Safia's Home Birth
Chapter 1
My labour started in my 40th week of pregnancy with a slow leak of my waters,
I had heard that early labour can be very slow especially in first time mothers so
I wasn’t concerned. I informed my Doula and we discussed my options. I new that I had read that waters going before contractions doesn’t need to mean a problem.
It can just be the labour process starting in its own organic way for my birth, as all births are so different. However in a few cases it can lead to infection, so I learnt about ways to avoid this. I monitored my temperature and followed steps to reduce the chance of infection as advised by Docters. The main one being avoiding anything going inside you.
I had had a healthy pregnancy which I had been very connected to and in my body and my gut I felt very calm. I didn’t feel at all unwell and my baby was moving completely normally, which are the signposts to watch out for any changes in the case of infection. I continued to monitor this and decided to wait before telling any Midwifes or Docters. As I knew that involving them would involve them starting the clock of what’s “ normal”. Which would intern raise my stress and anxiety levels which wouldn’t be conducive to help my labour progress. We had been told that sometimes the best thing is to ignore the early signs of labour so that you don’t put the breaks on the oxytocin production, so along with taking the above safety procedures that’s what we did.
The way that I live is unique our home is a 1920’s showman’s wagon, similar to a converted railway carriage. We live as part of a community with 25 other people, adults and children living in a similar way. So the environment can be quite lively especially in the middle of a mid summer heat wave, which we were simmering in. During my pregnancy I became fascinated in the natural birth process and the innate wisdom the body holds. Me and my partner were in awe learning about the intricate cascade of hormones released in physiological birth and the ways you can support the body to reach this state . Especially the illusive oxytocin often called the shy hormone the key ingredient which flows with love and safety and is blocked by stress and anxiety.
Knowing my self and my sensitivities to my environment at the best of times as some one who has suffered with anxiety most of my life. We spent months practicing ways to create a hormone rich bubble and techniques to encourage my to body feel safe to support the birthing process. So during the pregnancy I planned to have a home birth at my mums house, knowing that for me personally a hospital environment wouldn’t be conducive for my bodies needs in laboring naturally. I set up my care with two separate midwife trusts and organized a home birth with both teams just incase.
We were not surprised that my labour hadn’t progressed so far in our home environment. So we packed our bags to go to my mums house, to set up our oxytocin bubble. As soon as we left where we live and I was in the car I put on a song and got out of my head and into my body- I began to feel cramps and rushes of emotion flooding through my body. Something I recognized as surges of early labour.
We arrived at my mums and quickly realized this wasn’t necessarily the same arrangement as we originally thought, we thought we would have her house to our selves and she would go to spend a few days/ week/ as long as it took with her neighbor which happens to be a very close friend of mine. After a few attempts of explaining our needs and realizing that we were on completely different pages. I didn’t want to upset my mum and I also couldn’t cope with trying to explain our needs and feeling unheard. So I surrendered into just playing along with us all staying together in my mums house, however I had the building concern that my waters had broken and I still hadn’t found the correct environment to let my body “fall’ into labour. Something you can not force and is ultimately down to how relaxed and at ease your body feels, which at this point I was yet to feel apart form in the car when early signs of labour had started. So for me knowing my self and my sensitive nervous system, I still felt my body hadn’t had a good chance to let things flow.
The next day It had been 72 hours since ‘Premature rupture of membranes’ which it was now called as my labour hadn’t progressed inline with the hospital guidelines. I would prefer to call it slow rupture as nothing about it felt premature for me my due date was now the next day, and I was recognizing all signs as me being in a slow early labour. I was learning that the waters reproduce so I was a bit like a leaky tap, fact that contractions hadn’t started yet made complete sense to me as I could feel that my body wasn’t fully at ease. However I had always said that if my labour hadn’t progressed by this point I would inform the midwifes and go to get a check up almost as a compromise, but I was not ready for an induction. So we travel to the Hospital after explaining our situation to a lovely midwife who was open and understanding to our informed decisions we were making.
