My Own Birth Story: Positive First-Time Hospital Waterbirth

How Hypnobirthing led me from fear and worry to a calm, empowering and euphoric birth experience

To this day, that first experience of being in labour and giving birth to my son is absolutely one of the best experiences of my life. It’s memories of feeling completely safe, calm, loved, having unwavering trust in my body, baby and the birth process, and feeling an absolute high from the birth hormones and process that we go through.

That’s not to say Henry’s birth was a ‘perfect’ birth on paper. It was very long, I bled more than expected afterwards, and Henry didn’t cry immediately after being born so was taken off from me pretty quickly.

But, here goes…

When I initially found out I was pregnant, this birth experience would have seemed miles away from my reality. I was someone who’d always felt anxious in any medical setting. Just arriving into a hospital car park and I’d feel instantly uneasy (step through the hospital doors and that would magnify), needing a blood test would send me into a panic, even having my blood pressure taken would send my heart racing.

I’d seen the dramatic birth TV shows, I’d heard horror stories from friends (and even some strangers!), and I had my own insecurities and worries, so the only picture of birth I could imagine was fair to say a pretty negative one. Handing over all power and control, loading up with medicine, and trying to manage a crazy level of pain is basically what I believed to be true about giving birth.

Then somewhere in my second trimester, I came across a hypnobirthing podcast that really struck a chord with me and I immediately wanted to know more. In just a few weeks, I had binged lots more podcasts, started reading a book, and signed myself and my husband up for a Hypnobirthing course. 

The course went on to completely shift my mindset and perspective. I began to feel complete trust in my body and pregnancy, and real excitement about the day I’d give birth to my baby. I slowed down, looked after my body in new ways and found myself feeling so calm and connected with my pregnancy. I was thinking about birth like my own upcoming marathon - I knew it would be very physically challenging but I had total trust that my body and baby’s body were designed for birth and that it would be a really positive experience. 

Fast forward over a great second half of my pregnancy and then on the 13th Jan I woke up at 5am to my contractions starting. I’d had a sweep the week before and had felt a lot of cramping for days after that, but this was different and I immediately knew that labour was beginning. 

I felt so excited, and totally calm and confident. I stayed in bed just feeling relly grateful and happy that labour had started, but after an hour or two the contractions tapered off.

I had prepared myself that first-time labour would likely be a long process, and starting and stopping was a normal part of labour, so I got up, had breakfast with my husband, and tried to distract myself and have a relaxed day. 

Throughout the day the contractions kept returning but were sporadic and tapered off again many times over. At one point, as I’d walked down to the coffee shop they were so strong and I had to lean on my husband for support and completely focus on my breathing - people must have thought I was literally about to give birth. But then as soon as I was home again, they tapered off. By this point, I was definitely feeling frustrated! 

That evening, I remember watching a beautiful sunset from our balcony wondering if this would be the night we’d bring our little boy into the world, and the contractions came back and this time didn’t stop at all. 

I tried to get some sleep though the contractions which didn’t really happen at all, but I did rest a lot between them. They were strong, coming every four minutes or so and lasting a minute each. I wanted to labour at home for as long as possible until it felt too intense to continue at home any more, but I also didn’t want to risk leaving it too late and end up giving birth in the car. Eventually around 3am I decided to go to hospital, get checked and see how things were doing.

I had my eye mask on for the entire journey into hospital, my headphones on listening to my birth playlist and Hypnobirthing audios, and my husband took care of pretty much every conversation and all logistics. All I was doing was trying to stay calm, focus inwards and keep my oxytocin high.

But by the time we were there and I got settled into a room, they had slowed down, a lot. I wasn’t that surprised and had prepared myself for this. I agreed to lay down on the bed for half an hour while they monitored the baby and I agreed to a vaginal examination as I felt I wanted some information about how my labour was progressing, and was told I was 4cm dilated. I was pretty happy with that, I knew my labour had slowed down a lot from the journey into hospital and now I just wanted to focus on getting comfortable in the new environment, staying positive, and bringing my contractions back up. Once they were happy with the baby’s monitoring, I got up and moved around the room as much as I could, and bounced and rocked away on the birth ball.

