After I found out I was expecting with Samuel (our first), the fear of childbirth sank in. I think I have always been a little afraid of childbirth. The stories of how traumatic childbirth can be and how many things can go wrong terrified me. A friend of mine told me about Hypnobirthing and it sounded amazing. It helped her cousin have 2 quick drug free labours with hardly any pain. And thats when I knew I wanted to do Hypnobirthing too.
I bought the hypnobirthing book and did the hypnobirthging course. Hypnobirthing is all about the power of positive thinking, by relaxing your body and mind you can let go of he fear associated with childbirth to have a pain free birth. I was convinced I was going to have a hypnobirthing experience. I would just breathe the baby down. I did all my preparations. Light touch massage. Daily affirmations. Visualisation techniques. In a way hypnobirthing allowed me to let go of any fear I had prior to Samuels birth, I was genuinely looking forward to the day I got to meet my baby. I was also excited for the day Sebastian was going to enter the world thanks to Hypnobirthing.
My water broke for Samuel at about 11pm and the excitement set in. I went into hospital just to make sure that my water did actually break and I didn't just wee myself. When a doctor assessed me they advised me to stay in the hospital because I had some meconium in my 'water'. (Meconium, for anyone who isn't aware, is basically when your baby takes their first poop... WHILE THEY ARE INSIDE OF YOU) They say that meconium (ew) could be caused because of 1 of these 2 things. 1) the baby was full term (which wasn't likely because Samuel was a few days early) or 2) the baby is in distress. 4 words you don't ever want to hear "baby is in distress". One of the Hypnobirthing affirmations is 'I am prepared to have the best birth possible, whatever turn my birthing may take'. So because of the meconium we stayed in hospital and I was advised that if Samuel hadn't arrived by 11am I would have to be induced. We were moved from emergency to a lovey birthing suite. We had our relaxation music and candles set up. Everything was going really well, until 10am rolled around and we discussed induction. I agreed to have oxytocin via a drip at 10:30am. That is when Hypnobirthing went out the window. My pain levels went from 0 to 100 in a matter of minutes. I found it hard to remain calm once I started to feel the pain. I think I really did believe that childbirth would be pain free and when I felt pain I started to feel panic as well, I did not prepare myself to feel this way. When people ask what was the pain like, I try to explain like a basketball was in between my legs. Looking back I really cant remember much of the next 3.5 hours. But I can remember that by 1:53pm I was holding my baby in my arms and it was love at first sight.
Second time around I felt a little worried about the child birth because of everything I went through with Samuel. I still decided to still do Hypnobirthing. Why? Because I was convinced that it didn't work the first time around because of the induction. With Sebastian my water broke at 7pm. Excitement set in again, we were finally about to meet our baby. Michael took Samuel to our parents place and we went to the hospital to make sure everything was ok. The doctor saw me at 11pm and said I was only 3cm dilated and most likely going to labour for at least 12 more hours. They gave me a sleeping tablet and asked me to go home and rest up, I was probably going to need my rest. I went home, took the sleeping tablet and went to bed. 5 mins later I had to get out of bed because I started feeling immense pain in my tummy and down my legs. I wasn't sure if I was overreacting and feeling anxious because I was away from the hospital but I asked (ok, more like yelled) at Michael to call the hospital. He was on loud speaker and a midwife could hear me moaning (ok, not moaning, more screaming) in the background. She said to Michael very clearly "Michael, now you need to do only one thing. Get your wife in the car and come straight here ASAP". The midwife was pretty much waiting for me with a wheelchair. They wheeled me into a birthing suite straight away. They assessed me to be 7cm dilated at 1am. By 2:30am I was fully dilated. At 3am Sebastian was in my arms. And again, the feeling of love was so overwhelming that it really does make you kinda forget what you have just been through.
So in my experience - yes, childbirth is intense. Yes, it was a little harder the first time around. Yes, it was faster the second time around but it was just as painful. The only difference the second time around was I knew I could do this. I knew my body could do this. After all, I had done it once before and I could do it again. I am so proud of what the female body can do, what my body did. It grew 2 healthy babies and delivered them naturally.
Will it happen again? I hope we will be lucky enough to have a 3rd one day. But don't worry, it would be a few years time. I definitely don't feel like writing a blog post about what it is like having 3 kids under 3.
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