Birth in all its true glory

Giving birth. The main concern of the majority of pregnancies. How the heck am I going to push a baby "out of that"?! Well, believe it or not people, it is possible! I know, I've been there.

Throughout my pregnancy I had my fair share of anxiety surrounding giving birth. As I watched my belly grow bigger and bigger, this anxiety also grew bigger and bigger. When discussing my birth plan with my midwife, it became clear to her that I was pretty easy:

"Whatever happens on the day!"

I hear the inward groans of many of you. But what about the natural, drug free homebirth in the middle of your lounge with your doula and spiritual healer? Well, I realise that that works for some of you, and I congratulate you in every way for having such an organic situation for your bundle of joy to arrive into. I, on the other hand, was completely content with a pain free labour in a lovely sterile hospital where there are drugs on tap. It was the idea of being in pain that I was really scared of, and I wanted the option of an epidural there. Deep down, I was really hoping for a c-section. In hindsight, I am very glad this did not happen, because six weeks of recovery just really doesn't do it for me!

In the end, the epidural was necessary for my own sanity. My waters had broken had 5am on Sunday, it was now 9pm on Monday, and I was absolutely exhausted. Although I was induced at 12pm on Monday, I had had no sleep and was starting to descend into a panicked mess. Therefore, the epidural was administered at around 10.30, I had one hour to enjoy it before my thighs started screaming and I was ready to get this thing outta me!

29 minutes of pushing later, we had a baby. It was now the wee hours of Tuesday, 43 hours after my labour had begun, and it was all worth it. About 15 minutes in, I started crying and "gave up", but luckily I got over this momentary madness and followed through to the end.

Let me just say, you feel a lot lighter after pushing out 3.665kgs (8lbs 1oz) of baby outta ya!

So, my opinion on the actual process of giving birth? It bloody hurts. Imagine your uterus being twisted in half, and you will get a fraction of the idea. However, it is worth every second of that pain when you see your beautiful baby looking into your eyes for the first time. So go on, give it a go :-)