A unique birth story - A planned home birth turned free birth
The birth of Seb
“The most empowering, amazing experience of my life”
I first met Dan and Marijke back in 2021 when they booked a private 121 hypnobirthing course with me at their home in Wakefield. I’m sure that they won’t mind me saying that they both had a very medicalised view of birth, which of course, happens when you are a neo natal nurse and a paramedic.
During the time that I spent with them we really worked on their mindset for birth and built their confidence for labour.
They went on to give this review below and gave birth to baby Freyja who is now 1 (and just the cutest might I add).
I kept in touch with Dan and Marijke and was over the moon to hear that they were expecting their second child and were planning a home birth. I went back to their home in 2022 to deliver a hypnobirthing refresher course for them, it was just amazing to be back with them, talk through Freyja’s birth and help them to prepare for their home birth.
It’s important to say that alongside their hypnobirthing course, Marijke really equipped herself with so much knowledge surrounding home births, she was so prepared and both Dan and Marijke were listening to their hypnobirthing tracks every single night. Marijke even sent me this message just days before she went into labour, proof that hypnobirthing can be so powerful:
I was thrilled when I got a message to say that Seb had arrived at home, in a very quick fashion.
Thank you so much for sharing your story with us, you were absolutely incredible during a whirlwind of a labour and I loved seeing you all and baby Seb this week.
A very quick free birth
“After having done the hypnobirthing course prior to the birth of our first baby, we felt we should do a refresher course before our second little one arrived.
Following on from the course, I really invested time into doing the hypnobirthing relaxation and listening to all the tracks and practicing the breathing techniques.
In the week leading up to Seb's birth, I did a hypnosis track in the bath and I felt like I'd finally cracked it! I felt so floaty and I was on a complete high afterwards - I was ready to tackle this birth, and I was genuinely excited.
We had planned a home birth this time, as although our experience in hospital wasn't terrible, there were some interventions which we wished we hadn't have accepted with our daughter and we felt this was a much better fit for us and would allow us to fully use the BRAIN technique in our own environment.
We had the pool, the candles, the affirmations, the happy photos - everything was ready. We just needed labour to begin!
Building the happy hormones for labour
The day before Sebs birth, we went for a lovely walk around one of our favourite parks and just had an all round lovely chilled day. When I put my daughter to bed, I had the strangest feeling it would be her last night as an only child. I gave her some extra kisses and cuddles before she went down. This was a strange thought really as I'd not even had a twinge at this point!
My partner Dan came home from work around 8pm, we had some dinner and went to bed after watching some rubbish on TV and after Dan did some nice back tickles for me - a nightly practice to increase my Oxytocin.
I woke up around 1am thinking I was having a contraction, but thinking back to Hannah’s teaching, I knew to try to get back to sleep. So I went for a wee, had a big drink of water and fell back to sleep.
“Baby incoming”
At 3am I woke up to a 'yep, that's definitely a contraction!', I timed the space until the next one and it was around 15 minutes. I was uncomfortable in bed so I decided to have a potter downstairs and have a bounce on my ball and a sugary cuppa to get me through the next few hours - I didn't feel like having anything to eat.
By the time I'd bounced on my ball for a few minutes, the contractions were getting intense and much closer together. I went for another wee and took myself back upstairs to wake Dan up as I realised it was time to get the pool set up... things were moving fast!
I got upstairs around 3.45 and told Dan the contractions were getting more intense and very close together - I wasn't timing them, but I could tell!
Just 30 minutes after the first contraction
I sat on the toilet in the en suite and suddenly felt the urge to push! I thought it must have been my body wanting to clear out before the Labour, but, I heard myself making the typical mooing noise and thought, heck! Baby incoming! At this point, Dan peeled his eyes open and got himself straight into the bathroom as he'd heard it too!
I got on all fours, had a very intense contraction and checked myself to see if I could feel babies head. It was right there! At this point I panicked (probably transitioning looking back!), but Dan kept me calm and with the next contraction my waters broke, a few minutes later, Seb was born! No forced pushing, no midwives, just me and my partner with our baby. We didn't know what sex baby was before we gave birth, so Dan telling me he was a boy was such a special moment.
Labouring without pain or fear:
I can honestly say I laboured without pain and without fear. The most empowering, amazing experience of my life. We had just had a freebirth!!!
We did have to transfer to hospital to get checked over as there were no community midwives available. But we got the homebirth we so desperately wanted, delivered the placenta at home naturally and got hours of skin to skin with Seb. It was perfect.
Shame we never got to use the pool though! Haha!!
Marijke and Dan 2022 - Wakefield
