Thank you to Toni & Craig Hansbury who did face to face refresher session with me (Liz!) in my local area of Solihull. This is the second time I have worked with this lovely couple and they are just fabulous. Congratulations to them both (and to their little girl Harper) and welcome to the world Harlow!
“Harlow arrived on 11th May at 4:26pm. How he made his arrival shows that babies really do come when they’re ready! He was my second ‘Hypno’ baby and he’s just as chilled as my daughter still is, I put this all down to my chilled pregnancies and hypnobirthing techniques.
I had a 39-week growth scan due to late diagnosis of gestational diabetes which showed that baby was measuring as expected but that the level of fluid surrounding baby was a lot lower than what they were happy with. The consultant therefore decided I needed to be induced immediately. Following the B.R.A.I.N framework, we asked all of the questions we needed to know about why I needed to be induced so soon and we agreed with the consultant that we’d postpone the induction for a week to give baby more of a chance to arrive naturally.
That week I tried everything physically possible and ate everything the books say to eat (except medjool dates ?) but baby clearly wasn’t ready. I had a pretty relaxing week too!
On Wednesday the following week I arrived at hospital for my induction. The thing that the medical professionals don’t make very clear is that induction could take days and in my case three days of failed pessaries. My husband was amazing, the staff were lovely and my family were so supportive throughout my four days on the induction ward. But I honestly believe my body and baby had other ideas and things just weren’t quite ready at that point.
By Saturday morning I’d had a total of three pessaries that had all fallen out after a few hours, my cervix was supposedly just as dilated and as soft as it was when I came in. I was sore from all the examinations and by Saturday morning I’d had enough. Suzy was on a loop that morning to maintain my focus and Liz’s pep talk had reminded me of all the things I should be doing to keep positive.
The consultant visited late morning and commented he’d never known someone to lose as many pessaries as I had done. Apparently, I was the talk of the ward. He explained what the next steps could be in such a positive way that gave me reassurance and we decided that we would leave my body to rest for the Saturday.
I watched Friends and played cards with my husband. We went for a walk down to the canteen for lunch and I had a shower, did my hair and put my make up on. We laughed so much, the most laughing I’d done in the four days I’d been there.
At around midday I began to feel some tightening’s and just carried on as normal. I’d had similar sensations for days with my first child and so thought nothing of them. As my sensations got stronger and I was having to breathe through each surge the midwife asked me if I was having period pains. I nodded and my husband told her they were definitely contractions, to which she looked at me and I could tell she wasn’t convinced. I didn’t really believe it at that point either! I was so in control, breathing through each surge and talking normally in between.
At about 3pm they were coming only every four minutes but they were definitely getting stronger so I decided I wanted a shower to ease the discomfort on my back. My husband came with me as I wanted support with my breathing and even though I was in the mindset that I had a long way to go, I was just so excited that something was finally happening.
I stood in the shower for 20 minutes dancing around and laughing with Craig, when all of a sudden, my non-existent waters popped and I was doubled over having constant surges with no breaks in between. The look on Craig’s face was sheer panic but that just made me laugh even more as I had no idea what was happening. It was all so sudden. He grabbed a midwife walking past and explained that I was having strong surges like I needed to go to the toilet. Craig told her we were hypnobirthing and that’s why we’d kept to ourselves. She was very quick into action at that point when she realised I needed to get over to the labour suite.
From my waters breaking in the shower to the arrival of Harlow it was 21 minutes. My Mum had come all the way from America to be with me again and she missed it all. I was in so much shock afterwards that I didn’t even process I’d had a little BOY.
I still didn’t get the pool birth I’d always wanted (even though I almost had a shower birth) but I was so proud that I’d managed to have the unassisted, natural birth I’d hoped for all along. It just goes to show that my body decided it was ready when I finally stopped wanting anything to happen, he was just waiting for the right moment to make his entrance. And what an entrance it was!
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