home waterbirth essential ?

[lolo74]

hello all,

never posted before but read a lot of threads!! a very usuful forum.

I am -planning a home waterbith.

we have decided to go for this lovely pool. Love the color!

The pool + the kit cost £105.95 including the delivery but as we are on a budget, I'd like to know if the water pump is very essential.

Also the kit comes with an electric air pump, do you think a manual air pump would be too much work?

Thanks for your help

lolo XXX

Let's see. Having pushed out your baby and the placenta, are you going to be up to bailing out what is essentially 15 large baths worth of water?

Yes get a pump. But you might want to think about going to a plumbing supplier/pond supplier to get one instead as they may be cheaper - many of the peripherals are. Or have a look on ebay etc.

"Having pushed out your baby and the placenta, are you going to be up to bailing out what is essentially 15 large baths worth of water?"

Er no, that's what partners are for.

I had a birthpool-in-a-box, didn't bother with a pump to empty it and (I'm told) that it was just left siphoning out down a drain via a hosepipe. I wouldn't know (and don't very much care!), I was snuggled up with my newborn daughter.

Liner is (apparently) essential as any remaining goo can be bundled up and disposed of with minimum fuss. Again, I was too busy snuggled up with DD to care!

Electric air pump is, however, essential to inflate it but you can buy these most places. I had one already for airbeds/paddling pools etc.

A friend has a birthpool-in-a-box which I've attended in use a couple of times in different settings. TBH, a manual footpump really doesn't take long and syphoning the water out afterwards doesn't either. Electric pumps aren't really necessary for either job but someone dedicated to setting it all up and maintaing it throughout birth to clearing up can really help. It means your chosen partner can be free to support you without having to worry about the practicalities surrounding the pool.

Top purchase so far, for what has effectively become a communal pool are new liners for each birth, of course and a shower type mixer attatchment used for a case of seperate taps. It saved having to switch the hose or run with buckets!

oooh, ooh, the other top purchase was a pack of condoms so that when a midwife attempted to kick one friend out of birth pool for monitoring, the condoms were proferred to protect the (otherwise non water proof, in this case) doppler

Admittedly, the doppler eventually packed in (as it was attempted at some point without 'protection') and the midwife involved said she would explain to her supervisors that this was exactly why a waterproof doppler was necessary!

Pinnard was used for the remainder of the birth.