On route once again when in the safe environment of the car I started having rushes and cramps again.
In the hospital we were met by the lovely supportive midwife I had spoken with on the phone, long story short they check me and my baby over and every thing is fine. The options when your waters go and labour doesn’t progress, after 34 weeks is A- Induction (Active management) or B (Expectant Management). Which is reducing the risk and monitoring infection. The induction would come with vaginal examinations and an insert of Prostaglandins. Two things that would hugely increase the risk of infection. I made an informed decision and opted for B. However this wasn’t ever presented to us as two options or a choice.
The midwife caring for us was very supportive and understanding but they of course have to explain the risks of waiting to me. So they pull in the ‘Oxytocin killers’ a name used by the midwife and they did not disappoint. They brought in a consultant who laid 1000 daggers with her every look. She went on to put the fear of death into us ( literally- telling us our baby HAS sepsis) and a thick coating of judgment with every glance. There was a passing threat when the baby is born it will need to be monitored. This wasn’t clearly stated and Raph didn’t even hear the consultant say this, as it was a most muttered at the end of long list of damage we were exposing our baby to. I was aware of the risks but for me I felt induction comes with more risk to my baby than expectant management.
I wasn’t pushing for a home birth because it was some far out idea I had got into my head that served a purpose more for my ego than for my baby’s health. I was pushing for a home birth because I had done research into the benefits a physiological birth can have on your baby. Knowing my self and being someone susceptible to anxiety and being so sensitive to my surroundings. I really didn’t think that was going to unfold for me if it was interrupted by intervention and the constant monitoring that would come with it in hospital. Especially not an induction that would put me at a much higher risk of infection as it is inserted inside me then its progress in monitored with vaginal examinations. This seemed like an option that wasn’t better for my baby at all. I gauged the situation and made an informed choice as I naively thought it was a choice. I trusted in nature and my bodies innate capability’s and I went on to be punished for this.
As we leave we arrange midwife visits to check the baby’s heart rate and blood tests to check the rate of infection in my blood and are thankful for this care. We explain that our cut of point for waiting for labour to start if all is well would be the following Tuesday which gives us another 48 hours to encourage full labour to occur naturally. As even with the induction they were offering it can take up to 48 hours to begin to work. They say that the neonatal Docters will call us, we say ok and are willing to speak to them on the phone. (They don’t ever call)
We go back to my mums house and wait.
On Monday a very helpful community midwife comes to check me and the baby over. She says she has been thinking about why I wouldn’t not be going into full labour and maybe the baby is not right position. This made a lot of sense as I had suffered with PSD Pelvic girdle pain through out the pregnancy and hadn’t been able to walk more than a few steps for months, then since my waters had broken I had been able to walk with ease again. I really appreciated personalized care approach to try to look at ways to help my individual situation rather than a blanket worst case scenario.
I also went and chatted with my friend who is my mums neighbor and explained the situation, which couldn’t be better described than ‘ I feel like cat searching for a dark cupboard to give birth in’. She is a dog owner and was quick to understand birth as an animalistic venture that required privacy and inward focus. She said she was going away and we could use her house. I will never forget that feeling of relief to be fully heard and understood with such ease, the whole thing was the biggest gift of my life to date.
She began to pack her bags immediately and within an hour we had moved into her house. I got on my birth ball and unwound on my yoga mat releasing tension that had been building along with the situation and the mid June heatwave that had reached a peak. That night we went to bed feeling so much calmer less observed and more open. The day of induction was getting closer but I felt very hopeful knowing I would meet my baby soon.
Chapter 2
At 3 o clock in the morning I woke up to period cramps and the sound of the river flowing out of the window. I new he was coming. I left Raph sleeping and wanted to tread carefully knowing labour’s shy tendency’s and there was still a chance it could slow down again.
I went down stairs and was greeted by the dim morning light and a soothing sight of rain drops dancing down the window pane a welcome sight of cool release. I had an overwhelming feeling of letting go and a shift in energy like a purge of the stress that had build. The sound of the rushing water felt like a cooling wash of purification over my whole system.
