Earlier I told the story of how I came to fall pregnant and my experience of pregnancy.
The last few weeks of my pregnancy are a blur. I do remember just wanting things to move along so I could be relieved of the discomfort. In hind site, that discomfort was nothing compared with what I experienced post birth. I kept reading up on ways to bring on labour and went about walking, eating curries, using essential oils and having sex all in a bid to get things going.
At my 40 week check up my Obstetrician was happy with everything and said we’d wait at least another week before considering an inducement. I was due on May 8th, 2010. Early evening on Monday the 11th, Mr T and I were watching TV when my waters broke. I ran to the toilet and sat over the bowl as what seemed like an endless amount of fluid gushed out. I joked with him that it now made sense why the books told you to put a plastic layer under your sheets in case it happened in bed.
I started to get excited and was waiting to feel contractions. I remembered from the antenatal classes that they didn’t want to see you in the hospital until you were having steady contractions at regular intervals. What I was feeling still felt like Braxton hicks and there was no logic to them. I phoned a girl friend almost two hours later and she asked if I’d let the hospital know. No, I hadn’t, should I? Of course she insisted. So I called the birthing suite and told them my waters had broken a few hours ago. The nurse couldn’t believe I was only just calling them. They asked me to come in to be checked out. Mr T and I drove in at 9pm. I had a bag packed now, expecting to be admitted. I was hooked up to a monitor. Not much action it seemed.
My contractions were so light and irregular that I was a long way off anything happening. I was given the option of going back home to get some sleep or staying in the hospital with little chance of much rest.
Mr T and drove back home and I got about 6 hours sleep. The next day they called to check on me in the morning, I was trying to time what I thought were contractions but couldn’t feel much. By 4pm the hospital called back and said I needed to come back in as nearly 24 hours had passed and the risk of infection would be getting high.
When we arrived they took me straight into the birthing suite and after an internal examination told me they needed to move things along. One of the midwifes told me I was going to need an Epidural. I panicked and told her I didn’t want one as my plan was to stay as natural as possible. She told me that was ok, but that I was going to be hooked up to a monitor and on a drip the entire time and that the Oxytocin they were giving me would make the labour more painful than normal. To her credit, she went along with my protests that I would just see how things went. But I do remember overhearing her call to the Anaesthetist who was checking in to see what work he might have as she told him there was nothing for now but it might change in an hour or two.
In the meantime I heard from another room the most gut wrenching scream I have ever heard. Mr T heard it too and we looked at each other as the midwife sensing how scared we were told us that woman was just about to meet her baby, she was right at the end. Bloody hell, I will remember that sound as long as I live.
After the drip went in it became hard to even go to the toilet. I needed someone to help me and the contractions came on fairly hard from the start. They started off 5 minutes apart and every 15 minutes the nurse came in and dialled up the dose of Oxytocin. I started to feel nausea and incredibly cold. They turned up the heating and gave me a blanket. Within an hour the pain was excruciating and the contractions 2 minutes apart. I thought this meant it wouldn’t take long.
The midwife was brought in for a chat as I asked how long it would take. She said I was only a few cms dilated and it could be another 6 or so hours. The tens machine I’d been using was not helping anymore. Mr T suggested I try the Gas. It was politely suggested that wouldn’t make a huge difference. I conceded and asked for the Epidural. It was about 7.30pm and I remember chatting to the Anaesthetist who’d called in on his way from an early dinner with his family.
I was still incredibly nauseas it was getting worse. They told me it could be a side effect of the Epidural. Not long after I was shivering so violently Mr T began to get worried. After taking my temperature it became apparent I had a fever and the blankets and heat were only making it worse. My temperature had hit 39.5 degrees and even one of the midwives said she hadn't seen one that high in a long while. My baby's heart rate was also rising and they were getting worried as it passed over 200 beats/minute – at one point peaking at 230! I had an infection as a result of my waters breaking early and Penicillin was added to my drip.
When the Obstetrician arrived and examined me he told me the baby was posterior and that he’d give it a while to move around, but if not, it would be coming out of the sunroof. At this point I was really out of it. I dozed and don’t remember anything after the point at which he left and then returned a few hours later.
The Oxytocin was continually dialled up. They wanted to get the baby out as quickly as possibly without surgery.
I remember the doctor coming back and telling Mr T and I that one thing was sure, before the sun came up in the morning, we were going to have a baby.
Fortunately my baby moved enough to avoid a c-section, but as the Obstetrician returned in gumboots and a big plastic coat and placed a large plastic sheet on the floor, Mr T and I worried. He showed us the forceps and part of me is glad I was so dosed up on medication at that point, or else I’d have seriously panicked. I didn’t even contemplate how those huge things were going to fit my lady bits.
