Samantha Christine (Sam / SAMCFIT)

And something I had learned preparing for a natural birth and a home birth is you're

when you breathe against or push against the contractions that you feel instead of working with them, that's when it's more painful.

That's what's going to prevent any progression because you're tensing up.

So it's like with each contraction that you have,

Instead of tensing up, it's like you want to breathe, move with the pain, like make it fluid, right?

Breathe with the pressure.

I could literally feel with each contraction him like moving down, moving down, moving down.

And what's really cool is like I guided my entire delivery.

Like I told her when I was ready to

to breathe the baby down instead of push is what we say, breathe the baby down.

And she was just a support right beside me in that tub.

And so.

It was amazing.

Like when he, I was like on all fours, kind of like hanging over the tub.

And again, like at this point, it was just my mom, the doula, the midwife, her assistant, and my ex-husband, boy's dad.

It was pretty silent besides me just breathing this baby down.

And I'll never forget, like they call it the ring of fire.

Have you heard of that?

yes I have yeah it's like when the head comes out yeah okay and I had heard of that and I was like okay we're gonna see how this feels because here we are quite literally it is a burning sensation but it's like such a relief after that so it's when the head comes out it's like that ring of fire and it's a burning sensation and then it's out it's like you have a moment of relief because like the head really is the hardest part or most challenging right yeah yeah

So at that moment, I remember just feeling like, oh, okay.