Brett's Birth Story

At 8:35pm Friday 10th of June I felt my first contraction.  I was laying on a mattress in the lounge room watching a movie with my husband and both our Mothers (both had travelled to Syd for the birth). 10 minutes later, another one.  I whispered in my partner Zeke's ear and we just smiled at each other but didn't say anything to our Mums.

Once the movie finished I told Zeke to go to bed to make sure he was rested,  My contractions were still coming every 10 minutes and had been the 'real deal' from the start. I told my Mum and she stayed up with me and I called my midwife and she told me to let her know how I was going in the morning. I spent my time packing for the hospital, laying down with Mum and had a really nice hot shower. By about 2am my contractions were 6 minutes apart and lasting 1-2 minutes.  I called my midwife back and told her I wanted to come in (I had an hour trip to the birth centre). On the way in my contractions were coming every 2 minutes and really required my full focus.

We got to the birth centre at 4:30am and I was 3-4cm and happy with how things were going so the midwife let us be and only came in once an hour to listen to bub.  From then on I was in my own little world of breathing and humming sitting in the shower with Zeke and then I hopped in the bath -ahhh the best pain relief ever! From that point on I had 'coupled' contractions - 2 contractions in a row before the break so it was pretty intense but i remember telling myself it was bring me closer to bub twice as fast!

After a couple of hours I could see the sun peaking through the blinds and I felt a sort of change in my body and asked Mum to get my midwife Jane to check me - she bargained with me to wait another half hour so I did.

I got out of the bath and into the double bed and was 9.5cm with a bulging bag of waters. Jane left and I sat on the toilet while Zeke ran a fresh bath.  With the next contraction I felt the sudden urge to push and went with my body. Mum told Jane it was time and she came back in and knelt down on the floor quietly. With my hand I could could feel the bag of waters only just inside my vagina! As I hopped back in the bath I had another contraction (still coupling so lasting over 2 minutes with a 1 minute break in between). I felt the waters bulging and as I pushed I used my fingernail to break it and felt such a relief of pressure! From then on I could see my baby's head through the water (Jane was holding a mirror for me). With every push I could see it getting lower and used my muscles to hold it there in between contractions. Having the mirror was great it gave me a great focus point. I kept feeling the top of the head and could believe how much hair there was!  

As the baby was crowning I tried as hard as I could to stop pushing and just pant and breathe it out to avoid tearing if I could and pop the head was out! I had a long break until my next contraction and Zeke and I both stroked our baby's beautiful dark hair underwater as I caught my breath and waited for the next contraction. One big push later (after 25 minutes of pushing) my baby was born into my own hands and I lifted her out of the water and onto my chest. My baby girl!  

 Cathy's Birth Story

Well after being 10 days overdue and persuading the hospital to let me go 14 days before being induced i went into spontaneous labour at 10 days overdue on Thursday 10th November at 2.30pm. The contractions were 10 mins apart and 1 minute in length. It was super hot here in Sydney so was pacing around my house with fans pointed at me for hours and hours.

We finally went to the hospital at about 12.30am. My waters broke at 3.30am and it was full on from there. I had a shower and then decided that i would like to go in the spa and what a great move that was. The spa was fantastic and made me feel so much better, no weight on any part of my body and just felt so right. So i arrived in the spa at about 4.30am and did not get out til i gave birth at 11.07am, so i was all wrinkled up.

As I was pushing Chloe's head out, the PA system came over the loud speaker and told us to be standing for a minutes silence for Rememberance Day.  I have never laughed so much in my life, Paul was up standing....the midwifes were in stitches it was just hilarious!

As Chloe was born i picked her up myself as there is no contact with anyone in a water birth so i picked her up and put her on my belly, it was beautiful and a fantastic way for our little mermaid to enter the world, cradled by her mum with no monitors or drugs, not even a Panadol. 

Carla's Birth Story

Alexandra's Birth - July 2010, St George Birth Centre: I was 13 days past my due date, induction was to be on the 14th day. I had been frustrated that labour had not started yet. Alexandra was posterior so this could have been the cause, she was fully engaged though. After many attemps at natural induction techniques I came to using the one that was most controversal, castor oil. It was my last resort as I really didn't want to be induced. 4 hours later I woke at 11.30 pm to my first intense contraction and my waters broke. I called Briony (my doula) and she arrived an hour later.

Labour was fast from the start, contractions lasting a minute and only 30 seconds apart. I wanted to stay at home as long as possible. Briony was amazing and was doing acupreassure techniques on me that took a degree off the pain of the contraction. It was amazing and I credit that to not needing any drugs or gas for my labour.

