Hi Icecream sorry it took so long to get back to you!
We decided to homebirth for a number of practical reasons but the initial urge was due to my hate of hospitals and clinical settings and strangers getting up close and personal with me, and my exposure to them!
My mum has passed on 10 years now so my primary midwife filled her role with lots of motherly comfort and advice and was absolutely lovely. We live an hour away from the hospital so driving in car through kangaroo country in the middle of the night in an area where the ambulances are so few that people die frequently while waiting, was also another big concern. Plus at the time I was living up here while hubby worked in Melb all week long, so I was expecting to be on my own when labour began too. But the comforts of being in my own space, with midwives who I had become to know extremely well, and who were supportive of all my choices and weren't going to pull me out of the pool, or artificially break my waters, who were going to support my perineam instead of cut it open, all of that was the most important for me. And as for the cost, yes expensive, but well worth it, and thanks to the baby bonus we weren't out of pocket at all. Are you in my belly buddies group? I think we are both roughly same gestation, I'm just over 12 wks now...
My birth - which was my first - was a home birth, which also became a waterbirth.
I was pretty determined to have a home birth for many reasons, but mostly being because I feel the most comfortable in my home where as hospitals stress me out, and because my pregnancy was low risk I felt absolutely fine doing it, some relatives on the other hand didn't have a great first reaction when we told them, because it isn't the 'norm' But now they saw the outcome and how happy I was with my homebirth and that nothing 'bad' happened, they are all supporters now.
I LOVED being able to give birth at home. Despite some complications (baby wasn't in position which led to some drawn out, painful labouring, but my wonderful midwife Clare managed to turn her around. After that only half of my cervix had moved out of the way so CLare had to go in during a contraction and push the other half out of the way, not fun, but it enabled me to have a vaginal birth) I delivered my baby and she was never in distress and came out great. I know that if had I been at a hospital, because of the long labour, position of my baby, and then the cervix still being in the way, I may not have had the drug-free vaginal birth I was hoping for.
That being said, I went into the homebirth knowing that transferring to a hospital was a possibility, so I planned for that scenario as well.
Next time I will be planning a homebirth again. I loved being in my own environment, being able to move around, eat if I felt like it etc. And afterwards it was wonderful to slip into my own bed, with my new baby, and not have to worry about things like paperwork, driving home, strangers etc.
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