’s heart rate also wasn’t recovering after contractions. The doctor came and told us that they were very concerned about baby and that if baby had another episode of bradycardia that we would need to meet baby quickly and have an emergency cesarean. We also consented to have a fetal scalp clip put in to monitor baby’s heart rate better.

 

Two hours later, I had just changed positions and had had three really long, strong contractions when I heard the monitor go off and saw that baby’s heart rate had dropped again. Suddenly, there were lots of people in the room. The doctor did another cervical check and I was 7cm dilated. A Code Green was called and we were in the operating theatre within minutes. They made the decision to do a general anaesthetic which meant that Jordan wasn’t able to be there for the birth, he says it was a very long 15mins waiting for updates and to meet our baby.

 

Luckily, our baby came out healthy. Jordan did skin to skin while they waited for me and fed baby some of my expressed colostrum. When I finally got to meet baby in recovery, Jordan got to tell me that they were a little girl! She went straight on to my chest and stayed there for the next few hours.

It definitely wasn’t the birth we were hoping for, but Jordan and I both feel very positive about our experience. This is largely due to the knowledge we gained from our Calmbirth course. We were able to make informed decisions and understand the rationale behind the interventions we experienced.