At 3am I said I could feel the baby turning, it was like a corkscrew feeling with intense pressure, but I still knew the birth was far away. James (my husband) and Briony said we should head to the hospital, I was still hessitant to go, but 30mins later said OK lets go!! Thankfully being 3am the road was quiet and the normally 15 - 20 min trip was quick. Contracting in the car is not fun! As soon as we pulled up, I got out of the car and on the pavement I went to my all fours for a contraction!! I was in my daggy winter nightgown! Got into the hospital and I vividly remember going again to the floor when I got out of the elevator (as that was the most comfortable position for me) having my next contraction, then got up and saw a boy with a wheelchair waiting for me to sit down on the chair. I looked at him and said 'I don't need that!' With the assistance of James and Briony I walked to the delivery room.

Labour became more intense in hospital, Briony played calm music, burnt aromatherapy oils and continued the amazing acupressure. What I liked was that James saw what she was doing and helped out. So arrived at hospital at 4am and was 6cms dilated. At 6am I was fully dilated and was told by my Midwife that I could start pushing. The pushing stage was the hardest, especially as it was drug free. I was pushing for just over 2 hours! All we could see was her full head of hair coming! My Midwife was constantly wanting to do internals during the pushing stage, I found the internals to be more painful than the contractions!! They were extremely invasive.

At 8.19am - finally after some coaching on pushing, her head was coming out. What surprises me is I really don't remember the pain, but I do remember the hard work involved! Her head came out, James was allowed to catch her arms when they popped out. Then my Midwife was calling out to me to pull Alexandra out. Then Briony and James started what seemed like an awesome cheer 'come on Carla, pull her out!' I reached down and put my hands under her arms and pulled her out. It was the most amazing experience of my life to do this. I pulled her onto my chest, we did not know her sex. I said 'what is it?!' As I lifted her leg to see! 'It's a girl! I knew it!' I said.

1 hour later I was able to move freely and shower, my recovery was very fast and I never required any pain relieving medication that day or in the days following. I love that I did it drug free, I loved my birth experience, I have no negative feelings about it as I feel I educated myself and was well prepared. Also I had an amazing Doula, Briony and James my husband to support me. The only negative feeling is my invasive internals. For my next Birth I will opt for a Homebirth supported by the St George Birth Centre Midwives and will hire Briony again, they are amazing women.

Kirsty's Birth Experiences

I have been very blessed to have 4 amazing joy filled births. All my births were relatively quick (the longest 1.5hrs) and all were drug free. I recovered well, bonded well with all my bubs and with my 3rd walked into my home 3 hrs after giving birth and with my 4th 5hrs after giving birth. And I credit it all to meditation.

I meditated on the labours throughout my pregnancies and the labours were all exactly as I visualized.  I'm a believer in what we think we become. My partner was also very involved in all of the births which made a big difference to my mental mindset. He would really get in assisting the doctor and encouraging me. As each child was born we always told each other we loved each other. I'm always surprised at the horror birth stories women want to pass on to first time mothers. Certainly its very painful!  But for me, my births were joyous blissful moments of my life.

Sarah's Birth Story

My birth experience was better than I expected.

Like any new mum, I was quite nervous as I was booked in, on a set date and time. Luckily for me (and I say lucky), I went into labour 2 days earlier than my planned c-section and experienced contractions and all the rest of it, but still had my c-section. My doctor was great, the nurses were wonderful, and I felt like I was in safe hands.

I have epilepsy and was only diagnosed 3 years ago. It was all very stressful during my pregnancy as we weren't sure what the drugs that I had to take would do to my baby. We had some specific things to look out for, but there was no option but to take the medication. It was safer that way, rather than having a seizure during my pregnancy, which was also stressful as I just didn't know what was going to happen at any time.

Thankfully, my pregnancy was relatively easy (if there is such a thing), aside from the usual discomforts that most women talk about.

I had always known I wanted to have a caesarian. Something in me could just not visualise myself having a natural birth. I was quite nervous to talk about this with my doctor as I didn't want to be seen as 'too posh to push'.

My doctor was great about it and said that if I was more comfortable with that then he was happy with my choice. We did factor in the risks of my epilepsy which pointed towards having a caesarian anyway due to the stress and fatigue on my body, but ultimately, it was the perfect choice for me mentally as well.

I really didn't know what to expect after the c-section, but it wasn't as terrible as I thought. Yes, I had pain. Yes, I didn't look at the scar the whole time I was in hospital, but overall, I really can't complain. When I finally did look at the scar, I realised it was not at all as awful as I was expecting, and the pain was taken care of by some good drugs in hospital and the very occasional panadol at home.

So the moral to my story is, don't feel afraid to say if you want to have a caesarian to your doctor (or anyone one else for that matter - just ignore people's judgmental faces and comments). And, it really isn't as terrible as other people make it out to be. I feel lucky that everything went smoothly for me and my little boy is 18months now and absolutely perfect.

 If you would like to share your positive birth experience with us, we would love to hear from you.  Please send us an email.