M’s - S’s story

S was hoping for a HBAC (Home Birth After Caesarean) but was initially met with opposition from her care givers. Through the work we had done together during her Private 1-1 Hypnobirthing & Antenatal course; S knew her options, was able to confidently make informed decisions based on her circumstances and confidently navigated her way through conversations with her consultant before birth. She says this about her experience before her birth:

“On the Friday we had another growth scan, and the baby’s measurements were back down to ‘normal’ after measuring huge on the previous scan. Because of this, the consultant decided I needed to have wither an elective caesarean section or induction on my due date. She quite forcibly told me that these were my only two options and didn’t answer when I asked her (three times!!!) what would happen if I chose to wait. I reluctantly agreed to a caesarean because I felt so put on the spot, but after thinking about it and reminding myself of everything you taught me, I decided to call the hospital and ask for a second opinion. The second consultant agreed that it was more likely that the scan measurements were ‘off’ and said he would be happy to cancel the caesarean as he didn’t see any reason why I couldn’t be left to go into spontaneous labour”.

The Birth

At 42 weeks pregnant, I finally went into early labour on the Monday and I called the community midwife team to give them a heads up. I was told that they had no staff available for home birth. I chose to stay at home for early labour.

Given that I was 10 days past my due date, on Wednesday I decided to go into hospital for monitoring. Whilst there, I opted for the midwife to break my waters.

I continued my labour in the midwife-led unit. It was a lovely dark room with a birth pool. However, by 4.30pm the next day, my midwives were concerned that minimal progress had been made and, since my waters had been broken, I was asked to consider accepting the syntocinon drip. I was aware of the risks of the drip (particularly for my circumstances) and decided I would rather opt for a caesarean.

The staff were absolutely amazing and really listened to all my worries arising from my first birth and concerns of a repeat caesarean. They accommodated everything I asked for in my abdominal birth preferences; my head was raised by a pillow, I had an eye mask on, music playing and aromatherapy. The team agreed to keep it as quiet as possible and not to talk to me and I basically just meditated my way through it with my hubby holding one hand and a lovely midwife holding the other.

Even though things massively deviated from what I originally wanted, overall it felt like such a wonderful experience. I felt really listened to throughout the whole thing.

So I just wanted to say another big thank you for everything you taught us, because it definitely helped me have a much better birth experience this time around.