Birth Story - Rach & Reagan’s Birth House Experience

Being pregnant during the early stages of COVID-19 meant rules around birth were changing constantly. My original plan was to go through the MGP program at Barwon Health but unfortunately at around the 28/30 week mark the hospital ruled out water births which had been my number 1 birth plan for as long as I can remember. With a water birth at the hospital looking like it was going to be out of the question I started to talk to my midwife about a home birth, although due to living >20 minutes away from the hospital both my parents were a bit hesitate on the idea of it incase myself or bubs needed to be transferred. I had heard about the Birth house and thought I would look into it. My midwife Helen from the MGP and my partners mum Kerry both highly recommended Lynne to me who I was incredibly lucky to be able to get at such short notice but she had planned to travel for the month I was due but because of covid had to cancel (it was seriously meant to be!)

Being a ftm I was well and truly prepared to go over my due date so you can only imagine my surprise at 37 weeks when I got out of the shower after a walk with my sister to notice I had, had my bloody show. After a minute of panic I called lynne who was at the hospital that day and she told me to come in just to get checked out just in case. As I got off the phone to her my waters broke at home and well and felt as though it happened just the way it does in the movies.
After some monitoring at the hospital and discussing with them my options (declining being induced or ABs to see how things naturally progressed) Reagan and I grabbed some dinner and went home.

At this stage I knew our baby would be arriving within the next 48 hours and was just hoping things would start by themselves. Reagan and I sat on the couch watching a movie discussing what might be to come. At around 8pm I had the excitement of some slight period pain which slowly started to ramp up over the next 30 minutes. At around 8.30 I knew contractions were really happening and found myself bouncing on the birth ball.
Just after 9pm I felt as though each wave was getting stronger and stronger. Reagan called Lynne to check in, she told him we were in for a long night and told him to get me to rest up and try get some sleep if possible.(... hes lucky I didn't punch him when he passed on the message).

I think it was around 10 minutes later and I asked him to call her again, I was really being drawn to wanting to be in the bath or shower but as we are on tank water was very conscious about the use of them. Lynne said we could head into the birth house and hang out there. I remember trying to get into the car as each wave grew stronger and stronger I was apologizing to Reagan as I felt them coming and was using every calm birth technique I could think of. Horses breathe had me laughing after each surge as I felt so silly.

We made it to the birth house and I made Reagan strip me off and jumped under the shower for instant relief. Reagan called his mum who we were lucky enough to have as our second midwife and she also lives close by.
Similarly to Lynne, Kerry expected us to be at the birth house most of the night so slowly made her way in.
I remember the joy seeing Kerry walk through the door as I had started to think Reagan might have been delivering bubs by himself. Kerry took over, got Reagan to put on my birth play list, calmed my breathing down and put my mind at ease. Reagan called my mum and Lynne and told them both to get down asap. Lynne and my mum both arrived within a couple of minutes of each other and my mum held the shower head and talked me through each surge.

It was perfect timing as within a couple of minutes I was starting to push. 11.04pm Laurence Neville was born. Surrounded by the love of his Mum, Dad and two grandmas. My whole labour was guided by my body, I listened to what I needed to do to and thought back to our calm birth classes remembering this was what I was made to do.

After a couple of minutes cuddling in the shower and a natural delivery of the placenta we had our first feed at the birth house before we had to get transferred to the hospital due to some bleeding. The hospital staff were truly beautiful and caring and it was a quick stay and an iron infusion before heading home that afternoon.

Covid was a blessing for our birth. We discovered the Birth House which we would not have otherwise considered which I would now love to use again when the time comes. It also meant that both Reagan’s and My mum could be at the birth which had it not have been for covid my mum would have been overseas for another 2 weeks and Reagan was meant to be interstate that day.