Categories
Archive
06 Jul 2019
Positive and Relaxed Cesarean
We embarked upon our hypnobirthing journey with Anna at Rock Your Birth in hope that we would learn to feel confident and positive about the birth of our second child after a traumatic first birth with our son via emergency C-section.
Having heard about hypnobirthing during my first pregnancy we decided to go along to a free trial session with Anna at the Wishing Well in Bromsgrove.
We were both so impressed with Anna’s passion for hypnobirthing and the content that we signed up for the full course. This was one of the best decisions we made as over the duration of the course we became prepared, knowledgeable, confident and most importantly positive about this birth.
After much deliberation as to whether to try for a VBAC or to have an elected C-section, I finally felt confident to give myself the chance to go for a VBAC.
At 36 + 6 weeks my waters started to gently release during my son’s bedtime routine, much to my excitement and my husband’s shock!
I called the maternity unit who suggested I wait an hour or so just to be sure it was my waters. I was honestly so excited, I thought this is it my body is doing this naturally and I am going to get the VBAC I’d been craving so badly ( I was a little surprised at myself for being so calm and excited but put this down to the course preparation)!
After waiting, nothing much more had happened during that hour and the midwife suggested I wait another hour however whilst I was on the phone I had a big release of waters so it suddenly changed to come in as soon as you can!
This was it I thought, we were on our way to hospital to have our baby! At this point I still felt excited but with an air of calmness, my husband on the other hand was panicking as we had our first busiest day of work for our bouncy castle business the following morning.
At the hospital it was quickly confirmed my waters had released (I hadn’t wet myself as Dave, my husband suggested). I was monitored and all was well with me and our baby girl, but I still hadn’t had any surges. It was recommended that I stay in overnight on the maternity ward however, knowing that labour would favour a relaxed, calm environment I wanted to go home and see what happened. After establishing that this was safe to do and agreeing that I would come back in at 9am the following day, we were on our way back home.
We arrived back home at approximately 2am and I put my diffuser on with some lavender essential oils to help me get some sleep (albeit very little as I was too excited to sleep).
As the sun came up I still hadn’t felt any surges and there was no further progress, so along with my hospital bags I was on my way back to hospital this time with my mum whilst my husband and dad were out working to fulfil our work orders. I was checked onto the antenatal ward and soon settled myself on the bed. As I was consultant led I was seen quite soon and advised that if I didn’t start to show any signs of labour by 1pm (18 hours since my waters first released) they would like to take me down to theatre at 4pm for a c-section due to the risk of infection.
I did get very upset when they told me this as I felt my chances of a VBAC were slipping away and I really hadn’t wanted another c-section if I could help it. Plus, Dave still hadn’t arrived yet and I’d really wanted him by my side when they told me this. I was also distracted by the lady in the bed next to me who was very angry and upset for her own reasons, so I decided I needed to take control and calm myself down.
I put my hypnobirthing mp3’s on, closed my eyes and practised my calm breathing, this worked a treat as I fell asleep! When I woke up, I felt calm again and remembering Anna’s mantra of ‘I control what I can and let go of what I can’t’ I accepted that this was how it was meant to be now and felt good about it.
I was so very pleased to see that the midwife that would be accompanying me down to the theatre was a midwife (Emma) that had looked after me on the postnatal ward after I had my son and she was lovely and helped put me at ease. Dave arrived and together with Emma and my mum we all walked down to the theatre area together and Dave scrubbed up whilst I went in for my spinal.
I’ve never been a big needle fan, so I was nervous about having the spinal but when I walked into the theatre, I spoke to everyone in there and my anaesthetist was a lovely man called Pete who helped put me at ease. I also made use of the calm breathing techniques and asked to hold my midwife’s hands whilst they carried out the spinal.
During the hypnobirthing course Anna had mentioned to us about creating a play list of music that makes you feel happy, calm and positive and well certain musicals have this affect on me!
I decided that during the beginning of surgery I would listen to Joseph and the amazing technicolour dream coat (it’s one of my faves) because ironically at 5pm that day I should have been watching it at the hippodrome with my friends however my little girl and fate intervened so the least I could do was listen to it!
I must admit I couldn’t really concentrate on the music too much nor enjoy Dave stroking my arm and hand, as I was too focused on listening for my baby’s first cry, and at 4:04pm that magical sound arrived along with my baby girl safely and soundly!
Charlotte Mary Crane was born, and we were over the moon.
We found out afterwards that Charlotte was still quite high up and had the cord wrapped round her neck twice so had she come vaginally it could have gone down the path of an emergency c-section.
We can’t thank Anna enough for helping us to prepare for the arrival of our gorgeous daughter. Anna helped us to change our frame of minds from a scared, negative place to a positive and calm place, that allowed us to embrace the birth that happened.
I can wholeheartedly say that despite it being another c-section it was a nice, positive experience and I can look back on it and feel good about it.