Welcome to the world Sonny Koa Evans! Born on the 19th January 2021 in water at Truro Birth Centre, 7 days before his EDD and weighing 7lbs 3oz.
This incredible birth journey is written by Sonny's mum, Charlie. As you read it you will see it is packed full of strength, faith, amazing support and the importance of having a well educated and prepared birth partner. Huge congratulations to Charlie and Nate, and thank you so much for sharing your story to inspire others and to break the society cycle of beliefs that birth is a traumatic experience!
"The plan for my birth was to be as natural as possible. I didn’t want any drugs or interventions to disrupt the natural birthing process and prevent me from experiencing EVERYTHING! I asked for pain not to be mentioned and for no one to offer me any pain relief.
We did the most incredible Hypnobirthing course with Cornwall Hypnobirthing, so I had been practicing all the breathing techniques. Both myself and Nate were feeling super confident about everything.
I wanted to stay home as long as possible so I was in my safe space to let the hormones do their thing for optimal birthing.
My first surge came at 11:30pm on Monday the 18th and it lasted about 2 minutes and my first thought was, if this is how bad it’s going to be I’m going to take all the drugs! After that small blip I settled into the surge and was just moving around the room and breathing through the waves. Starkey (our dog) came and sat on the bed next to me and I feel like he knew what was happening. Nate was SO excited!
At 12:30 I was a bit sick.
1pm I called the midwife as my surges were every 4 mins lasting 1 min. They suggested to try rest.
I tried lying down but my surges slowly got further apart and I was like nah I’m not letting this slow down. So I got the exercise ball and started bouncing, continued to breath through surges. I think I bounced on that ball for about 4 hours while Nate was drifting in and out of sleep!
5am I puked so bad. Having surges while being sick is... wild!
6am called the midwife again as surges were about 3 mins apart and lasting 1 min and they said to come to hospital soon. The car journey was hell and I was thinking, I swear to god if I get sent back home I don’t think I can actually get in the car again.
Got to Truro birthing Centre at 7:30am, had an assessment and I was 6cm dilated, waters were bulging but not broken. His head was right down and they thought my waters would go any minute. I was actually over the moon at this point that I had made it that far
8am we were given a room and at 9am I got in the birthing pool. Surges were strong and intense for the next 4 hours but I didn’t feel like much progress was being made. Nate was just hugging me and basically being my number 1 fan the entire time. He was awesome!
After continuing to be so sick for the first few hours while in the birth pool I then managed to drink a litre of coconut water which gave me a little bit more energy. Nate then made me eat a squishy, just one. And I actually projectile vomited all over him!
1pm was my I can’t do this point. My waters STILL hadn’t gone. So the I asked the midwife to manually break my waters to try and help things along. Shortly after that sh!t got real. Having my waters broken did the trick and it was go time. That hour was the hardest hour of my life but I knew I was going to get the best reward at the end.
2pm Sonny arrived after 14 and a half hours of labour.
After a few mins of cuddles and tears Nate cut the cord and then my placenta came out straight after. I had no tearing as well!
The one thing that made this possible for me was having Nate as my birthing partner being so damn solid for me. He was honestly amazing. With him knowing about everything from our Hypnobirthing course it helped so much. He studied all the information Terri gave us so much; he was so on it! He never doubted me for a second and understood the entire process so well that he has the ability to stay calm [even when I was screaming] He showed me so much love, cuddles and support which allows the hormones to do their thing.
I will be forever grateful for him supporting me to birth exactly as I wished."
Charlie and Nate did a private Hypnobirthing course with me in October 2020. They spent time leading up to Sonny's birth practicing the skills they had learnt and getting in the zone, so that they both felt calm, ready and fully prepared for when the day came. I am so grateful to be able to share their story with you.
If you would like to work towards a positive birth experience then sign up to my free taster on the 24th February at 7.30pm, or book on to my next group course which is in March. All the details can be found on my website.