I am 8 days post-partum but this is going to take a while to write- I want to document my birth story as fully as I can … first though, Theodore is crying so I need to go see him.
Back!
H arrived a week before my due date – and I gave birth at 40 weeks and 2 days, 2 days overdue and desperate to have the baby – not because of the pregnancy being a hassle; I think I had a fantastic pregnancy, but rather because we could see the days going by and I wanted to maximise the bonding time H had with his son.
We tried pretty much every natural method we thought safe to encourage – NOT to induce – labour… and for a while sex seemed to do the trick. I had contractions for several hours after sex, and drank a lot of cinnamon tea, but it didn’t really have the full effect. By this I mean, I had contractions for about 6 hours, small ones, and then they would disappear; it happened 3 times! By my midwife appointment on the 26th, I had resolved to ask for a sweep and see if that would work, because if not it felt like H would be saying goodbye to me and my big belly, and would have to wait at least 2 months to meet his baby.
Luckily, I was 1cm dialated when the sweep was performed, and less than 24 hours later Theodore Prana was born. He was and is a healthy, happy little boy, absolute perfection in our eyes, and this is my experience of his birth:
We went in to the hospital with my resolve to ask for a sweep, but with H also knowing if it didn’t work, I did not want to go further and ask for an induction. As much as possible, I wanted a natural experience, but by the 26th, I felt like I needed to have this baby out of me, and I wanted so much for H to be there. Thinking about it, maybe my labour would have started anyway, but I am glad I pushed and got the sweep, it meant that we got a whole week as a family before H had to say goodbye.
Once there, the midwife did a vaginal examination and told me I was 1cm so she agreed to perform the sweep – but did warn us that really this procedure was not done until 41 weeks most times so we were asking for it against normal recommendations. It was uncomfortable but not painful… the amount of blood shocked me a little bit, but she said it was normal and that unless I had bleeding heavier than a period or contractions coming regularly, or my waters broke, I should just ride it out. So we went home, and then decided that because it was still early, we would take a walk to the beach.
By the walk home I had some twinges but I didn’t want to get H’s hopes up again so I did my best to be discreet and just be aware of them without making any sort of faces. This was around 11 am. It worked until we got home and then a few hours later they hit properly. I remember telling mum that this was it – the contractions were making me want to cry so I was hiding in my room with H and napping in between each wave – they were about 10 minutes apart so I managed quite a few hours rest and every time one came, I would wake up, be on all fours and just breathe as much as I could.
I have never been more thankful for doing my prenatal teacher training as I was during my labour. The only thing I wasn’t prepared for was the nausea. Before being on the pill I would get extreme nausea during my periods, and this was exactly what happened, so anything I tried to eat, I would bring back up – not a pleasant experience.
We started my labour playlist of mantra’s around 4 pm and H let me squeeze his hand to distract from the pain. Mum gave me a mini massage on my lower back (H tried but his hands are bigger and heavier than mums… plus I wanted him next to me, even just being able to see him and hold his hand made such a big difference to my mental state). In between contractions I did some crochet, though that didn’t really happen for long. All of this worked really well until at 7 pm I went to the toilet and saw blood, more than I had expected.
We decided that to be safe, we’d take a trip to the hospital, so with me walking slowly, we made our way. On the slope in my estate I had to stop and throw up, which awkwardly was when we met a family friend… but she was quite relaxed and wished me luck and we carried on. In hospital they told me I was 3 cm dilated so to go home, but they gave me an anti-nausea injection which helped bucket loads! That said, I did ask Mum to get my Dad to bring the car round because walking home did not seem like an option by that point – my contractions were 4 minutes apart, and even though I knew my cervix was still relatively closed, it did not feel like it.
By this point I was in pain but still feeling quite controlled. I was worried about H and how he was handling things but at the same time I kept trying to concentrate on what baby was trying to tell my body. I really didn’t want to use pain relief or as little of it as possible so I was quiet and though aware of the other people, I am pretty sure I ignored them most of the time. This is probably partially why H told me he felt useless afterwards but I know that if he hadn’t been there I would never have been so calm. I know I made lots of faces, and I wanted to cry a lot, but at the same time, I was aware that my body was doing exactly what it should and that at the end of it all, I would be glad of all the hard work.
The car ride was awful – or so I thought until later.
At home I took 2 paracetamols and stayed in my room. Mum soaked a cloth and put some lavender oil on it and this stayed with us until I needed to push hours later.
Lying down was not comfortable so I was on my knees for most of the time. Even standing and squatting didn’t really seem to have much of an impact on the pain. H was a gem through it all… though at one point I think I kicked him out because I didn’t want to squeeze his hand anymore and he was making me nervous. I wanted him to have a good experience of my labour, but I wanted to not have to worry about how he felt either.
By around 10:30 pm I decided I couldn’t take any more without some stronger pain relief. Again we journeyed to the hospital and this time, the car ride genuinely felt like torture. Sitting was so uncomfortable!
Thankfully, when we got to the hospital they told me I was 7 cm dilated. I had the option of stronger pain relief or a bath with gas & air.
I chose the bath… and though I absolute hate feeling drunk, the gas & air proved to be just enough for me to get to almost 9 cm before coming out of the bath and going into the labour room.
I am now 12 days postpartum and still writing. I want to finish writing this before I forget, but my gosh finding the time is hard work.