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It turned out this labour wasn’t shy at all and the cramps evolved into surges then quite quickly into eruptions through out my body. Raph woke up at 7am and by 10 am I was nearing 3 contractions every 10 minutes and struggling to move or walk with out the surges rippling through out my whole body and Immobilizing me, shattering my edges.
We tried to eat, as I had the nurses voice from Saturday saying ‘Eat its a marathon not a sprint’. We tried to watch David Attenborough I felt as though watching animals might be a good way to ride it out, whilst encouraging my body into its animalistic routes. We then did full circle and tried to watch Pretty Women, I’m only reflecting on the hilarious contrast of the two programs now. Their wasn’t much watching as It become an inward feet pretty quickly. So Richard gear and Juilia Roberts ended up being a frozen back drop for the next 18 hrs. luckily I was blissfully oblivious to their presence.
The outside world was melting into a blur and I was soon being devoured by the sensations of my baby entering our world. I was falling deeper and deeper with every surge toward the veil of my world and his. An inward spiral, lead by the souls gravitational pull. Surrendering out of my mind in to my body.- in in in in and beyond- becoming my own black hole.
Flits of normal life kept coming and grabbing me out of the deep well of existence, people were appearing like glitches in time. The Midwife from the day before had arrived at some point, then our Doula, it continued like this. More Midwives, more surges, more evaporating, less of me more of it. Tools popping in and holding my hand. First the tens machine, oh the glorious tens machine I was glad I forgot it existed until I had been pushed to my first edge. Then I met the pool, I was reluctant to get in as it involved letting go of the my new best friend - the tens machine. The breath was the guiding light, the focus and anchor in the storm. Making the whole thing like one hell of an intense meditation. If I stayed on top of the breath like a wave above water. If I kept every cell in my body open and still, then the surges erupted up, up and out of me like hot lava out of volcano rather than slamming into me.
It was an out of body experience and the most embodied experience all at once, extraordinary and completely ordinary. If I moved my hips it became furious and I was wanting to catch up with my self. Gas and air was blurring the edges even more, I was using it to try to slow it all down. Later finding out Zaynu was back to back and that maybe my body was trying to flip him. Trying to stay calm and open. I became lost in it, the only way to navigate through it is to get fully lost in it. Letting go of my edges the space between self and it, I fully surrendered to becoming the pain becoming the force. Remembering my mantras and making some new ones ‘You can do any thing for 24 hours or 48, this isn’t forever. Stay open, stay soft, breath release let go.’
‘be the water, strong and fluid, let it flow, through and out.’
At one point I got up and started swaying, then the midwifes got up ‘ oh that’s it safia move with it’.. oh look were all dancing with you’ - I felt a connection with every woman who has come before me and everyone who will come after me.
“Eyes inwards energy inwards, breath release let go.”
I was becoming my own black hole.
I had been pushed through all of my edges, it had gone beyond, it couldn’t flow through me anymore it’s was getting stuck. Time bends- its was my whole life and a split second all at once. The pressure was meeting a block, it couldn’t move through me it was down instead of forwards and through. The pain had taken over everything that every was and will ever be, its was all that existed. The voices around me guided me to get into all of the positions that make the pain furious, move my hips, lye on my side.
I was trowing up on my self, I lifted my head “ this is awesome” The only relief, was the pressure from vomiting opening me. I surrendered into inviting death into tango, there’s was no way out, I needed to go through. He was stuck. His heart rate is dropping I need to get him out.
My physical body arrived into a squat with Raph supporting me with a rebozo, the rest of me had gone even deeper into our joint existence we began to move into the pain, completely devoured, we begin to rock to thrust. A clear visualization took over me, the tops of the trees and the river in the valley below. A sound that didn’t feel like it was mine erupted out of me, traveling from the place I was seeing and exploding out of the core of my being. The river was a channel for the power to surge up and out, up up then forward. He was moving, he was moving forwards. He wasn’t stuck any more I could feel him moving, he was coming, I could flow again. I roared and thrust and roared and thrust, we can do this. I felt magnificent I felt transcendent, I was the creator of life its self.
