The birth of our first child, Mila, also gave birth to a story about the importance of water in our lives; about the importance of informing and empowering women so they can make their own choices when it comes to the birth of their children. We were lucky that we could benefit from the New Zealand childbirth system, that has become a paragon for other nations due in a large part to the values and methods used by NZ midwives. Please share this story, so that other prospective mothers around the world might realise that there may be alternatives to what they have been told about childbirth. And so that we can also remember how magical an element is water: mother to us all.