Share your story
Were Rhea’s books or workshop part your birth preparation? We would love to hear your story, whether to share with expectant parents here, or privately with Rhea.
Were Rhea’s books or workshop part your birth preparation? We would love to hear your story, whether to share with expectant parents here, or privately with Rhea.
After an hour of pushing our son Pat was born at 7am in the morning. We had our fire going as the morning sun was coming through the clouds after a rain shower. It was magic! I was lost for words and in disbelief that after such an exhausting and difficult previous birth that it could be so simple.
My intention was for a birth without intervention, and I did everything in my power to make that happen,’ says Lauren. ‘I did a lot of research and worked to break down any fears I had. I built a relationship of trust with my midwife and knew that if we needed to transfer, then she would advise in a respectful way. I knew that I had full support and belief from my partner. Those were the things I felt I could control or influence before the birth… I did my due diligence!’
Sam, a midwife, birthed her first baby at home as part of the midwifery group practice (MGP) homebirth program at the Mercy Hospital for Women, which was introduced in October 2024.
After an emergency caesarean for her previous baby’s birth, Reanna had a physiological birth in hospital as part of the Hunter Midwifery Group Practice. ‘My biggest moment from reading Rhea’s book and also the workshop was realising where I had fallen down in my previous labour. I fell very broadly into the “aspirational but naive” category, and it was transformative to recognise that but also how to change my attitude to overcome this,’ she says.
Caroline birthed her first baby at home as part of the midwifery group practice (MGP) homebirth program at the Mercy Hospital for Women , which was introduced in October 2024.
Jane says the birth of her second baby, Lily, was ‘a healing and very redemptive birth experience’. ‘My first baby was born with a classic cascade of interventions, I was left feeling disappointed, sad and overwhelmed in the postpartum period, along with a sense of “not being able to do it”,’ Jane wrote to Rhea. ‘I withdrew my interest in the birth world for nearly three years until I found myself pregnant again. I then found your work.’ Here, Jane shares more about her experience.
Jerica describes the recent birth of her daughter as ‘a phenomenal experience’. ‘Luck did play a part in it, but I also attribute a lot of my positive experience to Rhea’s Birth with Confidence book,’ she says.
Alice’s first birth experience ‘left deep scars when it came to trusting care providers’, she says. But research, listening to positive birth stories and reading Birth With Confidence ‘reinforced my belief in my ability to birth on my own terms’, says Alice, who had a successful VBAC for her second baby’s birth.
After a ‘very much unwanted caesarean’, Amelia made different choices for the birth of her second baby, engaging private midwives and a doula for ‘my beautiful homebirth’: ‘Reading Beyond the Birth Plan made me realise that even calling in the most amazing supportive birth team could only take me so far.’
Suzanne says her experience birthing her three babies was ‘an unexpected ride of self discovery’. Fearful approaching her third labour after two distressing experiences, she read Birth With Confidence and was ‘blown away by how little I knew about the medical system and about birth’.