Birth Story Series: My third birth - 2026, part 1

Setting the scene: My husband Simone and I live with our two daughters M (age 4) and L (22 months) in the Port Stephens area of NSW, Australia. We’re now out of area for the hospital’s publicly funded homebirth programme which we used last pregnancy, and this time I had my pregnancy care from a private midwife, Haylie, with the goal of having a homebirth.

At the end of pregnancy you just take one day at a time. Always knowing the birth could be any time, but also that you may still have a while to wait. That was how it was this time, in my longest pregnancy to date. But the day always comes in the end! My midwife Haylie had been to visit the previous afternoon, and after chatting and checking my blood pressure and baby’s heart-rate, she dedicated a while to some massage and releases to help make sure my body was relaxed and ready. She did The Jiggle (Spinning Babies®), and some massage on my lower legs and feet, as well as acupressure point SP-6. She’d treated me to these releases etc. on her previous couple of visits as well and I joked with her that if she ever left midwifery she could take up massage! When I got up at the end of her visit I could feel baby P moving and digging down quite low, with some cramping. It was quite uncomfortable and I couldn’t sit down till he’d finished! I had another episode of that later in the evening.

The day of the birth I had the same sensations around 7am while baby was moving. They lasted a minute or two, and I was now defining it as cramping which I felt was caused by his movements. It was really uncomfortable and I was finding I needed to stop and use my contraction-coping techniques to get through -- swaying, breathing, and sometimes even vocalising. The most comfortable position was sitting on the toilet! After 4+ episodes of this I messaged Haylie at 8:40, telling her about it all and saying, “I’m thinking we don’t have too much longer to go. At least, I’m hoping!” I added “Still no contractions though.”

By that stage I was starting to think about asking Simo to come back from work early. Not because I felt labour was imminent, but because I was having these “cramping” episodes often enough and intensely enough that I wasn’t really able to focus on the girls as much as I would have liked to. In the end there was no need. Providentially, Simo had a very early finish that day, and was home soon after 9am! We had some couple time together ❤️‍🔥, and I spent the remainder of the morning resting and spending time on the birth ball, with more of those cramping episodes accompanied by mild to strong lower backache. I wondered a few times if it was contractions, but wasn’t 100% sure. We all went for a nap, but I was up by around midday and back on the ball.

I felt like I wanted to do some exercises/releases for positioning. At 12:30 I did three repeats of the forward leaning inversion, and then went to pee. At 12:40 on the way back from the bathroom I had another cramping episode, with strong uncomfortable sensations in my lower belly.

I moved on with 30 repeats of the cat-cow stretch. After repeat 8 I felt a tiny “clunk” in my pelvis like something had shifted. At 12:50 I had a definite contraction while on the ball, and realised that sensation at 12:40 had most likely been a contraction. For the first time it occurred to me that the “cramping episodes” might have been contractions all along! I think what threw me is that I was feeling so much of the cramping in my lower belly which I’m not used to AND I was feeling P moving a lot of the time too. I wasn’t aware of the girls moving in labour so I tended to think his movements were causing the sensations, rather than that he was moving through the contractions.

The “cramping episodes”, which I was now defining as contractions, continued every 10 minutes or so, lasting 40-60 seconds each. The intensity was mild to moderate. I was sitting on the birth ball, doing hip circles and figure-8s, and breathing through contractions, coping perfectly fine without any additional support, and honestly just really happy and thankful that labour was finally starting!

Simo and the girls got up from their nap at 1:30pm and whereas I’d been having contractions every 10 minutes, they’d just moved to every 5 minutes from 1:20. I told Simo where things were up to, and we decided if the next few were still at 5 minute intervals we’d call Haylie to start preparing to come over, since she has a distance to travel. And so, 1:45pm I was calling Haylie to let her know the situation. We decided she could take her time getting ready and then start to head over, although we’d let her know if things started moving a lot faster.

At 2pm Simo helped me put the TENS machine on. I was coping fine without it, but I was keen to try it this time - I’d not had one available at my previous births. They say the TENS is most effective if you start using it early in labour when contractions are still mild, and even though I didn’t feel I necessarily needed it, I did know I'd enjoy the sensation it gives! I also pulled out the “birth weapons” that Haylie had left for me - little spiky wooden balls. So by now each contraction looked like this: hit the Boost button on the TENS at the start of the contraction, squeeze the birth weapons in my hands while doing gentle figure-8s on the birth ball, and meanwhile visualise upward and opening movements - a helium balloon floating up and away into the sky; a hot air balloon going up; the petals of a rose unfolding and opening. And in the background an instrumental track for relaxation. The relaxation vibes were enhanced with the candles Simo had lit all around the living room. It was a cloudy day, but we kept the blinds closed for full privacy and low-lighting, and the living area by now was just oozing oxytocin.

To be continued!

[Photo of the birth weapons and TENS machine I used]