Since having my first baby in 2011, I’ve been on a phenomenal journey and I would love to share with you.

My spark to set up Birth You In Love was ignited during the pregnancies and births of my own children.

I saw a glaring gap in routine antenatal provision and my work from then on has been to help women, their partners and their babies have better birth experiences.

Like most women, I knew very little about childbirth when I was first pregnant, only what I’d seen on TV, from my mum and from a school biology class in 1991.

Having never had a baby, I’d never looked into it.

I didn’t know how to encourage a birth to go well or the steps I might take to stack the odds in my favour for a better experience for me, my baby or my partner.

In fact, I didn’t even know there were things you could do to help yourself have a better experience.

I guess I just thought you handed yourself over to the gods (or the doctors) and let them decide.

During my first pregnancy, I became fascinated with knowing more about birth.

• I read every book on childbirth I knew about. I was constantly researching on the internet. Heaven knows how anyone had their babies before the internet was invented!

• I’d heard about hypnosis for childbirth (hypnobirthing.) It sounded like the sort of thing that would enable me to be in control. I booked myself on a session with Dot Parry in Manchester

• At 5 months pregnant, I went to Solfest Festival in Cumbria and spent most of my time in the yurt of the Association of Radical Midwives. I didn’t even know such a thing existed but being pregnant, I was having a rather different kind of festival to normal!

• I was blessed to meet up with an old friend I’d lost touch with years before who was now working as a community midwife so she confirmed all the things about birth I’d been thinking about.

• The more I learnt, I had became astounded at the amount of lost knowledge about birth.

• It began to feel like the more I dug down, the more I realised that we, as a culture, have forgotten how women can most easily give birth and the maternity system, as most people use it, isn’t set up to help women fulfil the physiological process that is birth.

• And finally, I met ONE woman near the end of my pregnancy who’d had a really positive birth experience. She told me how she did it and told me I could too. She felt safe and totally supported by those around her. She completely inspired me.

ALL the things I learnt helped me have a fantastic birth experience.

But it felt like a mission to collate the information.

It was not all in one place.

There were things I didn’t take in; things which would have helped the experience be even better and in hindsight, ward off the potential for harm.

This is WHY I set up Birth You In Love.

I wanted to bring it all together to help other women and their partners and their babies.

What started as a hobby has turned into a full time passion.

In 2013, I set up the first ‘mobile’ Positive Birth Space in the UK. The space enabled me to gather women and signpost them to better birth experiences. I have supported hundreds of women over the last few years.

Birth You In Love is not about telling you HOW to give birth. Or WHERE to give birth. Or WHEN to give birth. Or with WHOM.

It’s about giving you options and choices and knowledge, so you can stand in your power and make the best choices for you.

And what’s the best choice for you may not be the best thing for your neighbour or your friend. It will depend on your worldview and your situation.

And it’s about sharing the tools you’ll need to manage the sensations and making the birth as comfortable as possible.

In 2013, I set up my first mobile ‘Positive Birth Space’ at The Green Gathering Festival. I ran it for 4 years, including at Solfest Festival and a number of others.

Modelled on the Yurt of the Association of Radical Midwives, a space I encountered at a festival whilst pregnant, I bought a 5m bell tent, decked it out with comfy mats and cushions and a small library of my favourite birth books and welcomed pregnant women and doulas and  birthworkers into the space.

It was wonderful!

There are SO many things to consider when you’re having a baby!

My second baby’s birth featured on the seminal BBC1 birth education documentary ‘Childbirth All or Nothing’ which aired in February 2015

PS If you feel drawn to working with me, do message me or call me on 07967 622884 and we can have a chat about what you need and how I can help you, be in releasing anxieties for birth or generally feeling more empowered and confident