Aelle has arrived!! Here's our very positive home birth (and slightly traumatic afterbirth) story :D

Hey lovely bumpers, it’s been a whirlwind of a week here, filled with so much love and happiness that I’m only now taking the time to write my birth story. Our little Aelle was born at home on Monday the 15th (39w 6d) at 3:40pm and we couldn't be happier or more in love!

This is going to be long so pull a chair… or tldr; Had a planned, very positive home birth, but had issues birthing the placenta; I lost a lot of blood and ended up in the hospital for 3 days. I wouldn't change a thing though, Aelle is a super baby and it all still remains a wonderful experience!

I'm going to break it down into 2 parts, the actual birth here and the more traumatic afterbirth in the comment section, so it's easy to skip the more gruesome bit and get straight to the baby pics :D

A very positive home birth...

I went into labour on Monday at 2:15am after a grand total of 10 minutes of sleep; my contractions were regular and strong from the get go. My husband had also just gone to bed so I didn't wake him up straight away. When I did, he was excited but we both know he doesn't function without a certain amount of sleep so he asked for a little bit more time, which I was totally fine with. He was my rock from about 4am on (despite trying his best, the poor man couldn't stay awake before then, haha!!)

My labouring was very quiet and focused, I had my eyes closed most of the time and didn't vocalise at all. I breathed through each contraction, reminding myself over and over again that each one would bring me closer to meeting Aelle and that pain was actually good so I shouldn't fight it, but surrender to it. Repeating these words, even though never out loud, really helped. My husband was by my side, caressing and encouraging me softly the entire time. That said, I freaked out during some of the contractions; they felt too much for me to handle, and during these times he actually became really stern, told me to open my eyes, to look at him and breathe. That was absolutely fantastic and totally recentered my focus. I don't think I would've been able to do it without him.

Anyway, we called the hospital a first time at around 11am, the contractions were about 4-5 minutes apart. It was decided that if they went up in intensity or if it felt like I really needed some help, we should call again 30 minutes later. We didn't feel the need to call again until about 1pm.

A lovely midwife came over at 1:40pm. She established I was 4-5cm dilated, which was disheartening to me as I had already been in labour 11 or so hours and was exhausted. About an hour later a second lovely midwife came over to change shifts. Our first midwife was a bit sad to have to leave as she would've loved to see the baby being born, but she ordered a taxi nonetheless and hung around in the meantime. Quickly after that I had 2 push contractions that I didn't vocalise. Then a 3rd one came and I couldn't hold it in. The midwives instantly knew something had changed and told me my water would most probably break soon as I was getting close to pushing time. Lo and behold, my water broke the very next contraction (ensued a big scramble as I was on the sofa... which had no protection on!). The water was green though, which meant I would have to go to the hospital, but before calling it, our 2nd midwife wanted to check my progress. It turned out I was 10cm dilated and ready to push. Our 1st midwife cancelled her taxi and I gave birth to Aelle over the next 3 pushes. Everybody was shocked it happened so fast! I couldn't get out of my clothes quickly enough (I was still wearing a dress and a bra!) and feel her close. She started breastfeeding pretty much immediately. It had all gone so fast all of a sudden, I couldn't believe I had just had a baby, it all felt surreal!

She didn’t get weighed and measured until much later on, but she came out at 3kg (6lbs 9oz) and 50cm (19,68 in). Exactly what my husband had predicted back when we got our positive test (along with sex, date and time (as in am/pm) of birth! All my predictions, on the other hand, were off… so much for mother’s intuition!). We think she’s pretty fantastic and cute as can be. That said, we’re maybe a tiny bit biased given that saying we’re in love is the understatement of the century! :D And here! are a few pics of our little monster.