Samantha’s positive unmedicated hospital birth story
The story of Samantha’s unmedicated, positive hospital birth to her daughter, including how she managed labour sensations and early labour at home.
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How would you describe your birth?
Empowering and magical
Top things she did to deal with labour sensations
Used exercise ball
Breath work
Stayed active
Carried on with everyday activity in early labour.
Samantha’s birth story
It was my first birth (second pregnancy due to a precious miscarriage) and I had a spontaneous, natural, unmedicated vaginal birth.
I was in ‘active labour’ for 21 hours and managed to labour at home for 18 of those hours.
Early labour
Throughout the day, I went about my regular activity, bounced on my exercise ball and was breathing through the contractions. I mowed the lawns, did some kerb walking, visited my mum - my early labour was very chill! Contractions were super mild.
As the contractions ramped up, I let the hot water run on my back in the shower. When the contractions got to around 2 minutes apart, I went into the hospital with my fiancée.
At the hospital
Within the first 2 hours, my waters broke on the bed and I begin pushing. Four pushes later and our little Lexi girl was out. I had the most beautiful midwife present, along with Chris, my partner. I think I really just listened to my body, pushed when it was telling me to push and breathed through it.
As cliche as it sounds, the female body just knows when to go into autopilot and do its things.
Dealing with contractions
I was really just trying to breathe through my contractions instead of holding my breath - I found this super challenging, but when I did, it helped so much.
My partner was just present, reassuring me that I could do this. My midwife was helping me with the breathing - reminding me to do the breaths, because it helped me.
After birth
I felt the biggest sense of love and security post birth. I felt as though I was the strongest person in the world and it was all because of this little life we created.