Clair tells her birth story in her own words…

After a long, arduous birth (24hr+ labour which ended up in a controlled forceps delivery with epidural) with my first son, I was apprehensive about birthing again. I spent a lot of time reflecting and researching how I could have the birth I wanted; a non-medicalised, physiological birth. I have been lucky to be involved with the continuity midwifery program at The Canberra Hospital with the same midwife for both of my boys. I could not fault this program for those wanting to experience a physiological birth. Luckily for me, my midwife was not an advocate for induction. I was 7 days overdue when the chat of ‘booking an induction’ if I reached 42+ weeks came up. Yuck. I was going to do anything in my power to bring on the labour. So, I decided I would mow the lawn; ‘let’s get this going,’ I thought.

To my surprise, I started getting infrequent pains whilst out to dinner with my family that evening. Watching the clock at Ginseng, the pains started to come 20 mins apart. We went home and at midnight, I kicked my husband out of our bed and told him to go and get some sleep while I laboured – walking, squatting, trying to sleep.

At 7am I woke my husband and asked him to take my eldest son to my in-laws and we went to the hospital. I love the birthing suits; huge bath, huge bed, relaxing and dark. I was emersed in the bath for hours like a baby beluga. I would have liked to have had a water birth, in my head, but the reality was I just felt like being on the bed. The guttural, dying cow sounds (and poo) came from somewhere I don’t wish to speak of out loud.

With a few deep pushes baby Rowley was born in the caul. An en caul birth is when the baby is born inside an intact amniotic sack which only happens in about 1 in 80,000 births - very rare and very cool. My husband described it as looking like a calf being born. They tell you about the rush of oxytocin, but wowee, incredible. I felt like superwoman! After an uncomplicated birth and perfectly healthy baby, we were home 4 hours after he was born. I feel incredibly blessed to have had this experience because it just changed my perspective on birth and the capabilities of those with wombs. We are bloody amazing.

What do you wish you knew before birth?

I would have mowed the lawn two weeks earlier if I had of known it was going to work that quickly

If you could, would you do anything differently?

No!

What did your partner do that really helped during labour/birth?

He stayed awake the whole time the second time round, that was a bonus.

What advice/honest truth would give a mama-to-be about birth?

Birth is very important. However IMO, it’s not the birth you should focus on. Spend time researching about breastfeeding/bottle feeding (and what to do if it doesn’t work), your recovery, how you’re going to put the baby to sleep, what role your partner will play. Birth is one day out of a lifetime.