Birth Announcement of a Daisy Mum - My own home birth :-)

When I set out on my Daisy Birth adventure I didn't initially start off with home birth in mind although this is what I'd said I'd always wanted after the birth of my first son. In fact we were all set for a water birth at our local Midwifery Led Unit as with three boys at home I thought home birth would be difficult. I have an 11 year old and my partner two older teenage boys. We then watched a programme called 'All or Nothing' about birthing your own way and it reignited my thoughts on home birth. Me and my partner looked at each other and we both knew straight away that we wanted a home birth so in a rush at 36 weeks I rang my Midwife with the change of plan.

My first son was born at 38 weeks so when this date came and went and 40 weeks came and went we started to feel the pressure of getting our water home birth on time. 

Ten days overdue having tried all the usual attempts to naturally start I decided I'd have a go at stretching my psoas muscle, a) as my back and hips ached in bed and b) to see if I could make a bit more room in my pelvis for my baby to descend. I'd learned about the psoas in Daisy classes, how we can carry a lot of tension in this muscle, it made sense to try and lengthen it. So I spent the afternoon doing gentle antenatal psoas exercises. I felt really relaxed afterwards and like I'd released some tension and tightness. That night as I was falling to sleep I felt my waters go and within five minutes I'd had my first contraction.

During the birth I used the Daisy breathing techniques I'd learned, I listened to my body and I used water and relaxation to stay calm and focused. I birthed for 3 hrs and 44 minutes which was amazing. My birth was exactly what I'd wanted, it was calm, relaxed, natural and free from any drugs. It was only afterwards when I reminisced about birthing in water that I thought 'Wow I caught my own baby!' 

Me and my partner were a team, we planned together and talked about how he would support me in great detail beforehand. He wasn't an observer but an active part and he kept me calm and focused. Daisy gave us the skills to achieve this. As my labour progressed I realised that the intensity I was feeling wasn't getting worse just more frequent and I knew I could handle it so I was able to let go and breathe.

Within an hour of the midwives leaving we were all in bed sleeping.

Daisy is a gift and all mums should have this knowledge. I can't thank Daisy and my Daisy teacher enough for the skills taught. I knew my body could do it I just needed to learn the skills and understand properly how my body worked in labour to achieve a natural home water birth. 

Since my first son was born in 2004 I've been passionate about working with woman. I really believe that women should be given more practical skills to help birthing as theory is only any good if it’s cemented in practice. All women deserve the best opportunities. Although home birth was my choice Daisy provides such fantastic skills and techniques that it can be used in any birthing situation and indeed in life to help bring about positive outcomes. 

Daisy isn't a natural birth, it's a positive birth.

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Why I chose Daisy?...

Hello and welcome to my first blog!

I wanted to tell you all about my own experience of Daisy, mainly because it was amazing but also because if I'm going to promote myself as a Daisy Birthing Teacher I feel I should share how Daisy Birthing really helped me.

I was talking recently to an expectant relative about my birth and why she should give Daisy a try. What I didn't realize was that inadvertently I was promoting Daisy as a way to achieve a home birth. As a first time mum she said I'm not that keen on birthing at home, which made me stop in my tracks and rethink how I do promote Daisy?

Daisy did help me achieve the home birth that I'd waited years for but it also gave me so much more at a time when I really needed support...

My first son was born in 2004. I really wanted an active, natural birth so I did a lot of research and a lot of reading in preparation. My labour lasted 24 hours from the first twinge to delivery and for me was not the positive experience I'd hoped for. I swore then that if I ever had any more children I would have a home birth. What I realised was I'd had the will and belief in my body but I didn't have the skills I needed to birth the way I wanted and nobody there to guide me back then.

Prior to finding out I was pregnant in 2015, Daisy had popped up on my Facebook a few times and it really struck a chord with me so when I got that positive line I knew this time I'd be doing things differently.

Due to personal circumstances I started Daisy classes at 28 weeks and attended two terms. During this time I was experiencing an awful lot of stress in my personal life and increasingly aware of how the stress would be affecting my unborn baby. All I wanted to do was enjoy my pregnancy and look forward to becoming a Mum again. So how did Daisy help me?

Well the first term of Daisy really helped me resolve what had happened to me 11 years ago. I had been carrying a lot of grief around about the experience. Daisy helped me understand what had happened to me physically and why and how a lot of the intervention I experienced and the direction I was given was unnecessary. I wasn't counselled about this as that's not what Daisy is about but the new knowledge that I gained helped me to see what could have been different. Simple things helped, like understanding how cervical dilation can go backwards as well as forwards and why some birthing positions are more helpful than others. Daisy taught me the skills I needed to birth this time and it also filled in the blanks in my knowledge about how to be active, breath correctly and stay relaxed and calm. 

Every session I practised my birthing breathing techniques and movements and I looked forward to the guided meditation at the end of the session, even though it was really hard to take my mind off what was happening in my personal life. By term two my personal stress had become less and I was generally able to relax a whole lot more. My second term really allowed me to learn to relax and it cemented all the skills I'd learned in the first term. 

What I would say to any new Daisy mums is complete as many terms as you can as the more you do the more embedded the skills you learn become so that on the big day you just know what to do to stay calm, you know how to breath and you can visualise exactly what your body is doing.

Daisy also offered a couples course which me and my partner attended; something I would recommend to all birth partners! My partner was really on board with my ideas for a natural birth and I'm really glad we attended together because we realised that his experience of childbirth with his ex wife were also very medicalised and Daisy helped him also to understand his previous experiences and how this birth would be completely different.

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