Nina’s birth - olivia’s story #2

I was 40+7 when I felt the twinges that I knew were the real deal. I had been very impatient after reaching 40 weeks and the days that followed. I, of course, had convinced myself that this baby would be early or at least on time or maybe just a few days over the EDD like her sister had been. I was emotional, tired, anxious, aching and, did I mention, TIRED?! I was also adamant that I would have no intervention - I didn't want to have acupuncture this time round but as my midwife appointment at +10 days loomed closer and with that the threat of a sweep I had started to think about reflexology and booked myself in for the next day.

I spent the day of the 19th February with my toddler, feeling really besotted with her (unusually so!) and had taken a lovely long bubble bath with her that evening before settling down in the front room in my usual position on a bolster - I was doing all the right things with this pregnancy to avoid another back-to-back position for the baby and birth. The usual evening twinges had started but by 11pm they hadn't petered off and I went to bed secretly knowing tonight was THE night. Our doula, Jay, had previously said to me 'rest and ignore the cramping until you can't ignore it anymore', so I went to bed and drifted into a peaceful sleep listening to my hypnobirthing track. I should mention here that the 19th February was the biggest supermoon of 2019....all the ingredients for a special birth were lining up for me!

At 2am I was woken by strong tightenings and the undeniable urge to have a poo! I took myself to the loo and then down to the kitchen, via my daughter's room as she had randomly woken up. I gave my daughter a big cuddle and felt a woooosh of oxytocin which brought on a contraction. I knew we had lift off.

Down in the kitchen I made myself a hot chocolate and started bouncing on my ball while using the 'flower hour' technique to have a look at what my contractions were doing. The 'flower hour' was a great tool that I had watched on YouTube earlier that day (sent to me by Jay) that helps you time and record contractions for an hour so it's easier to relay the info to the midwife when you think it's time to call in.

I texted my mum who was in New Zealand (so it was her afternoon) and I told her that I thought I was in labour and I also texted Jay to say things had started. At 3am I woke up Jack as my contractions were now 2 in 10 and lasting about a minute each. Still very manageable but I knew that it was time for Jack to start getting the pool ready. When I woke Jack he told me to get some more rest and to go back to bed...I thought 'yeah right, I've already been doing that since 11pm', but I did what he said and I lasted about 30 minutes before I had to get up.

I kept falling asleep between contractions and this made them much harder to cope with. I decided that a bath was where I wanted to be so I ran a shallow bath and held the shower head over me, on my lower back and tummy and neck. It helped with the contractions so much. After 40 minutes in the bath I had to get out and felt that itching need to pace! So I came back downstairs and popped my headphones on and the playlist that I had prepared - it was a pretty upbeat and fun playlist and I moved around the dining room table under the skylights with the full moon beating down on me and danced and closed my eyes and stomped around the kitchen in between taking trips to the loo to empty my bowels again and again. By this point it was about 5am and things were really ramping up - I turned off my music and began listening to my hypnobirthing track. I remember a really pokey contraction which caught me off guard and I had to focus to catch my breath. This is where the hypno track really helped and it felt like I was in tandem with it - each time our hypno teacher said 'breath slowly in' it was at the exact moment that I needed to be told that.

I was on all fours on the sofa in the kitchen rocking and shoving my face into a pillow with each contraction as I didn't want to wake up our daughter and I was starting to get very vocal! All I wanted was for Jack to finish preparing the front room - the nice soft floor area that we had discussed so that I could get in there and close the door and stop worrying about noises I was making. I also really wanted Jay there but I couldn't find the time to text her between contractions - the only thing I could do was beg Jack to hurry up with the pool and the soft area. Something had changed and the pressure was all in my lower back and contractions were coming so fast I was arching back with each one and throwing myself forward into the pillow. With the pressure in my back it meant that with each contraction I had the urge to push and it's all that I could do. I was growling and telling Jack that the baby was coming and that I needed him to put pressure on my lower back. Jack didn't say this at the time but it was at this point that he thought that I had another back labour as it was all sounding familiar to our first birth - which took a hefty 36 hours - so he started to think we weren't that far along.....little did he know. I bloody knew!!

