09/02/2026
Laura was a first time Mum who attended my pregnancy yoga classes in Dartford the whole way through her pregnancy. Once in her third trimester she also attended my group hypnobirthing course with her husband. She went on to have the most straight forward water birth at Darent Valley birth centre:
As a first time Mum with her first pregnancy I assumed my pregnancy would most likely run over 40 weeks, and prepared for a long labour with lots of different interventions and pain management methods to work through. I have always been scared of the pain and process of both pregnancy and childbirth, and although my pregnancy had been healthy that fear of birth led me to attending hypnobirthing and pregnancy yoga classes. Turns out making any assumptions about your labour and birth is only a guess, as baby girl was born 10 days early after only five and a half hours of labour!
I awoke in the night at around 4am at 38w+4 to some strong period pain like cramping that would build in intensity and then go away. I thought “this could be something, or it could be nothing. Let’s rest”. I subsequently had two more quite soon after and thought I should keep an eye on them.
I checked my phone at 4.30am and started writing down when each “cramp” came. It was every 10 minutes. I listened to a hypnobirthing track and used my breathing to keep the pain under control and woke my husband, Ish, and I told him it could be nothing but I was having contraction like cramps. They were getting more intense so I timed them and at 5.30 they were coming every 7 minutes and lasting at least 50 seconds. I handed over timing to my husband but it was pretty clear things were getting more painful and closer together quickly. Time was flying at this point, and I remembered Colleen’s advice to focus on the painless time between contractions rather than focusing on the contractions which helped me to get some rest every few minutes. By 6am they were every three or four minutes, and we made a plan to call the birth centre in half an hour.
I was listening to my hypnobirthing tracks, used the birth ball to be in a kneeling position, and was squeezing my spiky ball during contractions to counteract some of the pain elsewhere in my body. All of these tips for positioning and pain management were covered as part of the Bloom and Flow hypnobirthing course.
My husband coached me through my breathing and doing different pressure and massage techniques on my back. The contractions were ramping up in intensity quite quickly, so the change in techniques and approach every few contractions was necessary for me. At 6.30am Ish ran me a bath and we spoke to the hospital while I was in it and I had two contractions while on the phone. They told me to come in and be assessed when I was ready. I was aware that often women get sent home after assessment to continue to labour in a calm safe space until they’ve progressed into the first/active stage of labour post 4cm, so we took our time labouring and getting ourselves ready to get to the hospital calmly (but keeping an eye on the infamous Dartford traffic!).
It took us an hour to leave the house as I got ready slowly in-between contractions, and by 7.45am contractions were really really intense and I felt like I had to go to the birth centre NOW. I breathed through two contractions on the ten minute car journey, window open for fresh air and had another in the car before walking into the hospital.
We got to the birth centre (after the longest walk of my life) just after 8.15am and instead of being assessed on Tambootie they saw how frequent and intense my contractions were and sent me straight to the birth centre. When we got to our room I lost my mucus plug when I went for a wee. The room we were given was the one we had previously seen on a tour of the Birth Centre that the antenatal education team offer which was quite funny, the space felt safe and ‘known’ because of seeing it before.
By now contractions were so intense and felt quite overwhelming as I was still fully clothed and ‘in public’, and I said to my husband that regardless of what they said I knew this baby was going to come soon and I didn’t want to go home. At 8.30am the midwife asked if she could do an examination and I consented very enthusiastically. For me the vaginal exam didn’t hurt or feel uncomfortable and I was at 6cm, just under four hours after my first contraction. My birth preferences were to only know my dilation if I consent to it, as I didn’t think hearing how dilated I was would contribute to a calm or relaxed approach to labour if I didn’t think “I had progressed enough” (more on that later). However it was really helpful to hear I was 6cm, and that meant we didn’t have to advocate for ourselves to stay in the birth centre which was my preference (I don’t think they’d have got me to leave regardless to be honest – I was posted up!).
