Home Birth 3rd baby – Stephanie’s Story
Love reading positive birth stories, you’re in the right place…. This positive home birth 3rd baby story is from Stephanie. Stephanie opted for a home waterbirth and welcomed her 3rd baby in the comfort of her own home, with her husband “catching” the baby himself. Baby Albie was born at 39+2 weeks weighing 7lb 2oz.
My Home Birth 3rd Baby
I loved reading positive birth stories when I was pregnant, so I thought I’d write my own to help another pregnant Mum.
Albie is my third baby, my first was a very simple hospital birth, and my second was an overall straight forward home birth – the last part was a little tricky as she had her cord around her foot, which meant she needed to be delivered quickly. She wasn’t positioned well which meant my cervix didn’t get to 10cm by itself and the midwife had to intervene to get her out.
Albie’s pregnancy was unexpected, throw in a pandemic – meant it was tricky at times. I had a lovely pregnancy but one thing I struggled to decide on was the birth. When the midwife initially brought up the idea of another home birth my first instinct was no way! I then spent a long time going back and forth trying to decide what to do. My thoughts were of whether my body could do it right again. What if there were complications and what was the best option. This was made harder by my husband not being allowed to any of the appointments. I felt a big burden of responsibility to make the right decision.
Birth Preparation
I then looked into hypnobirthing and found this course. I found it helpful to look at the practical aspects of the birth and try and get my head around all possible eventualities. Ultimately, in the end I booked the homebirth, but decided that it didn’t mean I had to have him at home. I ended up using it purely as an option. This then took alot of the pressure off and kept the anxiety at bay.
Early Labour
At 39 weeks I started to have on off contractions that didn’t get any closer or stronger, this was nothing like the girls as they were very go go go from the start. This continued for 2 days, stopping all together after a few hours.
At 39+2 I’d had a few contractions in the night but they’d stopped again. I decided to walk around, but as soon as I stopped or sat down they would stop again. I then spent the day walking around to try and get them going.
By 3pm they were starting to get a pattern (3 in 10 mins) , the midwife arrived at 3.30pm and said I was 3cm. By this point I wasn’t convinced they wouldnt stop all together again. I was quite disappointed. However, on the next heartbeat check 15 minutes later Albie’s head had really dropped down. So, we knew something was starting to happen.
My Home Birth 3rd baby
By 4.30pm I was needing the gas and air, and the midwife and my husband sorted the pool out.
At 5pm I got into the pool, I was really starting to feel the pressure at this point. At around 5.30pm the midwife broke my waters. I was now 10cm and they weren’t going (just like with my girls).
At 5.47pm Albie was born.
So in just over 2 hours I’d gone from 3cm to him being here, so don’t always believe in the 1 cm an hour rule. This wasn’t the case with my first baby either – she was 3cm to born in 3.5 hours.
Albie was born in the pool and brought up to the surface by my husband. My girls met him as soon as he was born, whilst we were still in the pool.
I’m so glad I wasn’t scared out of another home birth as it was amazing. The online hypnobirthing course really helped to calm my anxiety about the birth and made me realise I can’t control what happens during the birth but I can be aware of many of the options and for me it was the realisation that I didn’t have to have a definitive plan, just options.