I reached down and his head was bulging and my internal dialog that went a bit like this ‘gentle gentle butterfly breath’ 'but I can feel he is just there’ ‘slow slow’ ‘but he is just there’ ‘breathe breathe’ “patience” “ now isn’t the time for patience let me just uuuurrrrrrggggghghghhhhh’
His head was coming, ‘oh yeah that’s why we are doing this, I’m having a baby im not dying’ I was back in the room.
‘Gentle gentle, open open’ He was on the gateway of our world and I was on the threshold of being reborn as a mother. Birth and Rebirth. I felt his head, his hair, I felt me opening, me tearing. ‘I am irrelevant he is everything.’
As I was grasping his head crowning through me, I felt him do a turn. It’s almost mechanical. That moment was as if I had caught the inner workings of our universe mid dance through a gap in the fence, watching the magic that’s supposed to stay hidden, peeling back the corners of our reality.
Feeling it in my blood, in my breath, then in my hands... he is here.
Then a snap back to four walls, noises, people.
“Safia well done”... "Safia your baby is here"... "Safia your cord is very short”... “Safia you’ve said you dont want us to pat him down" ..."Safia take this towel….." I need a minute…. please keep your voices down… "safia how are you feeling?"…
“um like i've been split in two... but that’s ok... he is here..”
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I was scared and in shock, feeling surges of dateline take over me. ‘fuck fuck now I need to look after a baby, my baby, now? like right now? do I get a minute, now now NOW.’
Then my placenta wasn’t coming, but I wasn’t surprised. I didn’t feel like I had caught up, from pregnancy to Mother, just like that. Had I crossed the threshold?
I started loosing a lot of blood, they try the Pitocin (synthetic oxytocin) to stop the bleeding and release my placenta. It doesn’t work, no time to shower. Bundled in a dressing gown with my baby on my chest and put on a stretcher.
Chapter 3
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Outside it was a magical misty morning in the valley, I was filled with fear of being separated from Raph and being the soul responsibility of this new baby when feeling so weak and shaky. We were blue lighted to hospital.
Arriving to hospital wheeled into a room which was soon a flurry of Docters and Nurses filling the room. Everyone talking to me at once. One person explaining the procedure I need to under go in theatre, someone else taking my legs and cleaning the blood off me whilst putting plastic bags on my feet to prepare for theatre. Some one trying to take hold of my baby to try to make him breast feed whilst talking to me about how to make him latch, even though he is latching. Someone trying to find a vein for a canulla in my arm not very confidently. Someone else trying to put in another catheter ( there had been two of these in the birth when I he was stuck) My very sore lady region is ripped to shreds.
They are all fighting for my attention and focus simultaneously whilst the anesthetist goes through the options of drugs for the proceeder to remove my placenta and stop the hemorrhage. All whilst all of this is happening I'm still loosing blood and feeling fainter and fainter. I manage to calmly discuss the options and the fact that I want to be as focused and present for my baby and I don’t want to feel out of it. They ask about checking Zaynu, I ask what checks, then say yes just ask before. I ask when we can leave and the say when the atheistic where’s off.
I was reunited with Raph for a second so he can take Zaynu and I got taken into theatre. The placenta came straight out which stopped the bleeding then the 10 people mostly men behind the curtain take their time stitching me up. Which I later find out was very valuable as my question of have a split my fun stuff in two which they replied with “ no no just a few grazes” turns out I was more accurate on that one.