They got me to push about 6 times and then the midwife told Mr T to look at the pillow as the episiotomy was done. I just remember the sound and felt nothing. The forceps did their job and helped twist my baby around to get out safely. I just remember being so amazed as this little purple body was passed up to me. I also remember Mr T crying as he proudly exclaimed “Oh my god, it’s a boy. It’s a little boy”.
In hindsight I now know why Mr T didn’t get to cut the cord - there was still work to be done. Baby T was placed on my chest as I was stitched up and he attached straight onto my boob and suckled away as we watched in awe. I would later find out I had internal and external stitching as a fairly decent sized cut was made.
It felt so surreal to see this little being that has been growing in your tummy for 9 months.
The birthing suite was full and once he was wiped and weighed I was left to rest before they came back to take me to the maternity ward. Little T was wheeled out with Mr T and I was left to sleep. Only I couldn’t. I just wanted to shower and see my baby. In hind site I should have been more insistent. I couldn’t move, my legs were numb from the epidural and I still had a catheter in.
After about 4 hours, I was showered in a wheelchair and put in bed with in a room with my newly created family. My body was exhausted. The midwives later told me just how worried they had been for both me and the baby as my fever got so bad. The next three days I slept about 6 hours in total. I was spent. I wanted to be doting over this little baby, who I never got sick of looking at and cuddling as I fed him dutifully, but instead I was a crying, weak mess. Luckily Mr T picked up the pieces becoming chief nappy changer and gofer as I was bedridden for 2 days afterwards.
Finally I was given a sleeping tablet on the last night and got a few hours rest before some midwife decided it would be a great idea to bring the baby back to me at 3am in the morning for a feed (even though they’d already given him formula before). As struggling new parents who questioned why our baby was crying nearly all the time, wind was the natural response. Despite the fact he was getting only the tiniest amount of colostrum from me. I look back now and there is so much in those first few days that shaped my experience of motherhood early on. I left hospital without my milk coming in 5 days after giving birth. The following months were a battle to feed him as naturally as possible (as I wrote here).
I had the baby blues as my mum called it. I lost it one evening breaking down into a crying mess as mum and Mr T sat by my bed and Baby T lay in his crib. My bottom hurt from the ring of fire that was a combination of stiches and massive haemorrhoids, yet strangely that didn’t bother me. I was the happiest, most exhausted, most eager and hopeful I had ever been.
The last few weeks of my pregnancy are a blur. I do remember just wanting things to move along so I could be relieved of the discomfort. In hind site, that discomfort was nothing compared with what I experienced post birth. I kept reading up on ways to bring on labour and went about walking, eating curries, using essential oils and having sex all in a bid to get things going.
At my 40 week check up my Obstetrician was happy with everything and said we’d wait at least another week before considering an inducement. I was due on May 8th, 2010. Early evening on Monday the 11th, Mr T and I were watching TV when my waters broke. I ran to the toilet and sat over the bowl as what seemed like an endless amount of fluid gushed out. I joked with him that it now made sense why the books told you to put a plastic layer under your sheets in case it happened in bed.
I started to get excited and was waiting to feel contractions. I remembered from the antenatal classes that they didn’t want to see you in the hospital until you were having steady contractions at regular intervals. What I was feeling still felt like Braxton hicks and there was no logic to them. I phoned a girl friend almost two hours later and she asked if I’d let the hospital know. No, I hadn’t, should I? Of course she insisted. So I called the birthing suite and told them my waters had broken a few hours ago. The nurse couldn’t believe I was only just calling them. They asked me to come in to be checked out. Mr T and I drove in at 9pm. I had a bag packed now, expecting to be admitted. I was hooked up to a monitor. Not much action it seemed.
My contractions were so light and irregular that I was a long way off anything happening. I was given the option of going back home to get some sleep or staying in the hospital with little chance of much rest.
Mr T and drove back home and I got about 6 hours sleep. The next day they called to check on me in the morning, I was trying to time what I thought were contractions but couldn’t feel much. By 4pm the hospital called back and said I needed to come back in as nearly 24 hours had passed and the risk of infection would be getting high.
When we arrived they took me straight into the birthing suite and after an internal examination told me they needed to move things along. One of the midwifes told me I was going to need an Epidural. I panicked and told her I didn’t want one as my plan was to stay as natural as possible. She told me that was ok, but that I was going to be hooked up to a monitor and on a drip the entire time and that the Oxytocin they were giving me would make the labour more painful than normal. To her credit, she went along with my protests that I would just see how things went. But I do remember overhearing her call to the Anaesthetist who was checking in to see what work he might have as she told him there was nothing for now but it might change in an hour or two.
