Home Waterbirths and Costs

Hi All,
Very excited to be having a home birth with my wonderful mid wife (who delievered DD2 in a birth centre).
As my first appointment is still a couple of weeks away. I was wondering has anyone hired a birthing pool and what the cost was?
And also the oxygen tank that is required?
My only fear of a home birth is what if the Hot water system runs out? Has this happened to anyone?
Thanks:-)
(No -ve replies on basis of Im having a home birth! I don't care to hear your opinion!!)

Hi,

Can't comment on the cost of a pool as my midwife provided ours free of charge, didn't have gas but did price it but unless you are in NZ it's irrelevant, BUT our hot water system did conk out on us. LOL

Now bearing in mind that DS2 was in a tremendous hurry and we were lucky to get the pool filled in the first place, it was basically lots of boiling the kettle and water and dumping it in. Well that's what I assumed was happening as I was kinda busy at the time. LOL

Christina

Fantastic- But at least you have a light approach to it:-) But I guess you are otherwise preoccupied at the time aren't you:-)
I know when I was have dd2 that hubby never set up the camera and i never noticed- till he admitted it rather sheepishly two days latter- I just laughed, but I know he was expecting a roasting:-)
I just thought well maybe i should have been more focused if I wanted it done:-P

It's funny, at the time I only cared about them getting it filled so I could get in it...I could care less about how they did it. LOL We only just got it filled about 30 minutes before he was born so think if I can convince DP for a 3rd then it will be a "dry" birth and I ain't looking forward to it. Of course, maybe I'll get a nice "long" labour next time?

Had a "dry" one with DS1 and it wasn't fun.....didn't even feel DS2 crowning, just looked down and there he was. Bless DS1 too, it was supposed to be his last swimming lesson of the term that morning and he kept crawling all over me and I just wanted him out of my way. LOL I was very good though because I didn't yell at him, and he didn't seem to realise that I was in pain so I'd certainly have him around again, though he wasn't actually in the room when Alex was born.

Well good luck anyway............and if you've got any general questions I'd be happy to try and answer them if I can.

Hey there!

My midwife had her own birth pool so we didn't have to hire one. You may be able to borrow one from somewhere.....

We ran out of hot water, so dh and my midwife spent most of the afternoon boiling water in saucepans and the electric wok and tipping it in. It wasn't a problem at all from my side!!

You don't necessarily need an oxygen tank, unless you particularly want one... They have done studies and in the case of infant resus, they believe it is more effective doing face to face resus. I believe hospitals are using this method over oxygen more and more....

It cost me $1800 all up.

All the best!

Oh ok my mw told me i had to have oxygen. Have you found info anywhere on the new face to face resus? she is very open minded so i would love to discuss it with her:-)

Howdy, I'll have a search today to see if I can find some stuff. Although.....if your midwife says you need oxygen, that would suggest the face to face isn't a technique she is using or comfortable with. She should be able to access some info as well.

This is my midwifes site and here is a bit on not using oxygen.


http://www.homebirth.net.au/2008/04/resuscitation-of-newborn.html

I just dropped in to say hi and good luck. I tried for a water birth (tho I was in hospital) and I have to admit I got hacked off with the steam, but if the water had been cooler it wouldn't have helped painwise yk? Id been in labour for a good 20 or so hours by then so anything and everything set me off. Didn't help that my darling boy was posterior - they had to turn him a few hours later and I was almost to exhausted to push

SO anyways, best of luck, I hope everything works out for you smile

I am planning my homebirth too, and have wondered all these things! Fortunately for me, they aren't an issue anymore as I will be at mum and dads with a lovely big corner bath and continuous hot water, but I did have a plan!

I was borrowing the birth pool, or buying a deep paddling pool from target or kmart. I also had arranged a couple of urns to borrow so that we had an option on top of the stove top. We were also going to have a pot on the gas bbq as that is a bit quicker than our stove.

The oxygen, I have no idea, as my middy doesn't require it.

All up it will cost me about $1500, but the other midwives I interviewed charged anywhere from $2000 up to $4000. We would have paid it, but I'm glad my favourite was cheaper than that!

I am planning my homebirth too, and have wondered all these things! Fortunately for me, they aren't an issue anymore as I will be at mum and dads with a lovely big corner bath and continuous hot water, but I did have a plan!

I was borrowing the birth pool, or buying a deep paddling pool from target or kmart. I also had arranged a couple of urns to borrow so that we had an option on top of the stove top. We were also going to have a pot on the gas bbq as that is a bit quicker than our stove.

The oxygen, I have no idea, as my middy doesn't require it.

All up it will cost me about $1500, but the other midwives I interviewed charged anywhere from $2000 up to $4000. We would have paid it, but I'm glad my favourite was cheaper than that!

I hired a birthing pool and it cost about $100 at the time. This was for a large steel framed pool with a liner inside. This included all the hoses for filling and emtying the pool (which connected to the landry taps). Well worth the money, but you could certainly purchase on at the shops. Just make sure it is big enough to move around in. Also, if you labour for a couple of hours in the water, you might want to think about placing a mattress or beanbag under it as the floor can get hard. Our hot water ran out, but we just filled the pool in two phases (knew to do this as we had a practice run). We had a number of urns which we earlier filled and heated, filled the pool until the hot water ran out, covered it with bubblerap and waited for the hot water to re-heat (took about an hour or so), topped up with our urn water and then filled the rest of the pool with the next lot of warm water. We kept the urns hot and topped up as we needed. This process did take some time, but the reward was a pool which had enough water to sit just under my breasts while in a squatting position so I was able to freely float, change positions and enjoy the water.
Also, my midwives carried a kit, including oxygen and all the required resus and drugs eg for bleeding etc.
Hope this helps.