Two babies in 2 years, using Empowered to Birth techniques

It's been over 2 years since we did the Birthing Master-Class with Debra at 'Empowered to Birth' in Bendigo. This was when we were expecting our first baby.

 My first birth (June 2019) was fairly straight forward. Although it was slightly longer than I'd have liked! At 41weeks my hindwaters broke. 38hrs later she was born. This was followed by a physiological 3rd stage and unfortunately a post-partum bleed of 1.45L.

 In preparation for the birth of our son (March 2021) we reviewed the handouts from the class, clarified a few things on our birth plan, but overall were much more relaxed and chilled about the whole thing.

  At my 20-week ultrasound, bub was measuring well above the 95th percentile. There was a discussion about the accuracy of my LMP and due date given we had opted to not have any earlier dating scans. There was talk of bring my due date forward by 10 days, but ultimately it was left at the original date.

Several times it was mentioned that I shouldn't be expecting to reach my due date this time because baby was quite big and well developed from what they could see. Low and behold 40-weeks rolled around. The obstetrics registrar wanted to discuss booking an induction for 41-weeks however after using our BRAIN the registrar was unable to provide a sufficient justification for the induction (aside from risk of still-birth increases after 42 weeks. This was still 7 days after they wanted to induce).

 We decided to revisit the idea of induction, if I made it to 41 weeks.

For 2 nights in the next week I was up all night with contractions getting closer together and more intense as the night progressed. Both nights they subsided at 5am allowing me an hr. and a half sleep before Miss 20-months started her day.  On Tuesday night (40+5) I went about delivering some food to my sister around 9pm. Just as I got into bed at 10:30 the contractions started again. Given the last 2 times this happened and nothing came of it, hubby went to bed. I lay down to watch some TV. By 11:30 I was rummaging around looking for the TENS machine - turns out relaxed and chilled also meant disorganized. At nearly 41 weeks we still hadn't packed bags! By 12:30 we'd called my parents to come and stay with our toddler and headed to the hospital. Not long after arriving (1:30am) I had an on and off urge to push. The midwife asked to check how far along I was and found I was 6cm.  The pushing sensation was my waters bulging. From then on it became a waiting game for my waters to break. During this time, I focused on my breathing and opening and relaxing my body. The midwives commented on how focused and controlled I was able to keep myself. At 3am there was discussion around pain relief because bubs was constantly kicking during contractions and making them considerably harder to deal with. The midwife suggested we give it half an hr. more before acting on either pain relief or artificially breaking my waters.

We trusted in the midwifes advice and before we got to decision time my waters broke and the urge to push really ramped up. At 3:25am on March 10th 2021 our little guy entered the world at 4.05kg and 56cm. Turns out the ultrasound wasn't wrong he was exceptionally long! We'd opted for a managed 3rd stage this time around knowing that I was at an increased risk of another PPH and had narrowly avoided surgery the first time. The time immediately after his birth was a lot calmer without the PPH happening. He immediately got the hang of feeding and hubby cut the cord after it had stopped pulsing. We enjoyed skin to skin contact while a couple of stitches were done. We enjoyed watching the sunrise right up until discharge at 7:30am. We arrived home before Miss 20 months even realised we were gone. 

 The knowledge and skills we gained held us in good stead even over 2 years later. We were able to be our own advocates, ask appropriate questions and understand the implications of all of our decisions.