Shari's Birth Story

This post is the birth story of my daughter, Charlotte Joy ("Shari"). This will probably end up being quite a long story, so if you like hearing about birth and have some time on your hands, grab a cup of tea and read on.

I thought for quite a while about whether to post this story publicly on the internet, but decided that I would because I love reading birth stories myself and I know of other people who also do.  Sorry in advance if there are any parts that have too much information...

Shari was born on 30 November 2019. 38 weeks, 2 days gestation. 6 lb 1 oz (2.75 kg).

My waters broke at 2:15am when I got up to use the bathroom. They were an initial small gush into the toilet and I knew it wasn’t urine. They continued to gush/drip and I soaked through a couple of pads relatively quickly. I went back to bed with a towel under me and David woke up. I told him what had happened and we talked about it for a little bit, and then we both thought we should try and get some sleep. Every time I moved in bed there was another bit of leaking of my waters.  I remember finding the leaking really annoying.

I had the first contraction at 2:40am. This wasn’t too painful, and I lay in bed while I had a few more contractions. They were around 5 minutes apart to begin with. While I was having a contraction, I would have my hand on my belly and try to relax my whole body, and kept thinking/praying in my head, “I bless my body to do what it needs to do.”

Very quickly I knew I wasn’t going to be able to sleep. So I told David to get some sleep as I knew I'd need him more later on in the labour, and got up. I went and sat on a towel on the couch in the dining room because our lounge wasn’t usable (we were in the middle of doing some renovations and preparing for the installation of a fireplace). I turned on my phone and thought, who can I tell I’m in labour? As it was so early in the morning, I couldn’t think of anyone who would be up. I scrolled through Facebook and Instagram for a bit and then thought of my sister Sophie on the other side of the world. I had no idea what the time there would be and whether she would be available, but I messaged her and asked what she was up to. She immediately replied saying it was Friday evening for her and she was free. I told her what was happening and we decided to video chat so she could help me keep my mind off the contractions. We started the video chat at 3:30am and talked for a good while. While I was talking to her, I was moving around a bit as the contractions were getting steadily closer together and more annoying. I did the small number of dishes sitting on the bench while talking to Sophie. Every time I had a contraction I would angle the phone away from my face and breathe through the contraction, concentrating, and then after it I would keep talking. It was really helpful talking to her, however at around 4:15am there was only 2 minutes break between contractions and I wanted some more support with them, and my sister had to leave shortly anyway. So we rang off.

I went and got my maternity notes book from the car and David heard the garage door opening and obviously wondered what I was doing, so came out from the bedroom. I was glad he had woken up and asked if he could get up now, and give me support during the contractions, and help me time them. We started timing them and also started walking around the house, getting stuff organised for heading to hospital. The contractions stayed 3 minutes apart (2 minutes break between them) but got longer and longer. For most of them, I would hold on to something and rock my hips side to side. That really helped. I felt all of the pain wrapping around my lower abdomen, not on my entire belly, and not in my back at all.

When they got more painful I just sort of slumped against the wall in the bedroom with a hot water bottle against my belly, just breathing through the pain and thinking, I wonder if it’s time to call the midwife yet?!

I eventually decided at 5:45 that we should call the midwife as I was finding it so intense. I knew that I was supposed to call her when contractions were 3 mins apart (2 minutes break between them), lasting 1 minute long, and had been like that for 1 hour. Well they hadn’t been like that because they weren’t lasting a whole minute. But I said I wanted to call her so we did. My normal midwife wasn’t on call as it was her weekend off. So I called my backup midwife. I obviously didn’t sound like I was in enough pain. She could tell how long the contractions were lasting for because I would go quiet during a contraction and David would speak, then I would start talking again when it eased. These things made the midwife think that I wasn’t especially far along in the labour and had a ways to go yet. She was very sweet and gentle but told me that first time mums often have quite long labours, and that the contractions needed to intensify quite a bit before we went to the hospital. She did say that we could go in to hospital now if we wanted to, but said her recommendation was that we stayed home for longer.

I got off the phone feeling discouraged, because although I knew it was likely to go on for a lot longer, the contractions were SUPER intense and I was definitely starting to feel like I needed some sort of pain relief other than the hot water bottle. I was sort of in a pain induced daze and felt really out of it. I wondered how on earth I was going to manage if the labour was going to be hours longer. Looking back I was actually in transition at this point. I threw up once somewhere around this time.  Anyway, I really wanted some sort of pain relief so David ran the bath and I went and got into it (about 6:10 am).

