POST 12: BIRTH DIARY

The weeks have been a blur and the days have gone so fast, I think it’s like I’ve started a new job and I don’t have any concept of time right now.

My little boy is already 2 weeks 3 days old and I’ve only just found the time to write about the birth let alone the subsequent trials that I have encountered and learnt to master.

Lets start by going through what I remember about my labour. 
5 AM START

I woke up at 5am on the 25^th of April (3 days overdue) and thought that I was having a bad stomach ache due to a labour special curry that I purchased and devoured from the spice grill a day prior. I took a cocktail of paracetamol and gavascon then went back to bed. I woke again at 7am with more intense pains and decided to call my doula, she advised me to sit in the bath and take more paracetamol. I sat meditating in the bath and watching films on my laptop until 12pm, I think that  I was still in denial and thought I was having a bad turn from the food. By this point the pains were 4 minutes apart so I called the maternity assessment unit and they advised me to come in and get checked out. When I got there I was already 3cm dilated and you have to be 10 so I was taken to the ward to wait for a delivery room. My back up doula arrived, as my original doula was unable to attend and she began to help me into some comfy clothes, gave me hand massages, fed me water and put lip balm on my dry mouth. Just an hour later I got out of the hospital bath and my waters broke but there was Meconium in my show www.birth.com.Meconium. Meconium is when the baby poos inside and can cause infections so they checked me out again and put me on the monitor, by this point I was 6 cm dilated and I was feeling very overwhelmed by the pain so my doula made sure I was given some gas and air and went through a breathing and meditation technique with me, which made me get the maximum benefit from the gas. By 6pm I was fully dilated and was wheeled into the delivery room. I remember that I didn’t get a break between contractions; the midwife said that she hadn’t seen anything like it and brought in an anesthetist and a doctor to debate whether I needed forceps. After 2 hours of pushing at 8pm I signed the consent form for the forceps delivery but as soon as I had dropped the pen his head started to show and with one last effort I delivered him naturally with no pain relief at 8:11 pm.

I don’t remember much but I remember hearing him cry and him being placed on my chest. I didn’t feel this inexplicable love that people describe but just a relief that he was ok and a fear that I had taken on too much. I felt bad that I didn’t feel it but after talking to a lot of other mums it’s completely normal and something that comes with time.

After the birth I asked for a private room, which you can pay extra for rather than go on a mixed ward. That night was such a blur, I slept 2 hours and I couldn’t get him to latch onto my breast so I was expressing my colostrum by hand into a syringe and feeding it to him, which took hours. I kept looking over at him in the bassinette and wondered how I was going to do this and how I would keep him alive and well. The moment I discharged myself from the hospital was the day it all fell into place. The midwives did not fill me with confidence, in fact I was told I couldn’t breastfeed properly and I should stay in for 10 days. I discharged myself after 2 and was feeding him at home that day with the help of my doulas and my mother. Things just worked for me the moment I was back in my comfort zone. Just 2 short weeks later I am feeding him with confidence and figuring out how to sleep and get the house and myself in order. It’s all a huge learning experience and a huge responsibility but it’s a responsibility that I am enjoying and growing from and my love for him is growing more each day.

This post is getting a little long now so I’ll leave it there for now and continue with my next post discussing problems I experienced in the first week home, such as breastfeeding complications, baby colic and wound aftercare.