Leah’s Story

It’s hard to believe it, but we’ve been enjoying our baby-moon for an entire month now.

On Friday August 8th (our guess date) I awoke at 4 am with mild cramping, hoping that this was the beginnings of labour, but not wanting to be overly optimistic I decided to get some more sleep, not
wake Darcy, and see how things progressed.

We both awoke around 8am and decided to start our day, hopeful that this was it. From 4am till 9am I had experienced mild surges coming regularly every 10 minutes, at 9am the intensity subsided and the
surges became very irregular occurring about every 20-25 minutes.

We were pretty sure that this was the end of one chapter and the beginning of a whole new one, but since it seemed to be in the very early stages we decided to carry on with our day as if was any other
ordinary day. We went to our favourite coffee shop for breakfast, ran a few errands, and went for a walk; neither one of us willing to admit what was in the process of happening.

We arrived back at home around 1pm and contacted our midwife, Christie. The surges were still very mild and erratic and Christie said that while it did sound as if what I was experiencing was labour it was still early and to call her if the surges progressed to about 5 minutes apart. Failing receiving a call from us she would come by and visit us around 7pm.

Darcy and I set about accomplishing a few tasks around the house,
watched a movie and had dinner. At 7pm our midwife arrived to examine me, and discovered that I was 4cm dilated, though the surges that I was experiencing we still very erratic and in her eyes not strong enough to push a baby out. She stayed with us at the house until 8pm, during which time I only experienced three mild surges; we were told that we would be having this baby some time this weekend, but not tonight. She suggested that we go for a walk and gave us instructions to call when the surges progressed to 6-7 minutes apart.

We cancelled our plans for that evening and thinking that we were going to be at this for a bit Darcy and I decided to walk over to get ice cream and a movie. During the very short walk to the movie store
my surges became much more intense — I now had to stop and breath through them. Darcy held me during them and remind me to stay relaxed. When we made it to the movie store we quickly picked a
movie, still anticipating that we could be at this for hours, and grabbed some ice cream and headed for home. During the walk home the surges became more intense and as soon as we walked in the door the movie was thrown on the couch, the ice cream in the freezer and we headed up stairs to relax in the birthing tub.

While we were in the tub Darcy led me through a deepening practice and supported and talked me through each surge. At this point Darcy recognized that the surges were becoming more consuming and coming much faster; he got out of the tub to get a watch (we had no clock in the birthing room). During the time it took him to walk down the hall I had two very intense surges, and we decided that rather than time the surges Darcy would just page our midwife and let her know that things were quickly progressing.

We paged Christie at 9pm, and she phoned us back and said that she was on her way.

At this point I wanted to get out of the tub and move to the bed for the birth; during the move down the hall I experienced five very intense surges, one right after the other, and I barely had time to
breath before another was on its way. Darcy supported me (physically and emotionally) during these surges. He remained positive and kept reminding me that every surge brought us one step closer to having our precious baby.

Darcy paged the midwife a second time at 9:18pm — “Leah says hurry.”

At 9:20pm Christie arrived and found that I was 10cm dilated and ready to birth. Our second midwife had not yet arrived and Christie wasn’t set up yet, so I was given instructions to do my best to ignore
the wishes of my body and hold the baby in.

At 9:58pm the second midwife arrived and my membranes — which at this point were bulging and were the only thing keeping the baby from being born — were released.

At 10:27pm on 08/08/08 after a few pushes Lola Montgomery was born. She weighed in at 6lbs 13 oz and measured 20 inches, and both mom and dad were immediately in love and amazed at the entire birth process.

While the process was incredibly quick it was also amazingly intense and the techniques from the hypnobirthing classes allowed us to maintain a sense of control and calm over a crazy process.
Being at home during this entire experience was amazing, the greatest thing being that for the majority of the process it was just Darcy and me hanging out. It made Lola’s birth an incredibly personal and intimate experience.

All our best to you and all your HypnoBirthing babies!
Leah + Darcy +Lola