It didn’t really take long at all for them to build back again, and as they became more intense I was struggling to stay comfortable. This is when I got into the pool and felt immediate relief. The water was so comfortable and supportive, and took away so much of the discomfort.

I laboured here for the next few hours in a trance-like state. I was remembering my hypnobirthing ‘up - breathing’ during each contraction but between them I felt like I was on another planet in a brilliant way. I felt completely calm, relaxed, happy, high even, and was dozing off to sleep between most of the contractions. I was surprised that during the few minutes between each one, my body felt completely comfortable and free from any sensation.

Around 9.30am I agreed to be checked again as whilst my contractions had been coming consistently for hours and they felt strong, there didn’t seem to be any change in intensity, they seemed to have plateau’d. I was told I was now 6cm. The midwife offered and suggested to break my waters.

After being in labour since 5am the previous morning, I was really tired. I took time to consider my options, instincts, and the BRAIN acronym, and then agreed I would like to have my waters broken. The process of doing this didn’t hurt at all and actually, there was no flooding of water as I’d expected because of how my baby was lying and covering my cervix at the time.

I got back into the water and now really let my mindset change. Before this I had been very much enjoying the oxytocin high, feeling comfortable in the water, getting some rest between each one, and also I think one of the biggest things is that I was feeling scared about going into the next stage. But now I felt ready to let go, surrender to the labour and have my baby. 

After having my waters broken, the contractions very quickly began to feel stronger and more intense, and then things changed again. I had a couple of surges that were so intense and felt like my body was taking over and trying to expel anything from inside me. I heard myself saying ‘I don’t think I can do this any more’ but as soon as I heard myself, realised I must be in transition and so actually was very close to giving birth. 

The labour sensations had totally changed, the contractions were pushing everything down and I was feeling so much pressure down in my bum. The midwife who had been quietly busying herself just behind the curtain this whole time giving me privacy, reassured me to trust my body and go with whatever I was feeling. 

I was focusing on the down-breathing Hypnobirthing technique with each contraction and couldn’t believe how effective it was feeling and that I could really feel my baby moving closer and closer.

I ‘d been so comfortable in the water up to this point but now it was difficult to find a good position. I was constantly moving around the pool, trying different positions, using my husband to physically support me and hold me up, but nothing seemed to feel good. My husband was trying to massage my lower back, reminding me of how close we were now, and was reminding me to come back to my breath when I needed it.

I could feel my baby’s head moving down and then frustratingly back up again with each contraction which I knew was normal. But very soon after, at 11:50am his head was born into the water. I waited for the next contraction and his body didn’t immediately follow. The midwives encouraged me to really really push for the next one and there he was, born and lifted into my arms.

I was just completely blown away. Looking at his perfect little face, all the hair on his head, I couldn’t believe we had done it and he was here. He looked so healthy and alert, he locked eyes with me and was just taking me in as if he knew me so well and had been waiting to meet me. He wasn’t crying initially so the midwife recommended that we cut the cord earlier than planned, and they took him over to a bright light, rubbing him with a towel to get him to cry.

Whilst he was on the other side of the room, the midwives also noticed I was bleeding more than they were comfortable with, and it’s more difficult to assess blood loss in the pool so they helped me out onto a bed which did feel like a bit of an emergency and manually delivered the placenta to get it out as soon as possible.

My baby was passed back to me while this was going on, and then we had some time just the three of us, skin to skin, still listening to our birth playlist, and taking every inch of him in. Those first hours with your baby are just something else. We were amazed by his every sound and movement. And I felt incredible, running off the most amazing concoction of birth hormones, truly feeling like a superhuman. If only we could bottle up that feeling!