Sorcha

This was my second HypnoBirth, but my first as a practitioner. We had to get an out of area midwife to attend the birth, so we rented a cabin near to her house. We got a cabin that was a five minute drive from her home. For one week we waited at the cabin. My fiancee Graeme commuted in to work each day and my sister Karen stayed with me and my then almost three year old son Rafe. At the end of the week I was getting antsy for baby to come out so I went for lots of walks. One night I took a bath with a few drops of essential oil in it, went for a walk, watched a hilarious movie (laughing hard worked with convincing my son to come out), and bounced on a birthing ball. All this in addition to my daily use of evening primrose oil to soften my cervix and of course daily practice with scripts & visualization, and the CD at bedtime. During the walk I began to feel some tightening but I thought it may just be practice contractions. I watched the movie while bouncing on the ball, then did my usual night time routine. My abdomen was feeling constantly tight at this point.

I woke at 2:45am with steady surges that were already about 3 to four minutes apart lasting for about 50 seconds or so. My fianc‎ee and I lay in the dark timing them for about an hour while I relaxed. We were really excited for this "home" birth. When we were sure it was the real thing, we called our midwife and she headed over. We called my parents and they made the 90 minute drive to the cabin. I then got into the tub with candles and listened to the CD and also had Graeme read me scripts and use the anchor point to relax me more deeply. I found that the tub made everything more intense and I decided to go back to the bed for a bit.

I lay on the bed for about 20 minutes and then realized that baby was right there, ready to make an entrance, so I got up to change position and splash! My membranes released. This is what happened in the following two minutes: I had to get myself back onto the bed! I got onto in on my knees with my arms around my fiancee, leaning on him. I began to make deep "oh" sounds to open the birth path. My midwife thought I was getting close but had never attended a HypnoBirth before so she thought I still had some time to wait. My mother knew different! She came in just as my baby slipped out onto the bed - no pushing required!

We lay down on the bed, baby on my bare chest and dad cuddled in beside me and looked at the clock. Sorcha had been born at 7:30am. We both agreed that it was a great birth experience but we found ourselves wishing that it had been longer!

At six months, Sorcha is a healthy baby who laughs and smiles all the time. Like her brother, she is a relaxed and happy person. I know that HypnoBirthing had a large part to play in that.

Thank you Marie for creating such a wonderful philosophy and way of birthing. You have helped me to bring two wonderful happy children into this world in a peaceful, joyful way.