In the meantime I heard from another room the most gut wrenching scream I have ever heard. Mr T heard it too and we looked at each other as the midwife sensing how scared we were told us that woman was just about to meet her baby, she was right at the end. Bloody hell, I will remember that sound as long as I live.
After the drip went in it became hard to even go to the toilet. I needed someone to help me and the contractions came on fairly hard from the start. They started off 5 minutes apart and every 15 minutes the nurse came in and dialled up the dose of Oxytocin. I started to feel nausea and incredibly cold. They turned up the heating and gave me a blanket. Within an hour the pain was excruciating and the contractions 2 minutes apart. I thought this meant it wouldn’t take long.
The midwife was brought in for a chat as I asked how long it would take. She said I was only a few cms dilated and it could be another 6 or so hours. The tens machine I’d been using was not helping anymore. Mr T suggested I try the Gas. It was politely suggested that wouldn’t make a huge difference. I conceded and asked for the Epidural. It was about 7.30pm and I remember chatting to the Anaesthetist who’d called in on his way from an early dinner with his family.
I was still incredibly nauseas it was getting worse. They told me it could be a side effect of the Epidural. Not long after I was shivering so violently Mr T began to get worried. After taking my temperature it became apparent I had a fever and the blankets and heat were only making it worse. My temperature had hit 39.5 degrees and even one of the midwives said she hadn't seen one that high in a long while. My baby's heart rate was also rising and they were getting worried as it passed over 200 beats/minute – at one point peaking at 230! I had an infection as a result of my waters breaking early and Penicillin was added to my drip.
When the Obstetrician arrived and examined me he told me the baby was posterior and that he’d give it a while to move around, but if not, it would be coming out of the sunroof. At this point I was really out of it. I dozed and don’t remember anything after the point at which he left and then returned a few hours later.
The Oxytocin was continually dialled up. They wanted to get the baby out as quickly as possibly without surgery.
I remember the doctor coming back and telling Mr T and I that one thing was sure, before the sun came up in the morning, we were going to have a baby.
Fortunately my baby moved enough to avoid a c-section, but as the Obstetrician returned in gumboots and a big plastic coat and placed a large plastic sheet on the floor, Mr T and I worried. He showed us the forceps and part of me is glad I was so dosed up on medication at that point, or else I’d have seriously panicked. I didn’t even contemplate how those huge things were going to fit my lady bits.
They got me to push about 6 times and then the midwife told Mr T to look at the pillow as the episiotomy was done. I just remember the sound and felt nothing. The forceps did their job and helped twist my baby around to get out safely. I just remember being so amazed as this little purple body was passed up to me. I also remember Mr T crying as he proudly exclaimed “Oh my god, it’s a boy. It’s a little boy”.
Getting Stitched Up as my Little Man looks at his mumma (note the forecep marks on his face)
Little T was born Thursday May 13th, 2010 at 12.05am after what technically was 6 hours of labour, but had started 30 hours earlier when my waters broke. I was later told they broke due to his posterior head position, not because I was going into labour.
It felt so surreal to see this little being that has been growing in your tummy for 9 months.
The birthing suite was full and once he was wiped and weighed I was left to rest before they came back to take me to the maternity ward. Little T was wheeled out with Mr T and I was left to sleep. Only I couldn’t. I just wanted to shower and see my baby. In hind site I should have been more insistent. I couldn’t move, my legs were numb from the epidural and I still had a catheter in.
After about 4 hours, I was showered in a wheelchair and put in bed with in a room with my newly created family. My body was exhausted. The midwives later told me just how worried they had been for both me and the baby as my fever got so bad. The next three days I slept about 6 hours in total. I was spent. I wanted to be doting over this little baby, who I never got sick of looking at and cuddling as I fed him dutifully, but instead I was a crying, weak mess. Luckily Mr T picked up the pieces becoming chief nappy changer and gofer as I was bedridden for 2 days afterwards.
Finally I was given a sleeping tablet on the last night and got a few hours rest before some midwife decided it would be a great idea to bring the baby back to me at 3am in the morning for a feed (even though they’d already given him formula before). As struggling new parents who questioned why our baby was crying nearly all the time, wind was the natural response. Despite the fact he was getting only the tiniest amount of colostrum from me. I look back now and there is so much in those first few days that shaped my experience of motherhood early on. I left hospital without my milk coming in 5 days after giving birth. The following months were a battle to feed him as naturally as possible (as I wrote here).
I had the baby blues as my mum called it. I lost it one evening breaking down into a crying mess as mum and Mr T sat by my bed and Baby T lay in his crib. My bottom hurt from the ring of fire that was a combination of stiches and massive haemorrhoids, yet strangely that didn’t bother me. I was the happiest, most exhausted, most eager and hopeful I had ever been.
Proud Dad and Husband