I got out of surgery and am reunited with Raph and Zaynu, we all cuddle on my hospital bed and Raph happily shows me that Zaynu has done his first poo all over him. We got taken to our hospital room where we spent the day resting, beginning to piece our selfs together. We were so happy and blissed out. We stayed like this most of the day, naps and visits from the kind midwife helping me with breast feeding that I was very very grateful for. He was latching really well and I felt elated that we are both doing so well. It feels so tender and new but also so instinctive. I really appreciated the support but there were times when It felt like there was an air that there was problem but I couldn’t see one. We had just come out of a 23 hour labour where my baby was back to back with no food or sleep then loosing 20% of my total blood and we were actually breast feeding and both healthy and happy.
I felt like a fucking super hero.
At around 6 pm the anesthetic has worn off and me and Raph ask about leaving to go home and what we need to do before we go. They became reluctant and slow with the things to support me to leave, then the midwifes changed over.
The next midwife that came on came in with a real assertive energy that was quite overpowering this air like there was a problem became a little more like a gail. She said we needed to speak to the Neonatal Docters if we wanted to leave. At this point I still felt like a superhuman bullet proof goddess and I didn’t want there fear talk to penetrate mine and Zaynu’s bubble. As I knew that if I got stressed that would be detrimental to Zaynu’s health and wellbeing. Which was the most important thing for Raph and I.
I asked Raph to speak to them which luckily he was happy to. He was gone for about half an hour and when he came back he was in pieces. He tried to keep his calm when explaining to me but I could see he had taken a battering. He explained that they said if we leave they will call the police. They said that Zaynu needs to be monitored for 24 hours. He was thriving, I was mum who had come in for blood loss and retained placenta, at what point was it then about him not being ok? and why wasn’t this communicated to us?
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I obviously feel infuriated as we have received so many mixed messages feeling like we are being talked about not too. They have not been clear with us and our now holding us against our will. However still in my bullet proof newborn muma bubble, Im quick be the calm, positive spin on a shit situation voice which was a new role for me.
I say ‘well this bed with a little remote control is really quite useful and they bring us tea and toast if I push this buzzer and I do feel pretty weak so maybe its for the best.’ Lets just meet them in the middle we arrived at 6 am so we can leave first thing in the morning as then we would of been there for 24 hours.
We all try and get some sleep, Zaynu in the bed with me and Raph in a hospital chair. Zaynu wakes to feed every 2 hours in the night in sync with the checks the nurse comes to do on him, she ruffles her feathers when she comes in and sees me side feeding with him even though the barriers are up on the bed. Once again asking if she can bring me a cot, I calmly say again no thank you we are doing co sleeping and skin on skin. Im not going to put my baby down away from me. Once again there is a gust of the air of concern. I now realize the best thing to do is to play along in these situations. I was naive in thinking it was a choice.
At around 7 am we ask to make the moves towards leaving. The midwife says that we arn’t aloud to leave until 6 pm as she only started checking him at 6pm the night before.
At this point my patience is running out, they keep changing the bar, I keep trying to give them an inch to keep the peace but they keep pushing it. I feel like a caged animal. I express to the midwife that Im here for blood loss my son is healthy this is two separate things. Also that if they haven’t done the appropriate checks that’s on them as I said they could when I arrived at 6 am the day before. She is apologizing and says to me “ keep your self together, you’ve done so so well” Im slightly confused by her wording and feel so stressed by the whole situation but again manage to hold it down and breath through it. But we say we are leaving so please help is to speak to the right people to get discharged.
We wait until 8am for the neonatal Docters to change shift as they wanted to do a physical health check on Zaynu to sign us off to leave.
A new midwife comes on shift, again the huge air of concern with everything she’s saying to me. This language of me having a problem with mothering and struggling is getting louder and louder but it’s still not penetrated the bubble.
They continue to drag there feet but finally the pediatric doctor comes and does a health check for Zaynu, she is a lovley lady who is quite quick to start asking me questions about how I birthed, my experience with hynobirthing and my experience with PSD pubic synthesis disorder. Which she is also struggling with, it was so refreshing to be treated like a human being with my own knowledge and life experience.
The Midwife comes back in and is talking to me about co sleeping and going home with my baby, she goes to leave the room and accidentally leaves a piece of paper on the bed.
