This week’s birth story comes from a lovely couple who attended a TCBS Hypnobirthing Course with Ruth Warrilow of Flora-Lily Birth School covering areas across Chester.
Thank you for sharing your gorgeous birth story.!
“My husband and I did sessions with Ruth before the birth of our lovely daughter. My husband is not from a medical background, but I am. I found it really helpful to have a safe space to talk about my concerns and feelings and think about things from a more holistic perspective. I think it was also really key that my husband and I had protected time set aside to talk things through with someone with Ruth’s expertise in such a supportive setting. She was extremely knowledgeable and approachable. I felt that it enabled my husband and I to ask questions during delivery and feel much more confident and prepared, even when things didn’t go exactly as we hoped. My husband was incredibly relaxed and stayed full of excitement during the process which I was so surprised by as he’s normally a man who can’t even stand the thought of blood being taken! I think it gave us both the tools and knowledge to have the best possible experience and I’m so grateful for Ruth’s help.
A few days after my due date, I contacted the labour ward when out and about, because I was unsure whether I had lost a small amount of amniotic fluid . They told me to come in and I was checked over. I was really relaxed because of all the preparation my husband and I had done, even on the way home thinking to order pizza for us to take with us! Once it was confirmed that it was amniotic fluid, the medical team decided to induce me because timings were uncertain and there were concerns that there might be signs of infection.
My waters were ruptured artificially and then a drip was started. Obviously this wasn’t the natural process we had hoped for but because of the planning we had discussed with Ruth, I thought we were able to handle it in the best way possible. We took some time to set up the room as we wanted, with nice jazz music and things like my affirmations (written by friends at my baby shower) around me. The nurses ended up calling the room the jazz bar because we created such a lovely atmosphere!
We took our time to make sure I was in in the most comfortable position and personal touches like my snuggly blanket from home made such a huge difference The breathing techniques were really helpful and also having had the conversations with my husband about how communicate if I thought I was struggling, for example, saying him I need to help guide my breathing. We worked through some different hypnobirthing tools like the comb. Then after a couple of hours things felt more intense without without much of a break because of the induction. I felt I had the language and confidence to then speak to my husband and the midwife about the fact I felt I needed to try something else and decided to have some gas and air.
I found this really relaxed me . After about another four hours and some vomiting, I was getting quite exhausted and so again discussed with our Midwife and my husband, and decided to have some diamorphine. This helped me to sleep and pretty much wore off by the time I needed to push. There were concerns raised about our baby’s heartbeat on monitoring so there was one of those dramatic moments where everyone rushes into the room. Again thanks to the preparation we remained really calm and we were focused.
Happily our daughter’s heart rate improved and I was able to push with just a small episiotomy being performed. During the birth I felt very focused on the task at hand and incredibly well supported by my husband. I think our time with Ruth helped my husband and me remain calm and be an incredible team.
I honestly feel, taking into account the medical situation we had, that our daughter’s birth went as well as possible and was a really positive experience. “
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