By Jade Glen
Alicia Dixon says giving birth at home is an empowering experience.
The Berwick mum-of-six has birthed three of her babies in hospital and three at home with the assistance of a private midwife – and wouldn’t have it any other way.
Alicia’s eldest daughters, Shelby, 11, and Charlotte, 7, were delivered with straightforward, low-intervention hospital births, although both were bigger babies, born at 3.9kg and 4.5kg respectively.
Her next daughter, Emily, now 5, was slightly different.
“I had prodromal labour, it would stop and start and that went on for three weeks. I would labour for five or six hours and then just stop. In the end, when it actually kicked in, it was under three hours from start to finish – she was born within 20 minutes of us arriving at hospital,” Alicia said.
Emily was 4.8kg.
When she discovered she was pregnant again with Michael, now 3, Alicia decided to look at birthing at home.
“There were several factors that influenced my decision – number one is I really like low to no intervention births. With Emily I had to fight to keep it low intervention because of the prodromal labour and because she was overdue. I was under a lot of pressure to be induced … I just felt very stressed and bullied.”
Alicia started emailing private midwives. While some were unable to assist her due to her history of fetal macrosomia (the term given to babies weighing over 4kg on delivery) she soon found support from private midwife Joy Johnston.
“She was more than happy to support my home birth with Michael. I ended up having a very quick, low fuss, low intervention homebirth in my lounge room. He was 4.98 kilos,” Alicia said.
“Joy arrived at 1pm and he was born at 2.20pm. Basically she sat there quietly and watched and listened. She said if you want to get in the pool, get in the pool … I was pushing almost as soon as I got in.
“It was empowering – as soon as he was born I just wanted to run out to the street and scream I just had a baby!”
Alicia said birthing at home also gave her more confidence parenting her newborn.
“It felt very instinctual – it didn’t feel like I needed advice from anyone else.”
By the time Alicia fell pregnant again, Joy had retired from attending homebirths. The family had moved to Berwick, and Alicia tried to get in Casey’s homebirth program, but was ineligible because of her BMI and history of fetal macrosomia.
Joy recommended Martina Gorner, of ten moons midwifery, who she had mentored.
As her baby was breech, towards the end of the pregnancy Alicia had an ECV at Monash to turn her baby. The ECV was successful.
“Just after 40 weeks, I felt like I was in labour. I still had MJ at home, and he was still breastfed. I was hoping to get him to sleep, labour through the night, and when he woke up he would have a baby sister.”
It all stalled around sunrise, so MJ went to Alicia’s mum’s house for the day.
“I muddled around the house and Mick was doing things out the back. It started ramping up about 12pm – I called the midwife and she said she would come in half an hour. I hung up and Mick snuck around the corner and called and said come now.
“She came just as Poppy’s head was crowning.”
Poppy was 4.5kg and Alicia felt on top of the world.
“I think even more so (than previous births) because I got that far without any assistance.
“I could guide her head out, and I felt like I did it all myself, I felt really empowered. Mick is very squeamish when it comes to that, but he was right there.”
When Poppy was almost one year old, Alicia found out she was pregnant again.
“It was just tired – obviously I had five kids in six years so I was tired!” Alicia said.
Once again, Alicia went back to Martina of ten moons midwifery. Her pregnancy progressed with no issues and once she reached 10 days past her due date, she felt she was in for a well-deserved day of relaxation.
“I sent my kids to mum’s house on the Friday morning – even though I wasn’t in labour, I just wanted to lie in bed and eat and watch Netflix.
“When Mick got home, I told him I was going for a walk around the park. A friend ordered curry and sent it to my house – a pre-baby gift. I remember waking up and having a pain in my stomach and thinking maybe the curry doesn’t agree with me.”
Alicia got up to go the toilet in the early hours of the morning and had a contraction.
At 3.30am she contacted Martina, who arrived around 4am. She checked the baby’s heart rate and sat in the lounge room, letting Alicia labour unencumbered in the shower and bedroom.
Alicia said the delivery felt more challenging because of her baby’s position.
“He had his hand up by his face the whole time; it felt like he wasn’t going anywhere,” she said.
“It took a long time, once his face was born, for the rest of him to get out. I think it was just hard for him to move through because of the position.”
Baby Alexander was born at 6.38am weighing an impressive 5.06kg, or 11lb 2oz in the old scale. He was also quite tall, at 56cm long.
“I felt empowered, but tired and sore,” Alicia said.
After having a posterior tongue tie corrected at three-weeks old, Alicia said baby Alex was now thriving and was the apple of his older siblings’ eyes.
“They all absolutely idolise him,” she said.
