An alternative birth

Despite her baby being breech at 38 weeks, Louisa manages to turn her, intent on a water birth at home. She almost has her wish granted...

At 38 weeks into my third pregnancy, I suddenly felt hiccups in the womb, high up beneath my diaphragm and not behind the pubis lower down. It was my final check-up the next day and the doctor confirmed my fears that the baby was in breech position. I was adamant not to succumb to a Caesarean until I had tried to turn the baby around.

I resorted to anything I could think of – all of my friends swapped their pillows around down to their toes for a few nights, I spent time doing handstands in a swimming pool for a few days, took high dosages of homeopathy to “revert malpresentations” and put bags of frozen veggie on my chest…

Whether it was all the "good thoughts and deeds", or simple luck, a few days later I was relieved to hear those hiccups down below and it was confirmed that the baby had turned. I was delighted. Not only did I not want to have a Caesarean, I wanted to have a water birth at home.

Finally, at nearly 43 weeks, I went into labour. I woke early on a sunny Saturday morning and felt the start of those familiar waves. Luckily, my two children had parties to attend and my husband, Erez, left quite casually at 9.30am to drop them off and to do some shopping. It wasn’t long before I realised that my gazes at the clock were every four minutes. My first two births had been in Israel where we were living. The first had started at home but ended in hospital as my son’s umbilical cord was wrapped tightly twice around his neck. My daughter was born in an active birth centre where I arrived too late to use the Jacuzzi and out she came.

So, on the small-holding where we now live just outside of Plett, Erez had set up and sanitised a portable kids’ swimming pool. I hoped that my third child’s entry into this world would be in water. By 10.30am my midwife, Raven, had arrived and I requested an enema, which immediately eased pressure on the rectum. Soon after, the cervical plug came out and I waltzed my way through the contractions outside in the garden, marvelling at the height of the sunflowers and feeling embraced by the reggae music inside.

Just after 11am, Erez strolled in with laden bags of groceries and began filling the pool. I took a homeopathic remedy to help with shaky knees and I got into the water. I gave it 30 minutes but found that it was actually only when I stood or swayed that I could feel baby’s rapid descent. I was walking outside to the verandah when I could feel the baby’s head. I said to Raven, "I think the baby’s here." She grabbed a jacket hanging on a chair and threw it on to the floor, managing to catch our new arrival just in time as the baby slid out all at once.

"It’s a boy," she said, and she and Erez helped me over to the sofa where I cuddled him. It was 12.22pm. There were beads of perspiration on our amazed faces as we all devoured some chocolate. Long after the umbilical cord stopped pulsating, we realised we didn’t have a clamp, so we tied the cut cord with dental floss.

I’d had two quite severe blood losses with my previous births and Raven had no intention of yanking out the placenta, so we waited. Despite ongoing contractions, it didn’t come out naturally and I was anxious to complete this final stage of birth. We had waited for one and a half hours so I agreed to a jab to help the uterus contract and another homeopathic remedy and, before long, this miraculous bag of nutrition called the placenta, released itself.

It was wrapped in a plastic bag and when we move house next month I will finally take it out of the freezer and plant a tree on it as a blessing to how harmonious birth can be.

• Louisa Shneor is a qualified doula and childbirth assistant. She can be contacted on 073-635-1221