Kath's birth story

Kaths' story

Hi, my name is Kath and here is my story of a planned home birth which turned out as anything but!

When I found out I was pregnant with my first child I was so excited and knew from the very beginning that I wanted a home birth. I’d heard about the possibility of being told that there would not be a community midwife available when I was in labour and that I would have to go to hospital after all and that thought did concern me a great deal.

As I was still working full-time at this point we could afford to hire the services of an independent midwife called Nicky Flynn so I had the confidence that whenever I gave birth I would have the help of someone I had got to know throughout the pregnancy. It was wonderful having Nicky to come and see me regularly to listen to the heartbeat and take care of all the other checks and she always had time to answer all my questions.

As the due date approached we borrowed a birthing pool from Nicky (the liner inside the pool is bought by the user each time and only used once) and two weeks after my due date I was having contractions 7 minutes apart so we got the pool blown up and filled with water in preparation. Sadly, the contractions got more and more distant so we went to bed, hoping that tomorrow would be the big day.

The rest of that week I was having contractions through the day and night but only every 45 minutes or so. My waters broke slowly and I was told that because of the risk of infection I would have to go into labour naturally in the next 48 hours or be induced. I was trying to avoid induction as I’d learnt through the Hypnobirthing course how to work with the body’s own natural contractions but I didn’t have the confidence in my body’s ability to deal with chemically-induced ones.

I didn’t go into labour naturally so went into hospital for the induction. At least my husband and I had Nicky with us to explain everything that was going on which was a great support. After 12 hours of labour my cervix wouldn’t open any more than 9cms so it was decided that a Caesarean Section was needed.
So, despite doing everything I could to ensure a home birth, including hiring my own midwife, my son Harry was born in hospital after all. After the birth I was just so happy to have my beautiful healthy boy in my arms that the change in birth circumstances didn’t matter anymore. I was very disappointed when it was obvious that I was going to be induced because it felt that all the months of mentally preparing myself for natural birth were wasted and my dream of birthing in a cosy, familiar environment were snatched away from me, but once I had let go of that it didn’t matter anymore.

Harry is now 19 months old and has always been healthy and content so the fact that he was born so unnaturally doesn’t seem to have affected him at all. What I would say to any mum-to-be who is considering a home birth is that it would be a wonderful thing and I’ve heard so many positive birth stories but that you never know what will actually happen so plan for it by all means but don’t let your happiness depend upon it. At the end of the day, the most important thing is for you to have your baby put into your arms, however they get there!