"Positive Birth Program prepared me for childbirth"

My husband and I attended the Positive Birth Program at Bunbury Regional Hospital in July 2021. We then had the early, but safe arrival of our baby girl in August 2021 (pre-term at 35+3 gestation).

I really felt the positive birth program and education was incredibly helpful to allowing me to come away from my birth with a positive energy. I completed the Positive Birth Program at 30weeks gestation, and straight away felt so empowered. I started practicing the "release and let go" mantra daily, and also did the Hypnobirthing meditation each night before going to sleep.

I continued to work as a Physio until 34weeks and had in my head that I would have 6 blissful weeks of maternity leave to "nest" and continue to prepare myself and my body for the birth. My first week of maternity leave - I felt different. I felt that my belly grew suddenly that week, and there was reduced baby movements - each time in which I had checked and monitored (everything was normal!).

The night before I had lost my mucus plus, and then I woke every couple of hours with light period pain. But then I woke at 4am with a sharp pain, and when I got up to go to the toilet, my waters broke!

I got to the maternity ward at the hospital by 4:30am and was hooked up to the monitors. By 5am the period pain was more moderate and by 5:30am I was in full active labour! I was moved to the birthing suite and hooked up to a monitor in which I could walk around and move as this was one of my preferences. I unfortunately wasn't able to use water (bath or shower) which was my first pain management preference due to being early at 35+3. Initially this made me feel a little worried and the thought of not coping crossed my mind. However I then slapped myself out of that thought and reconnected to the positive thoughts I had been practicing. "this is happening and you cannot control the timing of this", "I've got this", "just breathe - release and let go", "these intense sensations are only temporary - one surge at a time" and this is what I did - I requested my eye mask to block out everyone visually and went into my own world for each surge. I asked for 2 heat packs - one for the lower back and one for the perineum and this was all the pain relief I used! I could feel when each surge would start to come on, and would say "here we go again, let's do this!" and would begin my hypnobirthing breathing as the surge would ramp up.

The staff that attended to me and OB were amazing at allowing me to do my own thing, and consulting with my husband about everything. They were so respectful of my hypnobirthing preferences and did amazing to stay quiet and not intervene despite there being about 15 people in the room (midwives, OB team, paeds team due to being early - just in case there was something wrong). They knew it was in my preferences that I didn't want to be on my back or with my feet in stirrups, so they helped me try multiple other positions once she was crowning. However progress slowed at this point as I felt I couldn't let my pelvic floor go anymore. Unfortunately as my baby started to show some signs of fatiguing (and they were worried as she was pre-term) - I ended up having to go on my back with my feet in stirrups. She was fatiguing more so the doctor came to me and said that if I can't get her out in a few more surges, he would have to intervene with an episiotomy and forceps (both definitely not in my preferences). Here was where I had to put all my hypnobirthing breathing to the side and revert to the purple face, teeth gritting, breath holding grunting to force her out. I understood it wasn't about me anymore, and it was about getting my baby here safely. Dr Martin was just so incredible with giving me every opportunity to birth my baby without intervention!

So with a textbook occurrence of events, leading to a 5 hour labour in unexpected scary circumstances (pre-term), with only 2x heat packs for pain management, and literally giving birth like they do in Hollywood movies - My girl was born healthy and a very loud and healthy set of lungs. For this I am extremely grateful. It was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life, but it is definitely the one thing I am most proud of myself for. And despite it all happening so quickly, unexpectedly, and not how I had hoped with my preferences, it was still such a positive experience. I think it all comes down to having knowledge of what you can control and letting go of what you can't, which I had learnt through the positive birth program. I trusted my body to do the things it was made for - those things I couldn't control (like spontaneous labour 4.5 weeks early) and I focused on things I could control - like my mindset, my breathing, and my ability to show up for each surge to help my body do its thing, not shy away from it or fear the pain. I honestly feel I have the Positive Birth program to thank for this!

Words cannot describe how thankful I am for the staff at Bunbury hospital, the midwives through the MGP program, and mainly Kasey, for the empowering education provided through the Positive Birth Program. Based on my experience, I highly recommend everyone doing this training too, and believe it will help to allow more positive birth stories across the entire state!