‘It's not often you hear a positive birth story, but it's important that you do’
Since this piece was written, Rose, a 36-year-old writer living in Bath and author of WH's The Mumologue's column, has given birth to her second son. This piece refers to her experience welcoming her first child into the world.
It’s dark outside and heavy rain is pitter-pattering rhythmically on the window panes. The room is quiet, except for the soft, pre-selected piano music emanating from the speaker. Fairy lights are draped over various surfaces and the gentle scent of lavender oil laces the air.
To my left, my husband is standing, squeezing my hand and kissing my forehead. ‘You can do this, you are doing it!’ he says.
On my right is Rebecca, our lovely midwife, who has been guiding us through the past six or so hours of labour. I’ve had an epidural and feel floaty from the gas and air I’ve been breathing in and out. My pain is intense but manageable, and I can feel every single one of the sensations moving through my body.
‘One more push and we’ll deliver the head,’ Rebecca says. I look at my husband one last time before throwing all my weight into the next push. The surge through my body is intense and I grunt and groan in pain. My eyes are closed; my focus more singular than it's ever been in my life.
And then it happens. I feel a popping sensation in my lower pelvis and my whole body relaxes. ‘Oh my god!’ my husband says to me. ‘He’s beautiful.’
Contraction and expansion
I let go of everything as my body pushes his shoulders out. As he's placed on my chest I look at him and think to myself that he is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. Tears swell from the corners of my eyes and down my cheeks.
I’m deep in shock at what my body has just done but so very in awe of the tiny, wriggling creature crying into me. A baby: my baby. My son. I am a mother. I am his mother. And he is perfect.
‘I’ll never let you go,’ I whisper gently into his tiny little ears as my husband pulls us both in for the longest, warmest hug I’ve ever had in my life. We both feel a sense of peace and completeness fill us up. Today – the early hours of a Sunday two summers ago – is by far the best day of our lives.
This description of birth, one which, yes, took place in an NHS hospital, might sound like a work of fiction or something I idealised in my head long before the fact. But it’s not.
Given that my birth story began with an induction, you might not ordinarily expect it to have had a positive outcome. You might even find it strange to hear that my first birth far exceeded any expectations I had prior to setting foot in the hospital, or that my partner and I look back fondly — not just at the healthy delivery of our son — but at the whole labour process.
At this point, it feels important to acknowledge how lucky I am to be able to say this. I know that this is not the case for far too many women, many of whom, in a broken system, suffer birth trauma. We live in a time in which Black women are nearly four times as likely to die in pregnancy and childbirth and in which systemic failings mean that the experience of labour is, for some, an ordeal with on-going ramifications.
It is also one of the areas of parenting in which sharing a positive experience feels wholly insensitive to those who haven’t been so fortunate — and a lot like showing off, which makes me wince.
The reason I want to share my positive tale, though, is because according to Megan Rossiter, founder of the Birth-Ed method and former midwife, it is vital to share stories of births that went well. This is especially true of medically assisted births, she says, in an environment in which only 43% of women were given the opportunity to go into spontaneous labour last year, according to NHS figures.
There's a lot to say about that in itself. But, for now, I’m going to focus on the reality – that if more women giving birth with intervention, it’s important that while being informed and cognisant of the risks, they hear positive stories, too.
Story time
Rossiter agrees. ‘Once a woman has decided that an induction feels like the right path for her care,’ she explains, ‘hearing positive experiences can be a real source of reassurance, inspiration and passed-down wisdom for her as she prepares for her own induction of labour.’
In our case, being able to take some of the uncertainty out of the birth preparation process helped us to feel a little more in control.
After months of flip-flopping back and forth about how labour might start and my increasingly unhinged attempts to try to induce birth ‘naturally’ myself (hello sex, spicy food, swimming in cold water and an incredibly specific aubergine parmigiana recipe) we had made an informed decision to have the procedure.
It also meant that, unless the baby had his own ideas ahead of our planned induction date, we knew when labour was likely to start and where. In turn, this meant we could do everything in our power to make the experience a pleasant one.
Take the final day before we were due to go into hospital. We made snacks to take with us, downloaded episodes of Junior Bake Off for easy watching, looked through our birth notes and made a plan to keep an open mind and take decisions as they came.
Considering how you'll make decisions as you go through labour is something Rossiter encourages. If, like me, you are induced, she advises continuing to actively make choices through the process. ‘See it not as “I've accepted an induction so now do what you want with me”’, she says.
‘But instead “I've accepted the first step of the induction process.. I will make a new decision at every stage,” in the knowledge that you can always ask for time, alternatives or to ‘opt out’ at any point.’
Fork in the road
This is the mindset we had going into the hospital and it helped us tremendously. Every time there was a choice to make it was considered calmly. In the end, this meant having my waters manually broken, accepting an epidural and syntocinon (a synthetic form of oxytocin often administered to speed up labour) alongside lots of gas and air.
For me, the pain medication gave me the space and time I needed to breathe, rest and prepare for the pushing stage of labour. It also allowed me to feel excited and look forward to the next part, knowing the pain was at a manageable level.
My son has now turned two and I'm expecting my second child. Safe to say, birth has been on my mind a lot lately. Last month, the All Party Parliamentary Group for Birth Trauma published the harrowing results of an inquiry into the systemic ways in which an under-resourced maternity system has resulted in devastating realities for women, the country over.
And while it’s so important to listen to these stories and shout them out loud to fight for the change we so desperately need, I think it’s also important that we hear from women for whom birth was good and for whom it was a mixed bag; an intense ride that was neither traumatic or ecstatic, but a necessary pathway to meeting their child.
Rossiter agrees. ‘There should be space for all women to share their birth experiences, the easy and the hard, the empowering and the traumatic and all the nuances that exist in between,’ she says.
Sharing birth stories, Rossiter explains, provides women with an effective way of processing their experiences. ‘There is wisdom to be gained from every birth experience, and space should be made for all.’
Birth for anyone, but especially a first-time parent, is an unknown territory. You can read as many books and take as many classes as you like, but, when labour begins, you’re on a journey with multiple different pathways leading towards the exit.
As I look towards my second birth, I feel cautiously optimistic about what is to come. It is my deepest wish that one day many more women get to experience a birth that makes them feel empowered and strong in the same way mine did. Or, the very least, not left with trauma.
It may be a while off, but I am certain that sharing our experiences, good, bad and okay, as loudly as we can, is part of the path to getting us there.
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