17 | Polly & Theo nurse midwife, Epidural, Induction, Childbirth Educator

In today’s episode Edwina shares the births of her two children Polly and Theodore. Edwina is a registered nurse and Midwife. Edwina let her confidence of being a midwife take over and she and her partner did not do any child birth education classes in the lead up to her first birth of Polly, a decision she regretted terribly on the day. After a long labour, Edwina had an epidural from a colleague who was crying cause she was so sad seeing her friend in so much pain. Eventually the epidural was in and Edwina was able to sleep. She also had induction medication to speed up her labour. Edwina discusses using the Epi-no to stretch her perineal muscles to prevent tears. She thinks this contributed to the fact that she didn’t tear in either of her births. Birthing in the hospital where Edwina works also posed added complications as her colleagues all knew she was in birth suits and a couple even dropped in to see how she was going. With her second pregnancy, Edwina was determined to do things differently and she and her husband both attended independent child birth education classes. She jokes about the fact that her sons head came out and she didn’t have another contraction for quite some time and she was chatting to her midwife while her husband was quite concerned that half his child had been born. Since having her children Edwina has started her own Child Birth Education classes teaching child birth education and Baby and Child first aide. Topics covered in todays episode include; Breech baby, Epi-no, perineal massage, child birth education classes, epidural, baby and child first aide, midwifery care. Birth Beats If you can spare a moment, please leave a review and rating in iTunes. It helps get the show to more lovely listeners. Connect with the show over on If you'd like my FREE guide on perineal massage click If you'd like my FREE 5-minute breathing exercise click Follow us on Instagram to keep the conversation going. To learn more about The Birth Class  my online childbirth education course head to the shop  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.