We have had a very busy couple of weeks settling in with our gorgeous son Arjun and enjoying every minute with him! He was born on 20th March after a long labour which ended in emergency c-section - but was all worth it to hold him in our arms at the end! After trying absolutely everything to induce labour naturally, we agreed to go in for medical induction at 41 weeks on 18th March and started off with the gel, which kicked off contractions nicely. It was a slow process but the contractions were fairly strong, so I focused on up breathing and visualisations to get through it. They told me that once I had dialated enough, they would break my waters to help push things along further. The vaginal examinations were uncomfortable enough, so I wasn't looking forward to that procedure, so Paren read a relaxing script which really helped, along with a bit of 'gas and air'. Labour continued to progress slowly, so they also gave me the drip. As the contractions got stronger, the hypnobirthing techniques really helped me to deal with them. Every midwife and doctor I saw couldnt get over how I was surviving all this time just with the tens machine and 'gas and air', as they see most women begging for epidural in inductions - instead I was calm and smiling between contractions! In the end, after 52 hours, my labour stalled and they found baby's head had moved slightly to the left and was swelling, so we had to have c-section before it got any worse. For me, that was my worst outcome for birth and one that I really wanted to avoid. I used the scripts and breathing to stay as calm as possible throughout it. All worth it of course, as we now have a beautiful, calm, happy baby :-) Thanks for all your help through pregnancy and your hypnobirthing course, it was so useful and I could not have coped so well without it! Read more birth stories on www.magicalbabymoments.com

Priya