Nomadic Mama: a freebirth tale

How did I end up with a stranger birthing in my living room? This question has been asked by many of you these past couple of weeks. Well, it’s actually quite a beautiful story because by the time Charlotte gave birth our families had spent the entire week bonding and forming the most beautiful friendships. Even our toddlers were joined at the hip. I know a lot of you have been asking for a backstory to this freebirth, but this is not my story to tell. Charlotte has beautifully written and shared her birth story with us.

Enjoy.

The birth of Aida Margi
12:58 am 18th of June 2023

We had always had in our mind that we wanted to travel Australia, we just had to figure out the logistics of what needed to happen to make it a reality. We also wanted a second baby and started to try just after our wedding in April 2022. We put our house up for sale and continued trying, the longer it took we knew it was looking like if we fell pregnant we would be birthing somewhere on the road as we didn’t want to put our plans on hold. Our house sold in September and we found out we were pregnant in October. We worked towards our plans of leaving in February 2023 and were due to birth our baby in June. We never had a plan of where or how we were going to birth but it didn’t worry us too much. As we made our way around, the destination we thought we would be in for the birth kept changing. We were a few weeks out from our estimated date and thought we should try and put some plans in place so I joined a WA Freebirth page and asked if anyone knew somewhere we could pull up in our van and birth. We had a few beautiful people reach out to us and everything fell into place like we always knew it would but way way better.

We had tinctures waiting for us in a post office in Perth so we drove up the day before my due date to get them and felt like everything was in place now and we were ready to meet our baby. A beautiful family in a small coastal town, Binningup, opened up their home for us and invited us to birth in their calm, warm family home. Each day passed as we all eagerly awaited labour although we’re now so glad that baby took a little longer as it gave us the chance to really get to know each other and bond before the special event that really bonded us for life. It was Friday afternoon, I was 6 days “overdue” and I had been feeling tightenings throughout the day but this had been common and they weren’t anything to really mention. As the night went on they were becoming frequent enough I could time them and I was excited that this could be it. I was nervous that if I went to bed they would disappear but thought if this is it we should all try and get rest while we can. I felt them throughout the rest of the night so didn’t have a full sleep but they didn’t progress enough to get up. When we woke up the next morning on Saturday our son said “come on mum get the baby out” we told him the night before that it would be coming so he was disappointed to not see a baby when he woke up. We snuggled in bed for a while really soaking up the last moments of just us. We got up and took our son for a walk to the park hoping that would bring contractions a bit closer and by lunch time they were frequent enough that we went to the house and setup. When we pictured free birthing on our trip I did not think it would ever be possible to have a birth pool which I loved so much with my first but we put it at the back of our minds so we weren’t disappointed. When we were offered the option to hire one we were over the moon.
We’re travelling with a few family members so our son went and hung out with his Poppo while the contractions progressed a bit further and my Mum came to the house with us. For the rest of the afternoon we were by the fire chatting, smelling clary sage and doing laps of the house.

My sister-in-law joined us and we had such a beautiful support rhythm going between everyone, she brought soup with her so we all shared that and no one had to think about dinner which was lovely. Shenae the beautiful home owner lent me her tens machine which I’d never used before and I really liked it, it of course didn’t take the pain away but definitely helped. I used this and tried different positions on the ground, leaning on my husband and gym ball until it was time to get in the pool. Once I was in the pool they used boiling hot towels on my back which was amazing in my first birth and were great once again. I went between sitting on the pool seat to leaning over the edge holding onto my husband. My contractions were all over the place but lasting over a minute mostly. In my first birth my contractions were never regular so we were used to this and it didn’t mean much. We felt like it was time for my Dad to bring our son back to the house as he really wanted to be involved. When he got there he hopped in the pool straight away with me for a bit. I chose to get out and sit on the toilet as this was a position that really worked for my first birth, we tried this for a while and it really opened up my cervix but we didn’t see a head. In between every contraction I would look up and in that small toilet door way I had my husband, mum, sister in law and Shenae all looking at me with adoration and the strength to get through the next one, all just waiting to burst into action as soon as I started to feel another wave. We tried moving out onto the floor on a mat on all fours, on my feet crouching leaning back on my husband, on my side with leg up. We tried them all and nothing was really bringing her head down. One thing that was a struggle for me was comparing this birth to my first as all births are different in their own special way and one thing that worked for one birth might not work for the next. I remember continually doing “horse lips” throughout every contraction and continually saying to myself loose lips-loose lips and trying to remain soft. With every contraction I found myself being thankful internally that it meant I was closer to meeting our baby. Unfortunately it got late and our son got tired and went to sleep. A couple times throughout mum would check the heart beat just to be sure baby was travelling fine, she used the same stethoscope she’d used on myself and my siblings throughout our whole lives which felt kind of special. We were going to head back to the toilet but decided to hop back into the pool first, I’m not sure what happened in that moment, I think I was just so ready to meet our baby, that on the first contraction back in the pool I pushed and everything changed. I could feel myself really open up and I could feel her coming. I remember feeling like I was going to tear and asked someone to hold my perineum with a cloth.
After a couple of pushes her head was very slowly coming out, once her head was coming out they could see why she took a while to show; her hand was right up next to her head. I was leaning on the pool so couldn’t see her coming out but everyone said her head was sitting there for a while on its own and then she leant back assisting her body to come out. At 12:58 am on Sunday morning my husband caught her, then him and my mum helped me turn around and hold our baby. Her cord was really short but long enough for me to hold her and for her to latch straight on and she fed amazing straight away. We sat in the pool cuddling and soaking in the special moment we all just shared together. We then woke our son up and my brother brought my nieces and nephews up to meet the newest member.

Once out of the pool I birthed the placenta and we all sat in the lounge room by the fire debriefing and winding down. We let her cord go fully white and then we burnt her cord with beeswax candles and Jacob finished it off by cutting it after a while. Due to her taking her time and coming down slowly and the amazing birth support I was surrounded by, I didn’t tear and I felt really good which meant we were able to just soak in everything that had just happened and go to bed and cuddle as a family of four. Aida’s birth was filled with so much support, adoration and love. I love that my nieces, nephew, Alex and Shenae’s two baby girls and our son witnessed and experienced how beautiful and empowering birth can be. We can’t express how grateful and lucky we feel to have been able to form this bond and for this special family to take us in and treat us as family and to also have such a supportive loving family who has been along with us in this journey and continues to care for us postpartum.