Birth Story - First Time Mum in Hospital

My labour was overall a positive experience… albeit an absolutely mammoth journey. I started having contractions on Friday eve, with a very slow (but powerful) latent phase. The Freya app said I was fully established within about an hour (I definitely wasn’t!). I actually went into the unit then as I started getting in a negative spin about baby’s movements as was worried it would mess with oxytocin until I had a check. All was fine and I was 2cm dilated.

I headed home and although I had contractions throughout the weekend they sometimes paused for a few hours and sometimes were an hour apart. It didn’t really ramp up again until Sunday night and more intensely on Monday. Hypnobirthing breathing and generally riding the waves, ensuring my body was relaxed when a contraction came on helped immensely. I felt pretty at peace throughout and never felt ‘in pain’ or anxious.

I cracked on until Tuesday morning in my little nest, by that point I really just felt too physically exhausted to stay at home, having not really slept for 4 nights so I opted to go into hospital for an epidural to get a bit of kip. I was 4cm on arrival and 12 hours later I was 10cm dilated… it was time to push!

They had suspected it would be a tricky one as he was positioned a bit sideways and indeed, he got stuck. Bit of a hairy 30 minutes whereby they worried he was too far down for c-section but too high for forceps, and he was in distress, but managed to push him a bit further in theatre (plus episiotomy) and he was out!

The most magical experience having him handed to me and on my chest for the first time. The midwives at St Michaels Hospital, Bristol and in the community team were incredible.

They were super respectful of me and the choices I was making throughout and just general frame of mind from the hypnobirthing definitely made it a wonderful experience overall! I was a bit disappointed in some ways not to experience it all the way through at home and without the drugs, partly as I wondered if I had stayed at home would being active have helped him to move position. But mostly didn’t dwell on such thoughts. Oh, he was 9lb 5oz. Quite a chunk!