Danielle tells her birth story: 'I had baby Macie Alice on the 3rd June 2008 weighing 6lbs 14ozs. Here is my birth story.
I was 12 days overdue and my midwife came round in the morning to perform a sweep, but unfortunately it wasn't possible to perform the sweep due to the position of the baby.
I was quite disheartened and was booked in to be induced in 4 days time. Later that afternoon, me and my husband went for a walk with the dog and came back, had our dinner and were just relaxing in front of the TV.
At 11pm I decided to go to bed. As soon as I lay in bed I had a sharp pain so got up to go to the toilet. Over the next ten minutes or so I had a few more pains which were like cramps, so I had a short bath and then got out and put my TENs machine on.
My husband decided to time the contractions as they seemed to be very frequent but this had only been going on for about half an hour; they were 3 minutes apart.
We thought it must just be practice labour as for (1) I wasn't in any real pain, just a bit uncomfortable and (2) it had just come on from nowhere to every 3 minutes!
At midnight I had some red blood when I went to the toilet, so decided to call the hospital for some advice as we live 30 minutes drive away.
I spoke to a midewife and told her what was happening, she said I didn't sound like I was in established labour but to come in to be checked and I could always go back home again.
We decided we would wait and see if it got any worse. In the next half and hour the contractions went to every 2 minutes and slightly more intense, so we decided we had better go in to be checked.
I was convinced I would be sent home again though as was sure this couldn't be labour.
We arrived at the hospital at 1am roughly and were shown to a delivery room, the midwife left us for a while and when she came back and examined me she said 'you'll be very pleased to know you are 9cms!!'
I was over the moon!
The contractions were more intense now, not painful, but strong waves through my body so I had some gas and air now and soon after I felt the incredible urge to push. I felt like my body just took over and just knew what to do so I just went along with it!
After a small cut, as the cord was round her neck and they needed her out quickly, my beautiful baby girl Macie was born.
It was the most wonderful birth and so much better than I could have hoped for as I was so terrified beforehand, but it turned out to be great in the end!'
