BellaOnline Forums Health and Fitness Pregnancy Photos of my waterbirth

I have 4 children and my first birthing experience was a lot like Lisa�s (see [url=BellaOnline ALERT: For anti-spam reasons, we restrict the number of URLs allowed in a given post. You have exceeded our maximum number of URLs.

Thank you, Katie so much for your story and photos! Beautiful children and I am so happy to have you stopping by the Pregnancy board.

I will keep you in mind for anyone asking about natural childbirth and/or water births!

Thanks again,

Kitty <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

That's so great! I went with a midwife too instead of a doctor. The doctors seemed obsessed with forceps and charts of exact weights to hit at each stage and so on. The midwife was so much more laid back - I could use a position that felt good to me, eat healthily and my body would gain weight according to my body frame and so on.

The hospital we went to had a special birthing room set up with a big bed and bathtub and everything, but the nurses went on strike just before I went in to labor. And of course they came off strike just after my son was born <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

In fact, my midwife was out of the room for a moment when the pushing part came on, and two of the nurses started putting my feet into the stirrups. It felt SO INCREDIBLY uncomfortable and I was trying to explain I wouldn't use them. The midwife came rushing back in and got me out of them and back into a better position. It was like the final "YES! I made the right decision!" moment <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

What awesome pictures. I'm always amazed at how happy and normal women who give natural childbirth look after it's all over. If I had to do it all over again I would have a midwife too. I did bradley and was 8cm when I walked into the hospital, the nurses panicked because they couldn't get a heart beat on the baby monitor even though I had asked a monitor not be used. The doctor on call was an [censored] who was late for his tee time. He checked me once let me push for 40 min. then gave me some b.s. about the baby being in stress and wanted to use forceps then scared us into an emergency c section. Because it was too late for medication I had to go completely under and was completely out for the birth. Later when I asked my doctor she said the baby was fine nothing was wrong. My husband found out that 8 of the 10 births that night were c sections as well. Pretty sad! The great thing was that everyone said babies are less likely to nurse after a c section because of the 12 hours it takes for the anesthesia to wear off on both of us but he did just fine. Male doctors are such pigs (sorry sometimes I still get mad about it). If I ever have another baby it won't be in a hospital and thanks for posting your pics they do help women who are struggling with that decision. One question. Is there something that maintains the water temp. warm?

I couldn't agree with you more about doctors! I really learned a lot with my hospital birth experience - we were constantly refusing treatments and procedures that they were insisting on. I'm very thankful that I had my mother-in-law there to stick up for me. After all, I was not in the frame of mind to do it myself. And, that way my husband was able to focus on supporting me with the birth.

The tub I rented for my home waterbirth had a heater that kept the water temperature warm. We set the tub up when I went into labor and filled it with warm water by hooking a hose up to the kitchen sink. (Our water comes from a well - so no chlorine <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> ). The heater then kept the temperature constant. The tub was great - very easy to use and it only took my husband 30 minutes to take it a part and get it ready to ship back to the rental company. Email me if you would like details.

It was a fabulous experience - one I would recommend to anyone!!