My beautiful baby daughter was born in the Whittington’s birth centre at 7:40am after a very quick 5-hour labour. As she’s my first baby, I was expecting a far longer labour, so it came as quite a shock when things progressed quickly!
In early labour I was able to use the breathing techniques I’d learned on the Active Birth course, and try out various positions I’d learned there and in Janet’s yoga classes, which made it easy to bear the intense sensations.
My main wish was to give birth naturally without any intervention or pain relief, and that’s exactly what happened. The day before I went into labour, I’d had a wonderfully powerful reflexology session with Sophia at the Active Birth centre, and my body felt very open and ready to birth my daughter when her time was right.
I made it into the Whittington birth centre just in time to crawl onto the bed on all fours, and start pushing. My waters broke just before she crowned, and there was a lot of meconium, so the midwives were concerned about her breathing. As a result, when she came out, they cut her cord and whisked her away for checks before I had skin-to-skin with her, but after five minutes or so she was put on my chest, breathing well.
We were discharged within 12 hours, to spend our first night together at home.
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Congratulations Sara, and thank you for sharing your wonderful story!
Remember that every birth is its own unique journey. Whether your labour goes quickly like Sara’s, or more slowly and for longer as it often does, using breathing, yoga and movement can make all the difference to you and your baby.
Sara had attended Janet’s Active Birth weekend – the next course takes place on 19-20 May and you can find out more here.
She also attended pregnancy yoga classes, as well as reflexology at the Active Birth Centre.