Once I was in the bath, almost immediately, I started having some really agonising contractions and I felt like pushing. I started completely panicking at this point because the midwife had said the contractions needed to intensify more before we went to hospital, and I wondered whether this was just the contractions intensifying more. I knew that they were so painful there was no way I could do this for hours longer. I also knew that most people experience the desire to push when they are at the end of the labour, and the baby is about to come out. However I had thought there was a lot longer to go! I was really scared. I told David I was scared and I wanted to push and didn’t know what to do. (Well actually I was screaming and saying this.) I asked him to call the midwife back. He called her at 6:12am.

The contractions made me feel like an animal. I don’t think it helped that I was really scared and didn’t know what my body was doing. I started doing a sort of scream/moan for each push and started pushing along with the contractions because the urge just overtook me. My husband had the phone on speaker so the midwife could hear the noise I was making. She could tell things had changed very rapidly! She told us to get to the hospital as fast as we could. At this point there was no way I was going anywhere, and I said I was staying put. So she jumped in her car and told us she was coming as fast as she could, and said to ring her back and call an ambulance if we could see the baby's head, and also told me to try not to push.

Well, the contractions were coming thick and fast and I couldn’t really not push! I ignored her advice and kept pushing. I think a woman who has been in labour and knows what it is like would understand. You have this overwhelming urge in your body to get this baby out, and you just can’t help going along with it. That was how I found it, anyway.

I was kneeling in the bath, leaning over the side of it, with my hands on the floor, facing into the bathroom, and David was in the bathroom right next to me, supporting me and praying for me. Every time a contraction would start I would say “Jesus, help me!” and go right back to pushing as hard as I could and making a lot of noise! It was really scary.  I felt really overtaken by the pain and totally didn't feel in control of my body whatsoever.

At one point between pushes I put my fingers up a little way into my birth canal and I could feel what I thought was my baby’s head. After the next contraction I did the same and I could feel that it had moved down. This was really encouraging because I was sure I was making progress, through the agony of the pushes.

At the point where I could feel Shari's head, David called the midwife back on one phone and dialled for an ambulance on another phone. This was at about 6:20am. He had both of them on speaker (so they could hear what each other was saying as well) and was alternating talking to them.

The ambulance operator was super unhelpful and told David to get me out of the bath and put me on the bed, on my back, to try and slow the labour down. There was no way I was able to go anywhere, and I refused to move. The thought of losing the only thing that was helping the pain (the water) was terrifying and I was in too much pain to move, anyway. At one point the midwife told David to pull the plug out of the bath. I feel sorry for him - with the midwife and ambulance on the phone telling him what to do, and his wife screaming in agony next to him and stubbornly refusing to do what the medical people wanted him to do, it wasn’t a nice situation for him to be in! He was trying to be firm but gentle with me and told me I needed to get out of the bath. I refused. At one point he pulled the plug out of the bath and I put it back in! Through it all he was so loving and gentle and was praying for me as well. I don’t think I could have done it without him.

And then, we could literally see her head. The top of her head was crowning at the end of the birth canal, and we could see her dark hair right there really easily. Her whole head wasn’t out, just the top of it. I didn't feel a ring of fire which I'm grateful for.

Once we could see her head, I gave another push with the next contraction, and Shari's whole body just slid out all at once into the bath. I picked her up, out of the bath, and asked my husband what the time was. He told me it was 6:30am. He told the midwife and the ambulance operator the baby had been born and the ambulance operator asked if the baby was breathing. She was pink and crying, so she was definitely breathing!

I held her and checked to make sure we had a girl like we had been told at the ultrasound. Yes, definitely a girl! I sat there in the bath, just holding my baby, unable to believe how fast she had arrived, and then the midwife arrived at 6:34am, just before the ambulance did. 

The whole labour was 3 hours and 50 minutes from the first contraction to birth.

I didn't even tear even though I had been pushing while my daughter was crowning!

 Such a cute little bundle

I’m so grateful to the Lord for how everything happened. Although it was super intense and I felt really scared, it was a quick labour (which I am really grateful for) and God was with us and he kept us safe.  

And mostly I am praising the Lord for our gorgeous baby who is such a blessing to our lives!

She was so tiny when she was born...

And here she is now! The cutest 3.5 month old baby you ever did see.  Super smiley, happy and (mostly) content! We have been blessed.