“We got to meet our daughter in the most amazing way. When Zara was born into the pool, Claire simply pushed her in between Simone’s legs (she was leaning on the side of the pool on her knees) and we both reached into the water and picked her up. Bloody unbelievable!!!!!!!!!!! I was absolutely bursting with pride and happiness.
Now I know that we (men) can’t give birth, but I feel like that day I came about as close as you can get.”Joe, Dad
On the 8th of December 2018 my wife and I were blessed with our second beautiful daughter. The surroundings could not have been more different from our first birth. We had learnt similar techniques for our first baby’s arrival so Simone gave me a refresher to prepare for baby number 2. Simone wanted to prepare to have a home birth and I had no reason to doubt her, and wanted to support her in her decision. With what I had learnt through hypnobirthing, I was comfortable that I could play my role in the arrival of our baby.
“As a father, history tells us that we should be nervously pacing up and down the waiting room, or giving our wives a hand to squeeze when she needs to scream and push a baby out. I wanted to be involved as much as possible or as much as Simone needed me and was happy to know that things didn’t need to play out that way. We had a birth plan and amazing independent midwives working with us to assist in our home birth.”
Simone awoke early on the 8th and knew that it was going to be the day we would meet our little bundle of joy. We had arranged for Simone’s mum to pick Amelia up when things started to progress, we had the birth pool already setup in the lounge room, tens machine on hand, birthing tracks and vaporiser. Simone had also made a board with important words and pictures for her to use during the birth.
Well it didn’t take long for things to progress (Simone was up at 5:30am) and by 7am Amelia was being picked up. The surges had become noticeably more intense very soon after and Simone called the midwives by about 7:30am. From this point, time was a bit of a blur. I couldn’t get too far from Simone at this point, she needed me near her, but I still needed to fill the pool up. During the surges I was using light touch on Simone’s back and trying to keep her breathing smoothly, then focus on getting rest and relaxing in between. Simone was now in the pool and our baby seemed to be in a hurry to meet us. I was starting to wonder if the midwives were going to make, and it might have been just us!
“While things were moving really quickly, I was already starting to think how amazing my beautiful wife was handling everything that was happening and was enjoying doing this together. To do it at home in our own little happy place, it seemed a bit surreal.”
Claire had now arrived (midwife 1) and I think was surprised at how far Simone had progressed. I spent the rest of our birth next to Simone on the outside of the pool, and experienced an incredible part of my life that I will never forget. Each surge that passed brought us closer to our baby, and in between surges that Simone seemed to handle with ease we were able to share a smile knowing that we were almost there. I continued to trickle water over her back, talk about breathing and of the beautiful gift we would have in our life very soon. I could not be any prouder of the way Simone was working her way through our birth, and it really felt like we were doing it together.
“One thing I still remember 12 months on was Simone explaining the feeling of her body taking over and helping baby into position to progress. No pushing needed!!! Still bloody amazes me.”
Julianna (midwife 2) arrived just in time, as our daughter was very close to her arrival now. Claire had a mirror that she used to show us the first view of the head. A few surges later and my amazing wife had birthed our second daughter, it was at 9:27am.
“We got to meet her in the most amazing way. When Zara was born into the pool, Claire simply pushed her in between Simone’s legs (she was leaning on the side in the pool on her knees) and we both reached into the water and picked her up. Bloody unbelievable!!!!!!!!!!! I was absolutely bursting with pride and happiness.
Now I know that we (men) can’t give birth, but I feel like that day I came about as close as you can get.”
Simone you are an incredible woman and thank you for letting me share such an amazing experience. I love you.
Joe
This recollection is 12 months on. It’s so nice to reflect in such a magical way.