Ish set up the tens machine (which we hadn’t practised yet as that was a job for the coming weekend, oops!) and that helped alongside squeezing the spiky ball for the next few contractions while the pool was filled. I started on the gas and air and found this useful to keep my breathing deep and rhythmic, as contractions were really strong and really close together. The duration of the painless periods between contractions were getting shorter, and I focused on closing my eyes and resting fully during those minutes.
By 9am, an hour after we got to the hospital car park, I was in the pool which felt better but I was getting the urge to push and Ish got in with me as I wanted to hold onto him as it was so intense. My body was in control of wanting to push/bear down and I hit the transition moment of saying I couldn’t do it and I wanted to go home! It’s true that when you hit that stage you go a little crazy, I’d heard about the stage many times and I didn’t even know I was in it. That’s when both my midwife and my husband reminded me that baby is coming NOW and I’m about to meet my baby and got me focused that it was time. My waters hadn’t broken yet so it felt really weird and really intense and full, but once they broke on one of my pushes at 9.34am I felt better and more focused.
My husband coached me through my contractions and pushing really calmly, and reminded me to breathe using the gas and air to encourage deep breaths. I was quite loud at this stage while pushing, so the midwife encouraged me to bear down. I also remembered Colleen’s guidance to make sound/noise from your stomach and lower body rather than from your chest/high pitched. This really helped on my out breaths and felt really releasing. It helped me focus on bearing down to push and to take control of the birth myself, rather than letting it ‘overwhelm me’.
At 9.51 baby girls head was born in two contractions and her body was born two minutes later on my next contraction. I got to ‘catch her’ in the water and bring her up to my chest where my husband and I got to cuddle our daughter for the first time, in the water together.
My husband had brought his swimming trunks because his preference all along was to get in the water with me if possible, and I’m so glad he got to be close to me during pushing and able to be right there with me and our baby girl the moment she arrived into the world. This was approximately five and a half hours after that first “is this a contraction?” cramp and only an hour and a half from being told I’d reached 6cm (grateful I’ve listened a hundred times at pregnancy yoga that how dilated you are has no correlation to how much time you have until delivery). Despite how intense and powerful the pushing felt, I only had a first degree superficial tear that required no stitches. This had been a really big fear of mine, but during the pushing stage that had left my mind entirely to ensure I was focusing my strength and power on the push rather than holding back in fear.
I was flagged as having an anterior placenta in pregnancy and there was an increased likelihood of a ‘back to back’ baby which I had heard were more painful labours to experience, this is something that had really worried me (and I had discussed this with Colleen in our last hypnobirthing class the week before!). In the end, although labour was intense and painful, baby girl was born in an optimal position, in the water, healthy and happy!
Five minutes later I was on the bed/sofa in the birth centre with my husband holding our baby girl and doing our first feed and skin to skin contact, then I birthed the placenta at approximately 10am. They offered gas and air for this but I found I didn’t need it and just did some deep breaths instead. Then we were left for our golden hour together and we were still a bit shell shocked from her coming early and quickly!
I had been so calm and relaxed about finishing up at work for maternity leave at 37+5d, I had left some organising and bits to do in the house to prepare for baby to keep me busy during maternity before baby arrived and I only ended up doing some of them! My husband had to quickly put together our bedside crib that evening when we got back from the hospital! I was absolutely convinced that baby wouldn’t be early, let alone 10 days!
I contribute a lot of my calm and relaxed approach to pregnancy and birth to be from the yoga classes and hypnobirthing techniques that Colleen and the other ladies in the classes gave to me. I felt so much more confident, armed with knowledge, and knowing what my birth preferences were and what options and choices I had. I went from being really scared of giving birth, to giving birth in the pool on the birth centre with just gas and air and my breathing techniques. Whilst labour felt like a whirlwind due to the surprise of it being early and quite fast, straight after birth I was sitting up, baby to my breast, and chatting away to my husband and the midwife. I had such a positive experience and I am so proud of safely bringing my daughter into the world.