Jack had called the midwives at this point and also Jay and had asked Jay to come at 7:30am as he was going to take our daughter to nursery for 8am. Around 6:30am I demanded that a soft area was made immediately in the front room - a hodge podge area made up of a mattress...not what I'd dreamed of at all! I had wanted my duvet, cushions from my bed, my dressing gown near by, fluffy towels for the baby etc etc. But I couldn't wait any longer I just needed to get in the position I was going to give birth in and be done with it. I wanted to be on my knees leaning over the sofa. So at least I got a mattress under my knees! It started to get light and the bin men had started to arrive - I remember hearing the bin lorry and feeling so elated 'Jay's here! Jay's here!'. Jay drives a big van to her births incase she needs to have a place to rest outside of the home so I was delighted to hear what I thought was her - but then Jack looked out the window and told me it was the bin men.

I started to worry about our daughter waking - I knew it must be gone 7am by now and any minute she would be awake and this pace that I had going would be gone and I would be stuck for hours again like I had been with her. I was bearing down - really bearing down. My clothes were off, I'd ripped my headphones off my head, I was sweating all over. I kept putting my fingers inside me and I could feel a head coming down. I remember Jack offering me a banana with the instruction 'you need to eat to keep your energy up'. 'I'M PUSHING A BABY OUT JACK. I'M NOT EATING AN F-ING BANANA NOW'.

I was roaring. I just let myself go. I remember thinking 'this is exactly what I'm supposed to be doing'. Whenever a thought of panic or fear flitted into my mind I bashed it away 'KEEP GOING, KEEP GOING. Whatever you do, DO NOT STOP'. Jack believed me now. I could feel his adrenaline picking up and the pace of his footsteps increasing as he rushed from the kitchen to the front room - 'what is he doing?! He's pouring flipping pans of water into the pool'. I could hear him rushing now. 'This is it, this is it'. That's all I could think.

Then two hands. Two calm, cool hands on my lower back. Jack came to rest behind me. 'Jay's here'. I reach for my phone, put my hypno track back on the speaker and take a deep, deep breath. Jack and Jay begin to talk quietly behind me, I can hear Jack calling the midwife, 'It's Lucy, she's on her way' he says. He's thrilled and relieved, I can hear it in his voice. He knows Lucy is the only midwife I wanted with me - she was the only one who I had connected with. 'She wants to know if she should go to the hospital first and get the gas or come straight here?'. 'GGGGGRRRRRRAAAAAAAHHHHHHH' is my response. Lucy knows, she's coming straight to us.

Something had changed, I had felt a moment of calm. A moment of clarity. I was no longer bearing down, I was breathing down. I could suddenly remember everything I learned in my hypno classes with my first birth. I was working hard to control it but I was breathing down. It was gentle and I felt so in control. I remember feeling as if I was breathing out a baby sideways - it felt enormous and at one point I genuinely thought the baby was breech - it felt so big. So wide. I didn't feel anything like that with my first birth. But I just kept going. Slowly, slowly. I heard Jay showing Jack where to put his hands to catch our baby. Jack was behind me now, it was just the two of us and our hands ready to catch our baby! How bloody ridiculous!!!

There you have it, Nina Jilly Clemoes - all 8lbs14oz of her - landed gently, ever so gently, into her Dad's and Mum's hands at 7:51am on Wednesday 20th February 2019. Nina came out looking up at the moon (she was back to back after all!).

Lucy, the midwife arrived 10 minutes later and Nina's sister woke up half an hour later to meet her. It was super. I read an article in The Guardian a few weeks after the birth which described women who choose to give birth in their own home as 'splashing about in a birthing pool on the shag-pile rug, surrounded by Jo Malone candles, pretending that giving birth is as easy as shelling pistachios'...well bugger off Barbara and your poorly researched and hugely condescending piece of writing. You cannot and will not take away the hard graft that me and my dream team put into achieving our home birth. It was instinctive, safe, and an absolute marathon of a night for everyone involved. Not a candle in sight....mainly because the splishy splashy pool took too god damn long to fill up!