That moment.
I lean forward and pick it up and see my name, how I live, my mental health history, my history of addiction, non compliant this non compliant that. A running commentary of judgment about me in some of my most fragile and vulnerable hours. How I am a risk to my baby and am already an incapable mother scrawled across the paper.
I still cant put into the words the feeling in my body as pieced together the last 24 hours in there ‘care’ every interaction every questionable moment suddenly fitted into a very sinister puzzle. I felt a sickening blow of devastation inhabit every cell of my body, with a numbing wash of grief as I felt my positive birth my whole journey to this point dying and there web of judgement becoming the much more respected reality. I was screaming at the top of my lungs watching the windows shatter all around me but staying blank and motionless to the outside eye, knowing that if I react they will get what they want. Suddenly realizing the words of the previous midwife actually trying to protect me.I felt like the years I have spent healing from my mental breakdown trying to work on my deep rooted low self worth, unarming negative core beliefs that I have been drip fed growing up in our society. That I am an unequal member of society because of the color of my skin, my unconventional upbringing, my single parent low income childhood, my differences in how I learn and express my self and how I process the world around me.
All this came tumbling down and I was left with a feeling of shame that I ever believed I could be anything more than inferior, fearful, lesser human being. Feeling so trapped knowing if I react or show any emotion they will get what they want and have more juice for their case against me as an unfit mother. Feeling the power of their distorted reality has over my felt sense of understanding the world.
I felt paralyzed between a contradiction of feeling and being. I felt suffocated, trapped, manipulated, emotionally coerced. An earthquake of fury on the inside, every cell of my body burning. Then a limp emotionless mask on the outside totally helpless. I was genuinely terrified of how any of it would come out, I could feel it eroding me but knowing I needed to be ok for my baby, I needed to get us to safety out of this world and back to our world, the real world.
I got Zaynu dressed to leave with my hands shaking feeling so observed. I got so confused with what to put him in, all of the clothes were so tiny but so big on him- ‘are these tiny socks or tiny mittens?’ I said to my self. I was terrified.
The Nurse talks to me about how im going to carry my baby to the car. I ask ‘in my arms is that ok?’ she replied “yes”
We finally finally go to leave the room, we get two steps outside our door and are met with..“ umm excuse me! You cant carry your baby out of the hospital you need a car seat!”…
I reply in a shaky voice “but my car seat doesn’t have an Isofix base its strapped into the car”
“you don’t have an Isofix base? It’s hospital policy you cant carry your baby to the car”
“….but I just asked the nurse looking after us and she said I could…”
“who was that?!” (..Raph said her name… then they call her over… she puts her arm around me and says “ I AUTHORIZE IT… “
I got passed the reception through the open doors into the corridor and broke down into 1000 tiny pieces. I was shaking and sobbing, I felt absolutely emotionally and physically annihilated, ripped to shreds. I came into the hospital feeling so empowered, invincible, in absolute awe of my body and the strength it took to bring my son into the world. I left an absolute husk…..
I later find out they were building a safe guarding case against me..
So at what point did me making informed choices become a risk and why didn’t they communicate this to me? They communicated all of the risks to me at the beginning when my waters broke and they tried to coerce my decisions. But in this last chapter when I was in hospital with my healthy baby. When did they communicate their fears or relay what was going on behind the scenes? When they spoke to Raph? That was too late as it felt like they were being deceiving by saying I could leave then dragging there feet and using my medication as a tool to keep us there. I don’t blame the individual midwifes, I feel sorry for them being put in that position. Each of them finished their shifts apologizing to us. The damage in this situation came from the system they work within, the blanket fear based approach rather than individualized care. Their lack of honest communication was inhumane and left me feeling discriminated against and objectified. My most empowered moments followed by my most insecure, punished for believing that my body knew how to birth, for trusting in nature and the inherent wisdom each woman’s body holds.
I was naive I thought that how you birth your baby was a choice.