Mama B – “I’m so thankful for the techniques learnt from doing hypnobirthing & yoga with you, as these meant I was able to have the VBAC in the MLU I’d really wanted.”

Our second daughter made a slightly early appearance at 38 weeks on Monday 3rd September (the first day of my maternity leave!).

I’d been to the Heath on the Sunday for a trace as baby’s movements had slowed. All was fine & the midwife said I was actually having contractions so might not be long before baby arrived. But as I couldn’t feel anything I assumed they were just Braxton Hicks & I still had a while to go, especially as our first daughter was born 2 weeks after her estimated due date.

At 3:30am the following morning my waters broke & at around 5:30am I started feeling some mild surges but I stopped noticing them once my daughter was up & we started with our day as usual (playing, eating, walking, etc) & nothing further seemed to be happening.

I had to go to the MLU at the Heath at 3:30pm to be checked as my waters had broken 12 hours before & was told I was 2cm dilated. They also booked me in for an induction the following morning as they don’t like to leave you longer than 24 hours in case of infection, but said to come back if labour had started before the 24 hour cut-off.
Once we got home we had some food, watched some tv & I spoke to my parents to check my daughter was settled with them. We then went to bed listening to the Hypnobirthing scripts, doing my visualisations & I also cuddled into my daughter’s blanket as thought it might help generate some oxytocin. An hour later I was having regular mild surges & after another hour I woke my husband as the surges were coming every 2/3 minutes & lasting about 1 minute. He called the MLU & they said to come in, but I wasn’t overly keen to leave my ‘safe space’ as still didn’t feel I was in full active labour & didn’t want things to stop once I got to the hospital if labour wasn’t fully established. In the end, I gave in & we arrived at the Heath at 11pm where I was told I was fully dilated. 50mins later & with the help of some gas & air, my husband’s coaching of the down breathing & a lot of loud mooing(!), our daughter arrived 🙂 (I had to have a few stitches because of grazes from my daughter’s nails, but my perineum remains in tact so would definitely recommend the massage of that & plenty of pelvic floor!)
My first daughter was an undiagnosed breech which had resulted in an emergency c-section after an induced labour & I was determined to have a natural birth this time round.

I’m therefore so thankful for the techniques learnt from doing hypnobirthing & yoga with you, as these meant I was able to have the VBAC in the MLU I’d really wanted.
Thank you Claire!

We are looking forward to seeing you for Mum & Baby yoga soon.