on the 26th of february i came down with a bad case of gastro, (sorry to be so straight forward) i had it for just under 24 hours and by 4pm that afternoon i started to get contractions every ten minutes and when this went on for almost 3 hours

i knew we weren't to far away from having our fourth daughter. i rang my mum and asked her if we could drop the girls off at her place as i had to go to hospital to be examined that was fine so we dropped the girls off stayed for an hour and then i had to go the pains were getting worst and they weren't subsiding when i moved so i knew this was it.

my mil met us at the hospital as she would be at the birth this time and the midwife was there waiting for us when we arrived at this stage it was around about 8.30pm, i was given an internal and found to be only 2 cm hmm i know and when the contractions came to a holt by 10pm that night they sent me home with two panadiene fortes to help with pain so i could get some rest as the midwife said she would be seeing me within the next two days, i was excited but at the same time i still had just over two weeks to go before my due date so i was a little nervous like the last time.

we drove my mil home stayed for a while and then left to get some much needed rest before i picked my girls up the next day, that night i had the best sleep i had in a while and i don't think i even moved once in my sleep lol, and at 8am i woke feeling really good and so i went to the toilet and fopund that when i would go i had no control but when i stood up there was no leaking so i thought to myself this must just be all the pressure from the symphosis pubis disfunction i had been diagnosed with 14 weeks earlier, so i told my husband and he shrugged it off like i did but something told me this wasnt the last time i would have this feeling, so i rang my mil just incase and half way through telling her my waters break in the loungeroom. i called for my hubby to get me a towel and he had no clue to why i would ask him that until he looked at my pyjamas and saw the water just seeping through everything then he clicked that he would be a dad yet again lol.

my mil was making her way to hospital i rang mum to let her know we can't get the kids and the midwife was on her way to hospital to deliver my baby.

when we arrived the nurses were all looking at me like i shouldnt have been there which isnt anything unusual when you have a baby at the hospital but have a private midwife looking after you, so just to get up their noses a little my midwife gave me the biggest room on the ward lol but not before she got an ear bashing from one of the staff grr, anyway my contractions weren't coming regularly so they asked me to get up and walk around so i went outside to get some fresh air before i got to stuck in a hospital bed and then i asked my mil to take me back to my room as it's started and i need help, well when i got back to the desk i had another contraction and it was so bad it felt like i was giving birth to every bone in my body from the stress my pelvis had been under from the other girls i couldn't cope with it and i had two women help me back to my room and place me on the bed as my midwife ran a bath for me to help with the pain.

when the bath was ready it was a great relief but i soon got very hot and felt dizzy from over heating so my husband help me to wet my hair while he sat with me the whole time telling me how i was doing great and he was proud of me for putting myself through this again for us to have one last baby, and as i wanted to cry i also wanted to rip his head of for helping me put myself there lol.

the pain started to get really bad and the pressure was unexplainable so i tried the gas but it made me spin out and feel helpless so i through it to the ground and the only thing that did help was bitting down hard on the mouth piece, and when that stopped working the screams got louder and so did the swearing and in the end my husband had to help hold me up in the bath as i kept going under at one stage from the ammount of pain i was in, the midwife asked to check my progress which i denied her that right and she was fine with it she said to follow what my body was telling me because after 4 kids i should know what i was doing and boy did my body tell me i called for her to help as i had this sudden urge to push so hard and she asked if it was in my bum i said it's bl**dy everywhere so she told me to let it build a little and then push with everything i had left in me, and so i did i pushed a whole of 3 times and my baby's head was out and then with the next contraction i delivered her and she was placed on my chest and no sooner after i began to cry uncontrollably due to the fact this was the only baby i would have where my grandmother wouldn't be here to share with me as she had died 8 days after i found i was pregnant, sitting here now i know she made sure my baby came into this world safely and for that i will always be grateful, but apart of me felt like she was there with me thr whole time standing over my shoulder helping me through each contraction and telling me it would all be ok in the end.

at first tennessee didn't cry so i got out of the bath so i could wrap her up to keep her warm and when half an hour had past she finally let us know she was here, the midwife said because she was born in water it is a peaceful experience for both mother and child and that sometimes babies just don't need to cry when they are first born, she must have been comfortable lol or maybe it was the gas i had???

well when it came time to deliver the third stage all that went through my mind at the time was i could have had two of her, see she was a twin but i lost her twin 5 weeks after my nan died and was told i would deliver the fetus as they call it when the placenta would be delivered, they were fraternal twins and the baby would look like a huge blood clot attached to the placenta once born but when the placenta came out there was no baby or blood clot and no answers to help me understand what had happened.

tennessee was soon weighed and she was my smallest yet at 6lb 4 1/2oz and she is still my tiny baby and she absolutely loves the water and the attention from her older siblings lol.

well i hope my experience has given you some insight on what a waterbirth could be like for you, it is truly amazing and if i had known had good it was back when i had my first i would have done it with all four of them it's a truly amazing experience.

my advice on a waterbirth though is to check with your dr or midwife to make sure all is safe to go through with one.and make sure it is what you want as it may be hard to change your mind when labour gets to the point of no return it is hard enough to move let alone get out of a bath half way through contractions and childbirth so make sure it's what you want

but at the same time as saying that make sure you listen to what your body is telling you, you may feel it's right for you when your pregnant but when labour goes into full force you may not feel so confident so listen to your body it's telling you something for a reason, good luck