The labour room is a little bit of a blur. I remember getting onto the bed and being on my knees. I was still using gas and air and I tried holding the metal at the back of the bed, but preferred H’s hand because it meant I had some contact with him. I don’t remember thinking very much at this point, apart from when I needed to breath and I could hear H and mum telling me to do so. I know that I used the lavender cloth to cool down at points, and that mum gave me a massage too.
The midwife I had was wonderful! She came in repeatedly to check on us but mostly just left us to ourselves. I do remember thinking as the contractions got longer and with less breaks that I was crazy not to have taken more pain relief but looking back I am grateful that I avoided it. I do remember being told that I could do small pushes in between contracts if I felt it helped, and thinking that the only thing it would result in was me passing stool – which it did, but it also helped push baby a little.
When that happened mum said not to be embarrassed but all I could think was, why on earth would I be embarrassed, I’ve had multiple people stare and prod at my nether regions today, everyone in the room can handle a little bit of poop!
Unfortunately, the amount of people who were going to stare and poke me down there was only going to increase… but we’re not quite at that part yet.
When she checked me next she told me I was 9.5 cm dilated, and by then I had told her I needed to push. She told me to wait and after being at 10 cm for a while, I asked her to break my waters because I was running out of energy and didn’t know how much more I could handle. I was so tired.
This is where I regret not taking any anti-nausea medication earlier, because if I had, maybe I would have been able to hold off a little. Still, she broke the waters and then I was allowed to push.
Finally!
The pushing took about an hour. I switched from my knees to my back twice, finally giving birth on my knees. I think generally they prefer you to give birth on your back, but he kept ‘turtling’ so I needed the help of gravity. Every push he would poke his head out and then burrow back in. H and mum kept me going, encouraging me and telling me I was almost there. H saw me crowning which was brilliant, and I wish I had been allowed to video it so I could have watched it back.
At one point near the end, when I was on my back, they said I was almost there and I wanted to tell them to stop lying. I felt like if it didn’t happen soon they were going to have to cut the baby out because I couldn’t push any harder. But the pushing didn’t hurt. It felt natural. My body knew exactly what to do when I stopped thinking and let it.
I know H at this point was flitting from watching the baby to holding my hand, but when I turned onto my knees I think he walked back a bit. I can’t quite remember what anyone else was doing, I just remember feeling Theo’s head inch further out and then retract. The midwife, said that once the head was out there would be some stinging, and oh my gosh there was, but she guided me through every mini-push and once his shoulders were through, the baby just slipped out. I turned back onto my front and Theo was put onto my chest. We opted for delayed cord clamping so H cut the cord after a few minutes and Mum took some photos.
Then baby was taken away and they pulled out my placenta. This is where things got scary.
I remember the placenta being pulled and it hurting a lot!
I remember looking at H with the baby and feeling exhausted but wonderful.
I remember him picking an outfit that said ‘Flying High’ and joking that the gas and air made it a fitting baby grow.
And then, I remember them pushing against my stomach and feeling the blood spurt out of me.
I remember feeling sleepy, and I remember looks of panic.
Mum switched to speaking Spanish and kept saying the word theatre.
H told me I wasn’t allowed to sleep – he looked really scared and I could feel the energy draining away from me.
I had a cannula inserted into each arm, and every time the midwife pressed my belly, more blood would spill out. I was at this point in a panic. They called the consultant in, and I kept hearing the word “theatre”, nobody had checked to see if Theo was okay, so H and mum were with him, and I felt useless. I wanted to be able to hold my baby and all I could do was lie there and fall in and out of consciousness.
The consultant came in and ordered 3 units of blood.
She had a little fight about her suture kit and then told me she was going to sew me up. Apparently it was the tear that had caused all the blood, not my uterus which is what the midwives had thought. Whilst she did that though, I remember her criticising my mantra’s as I tried to sing along to them; but they gave me some comfort and at least by then I knew I wasn’t going to bleed out.
I saw H’s face, and remember him saying “never again” and all I could think was that you hear horror stories of babies being fine but labour being too traumatic for mum’s to handle. I was scared that he wouldn’t be able to handle whatever came next, and I was scared that I wouldn’t be able to do anything for my baby. Even writing all of this down brings up that emotion and I am crying. My perfect labour ended so traumatically and I kept wondering what I had done wrong. I looked over at Theo, and told H to take lots of pictures. I didn’t want to miss the first few hours of his life, even if I would have to catch up on them after.
Once the consultant finished she said I had a hematoma that would have to resolve itself. I vaguely remember mum comparing my vagina lip to the size of a pineapple, which she later corrected me and told me she’d said apple. I was scared to move, but 3 hours after Theo was born, after H made me eat some toast, I painfully shuffled off the bed into a wheelchair and got taken to a recovery room which would become my home for almost a week.
My birth experience was wonderful, but the immediate after was awful and the days after left me depressed; though I didn’t realise it at the time. Now, 12 days postpartum I am like a new person, but my postpartum experience is something I will have to write about later.
For now, I am signing off on this story. Every pregnancy, labour and birth story will be different, and I am sure that in the future, if and when we decide to have another baby my experience will shift entirely, but this is what I know for now – labour is portrayed as a big scary thing, but actually it doesn’t have to be. Of course, sometimes things go wrong, but when people ask about my labour I have told them it was brilliant; for me the hard bit came after.
That said, I am loving motherhood, and I am lucky enough to have a lot of help. I look at Theodore and I know that even with all the scary bits, I would do it all again.
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