Labour… My Story

That’s right! my baby has finally arrived ! 16 days late but he made it in the end, so after 5 days in hospital and a day at home recovering I’m ready to tell my story whilst its still fresh in my memory.

I just want to put out a WARNING!!! any pregnant ladies reading this who feel they don’t want to know the harships of birthing a baby or feel they will scare themselves by reading my story please don’t read on past this point.

So as we all know my baby did everything he could to stay put in his mummy’s tummy so on Sunday 30th June they decided enough was enough and I needed to be induced! we had to be up the hospital super early so I was really hoping I would be holding my baby in my arms by that evening. oh how wrong could I be! So the induction I had was simply a gel that got inserted inside me which is supposed to start all the right hormones going to kick start labour. So after having this done we were allowed to wonder around the hospital and just had to go back every hour to be checked to see if I had dilated anymore. each hour passed and nothing happened, after about 8 hours it really got tiring! so we got moved to this private room waiting to be called down to delivery, the room was amazing we had a fridge TV microwave and our own bathroom plus a pull out bed for Mr M to sleep on! After another 6 ish hours of waiting we were told delivery is too busy for me to go down and have my waters broken so we would need to stay overnight and wait on news.

6am the following morning in came the nurse and said be ready in 15 min we are taking you down to have your waters broke. SHIT its happening! scared out of my wits we went down and met the midwife who would be doing the deed of darkness and popping my waters. Laying on my back legs wide open for the world to see and all she needs to do is insert this kind of hook thing, not uncomfortable in the slightest just abit twingey, after poking around for a while she said she couldn’t reach what she needed to, after a while longer of her poking me up the chuff I felt this really warm gooey gush flood out of me . (trys not to vomit) Then all I remember next is her running and pressing a button on the wall and in rushes about 5 doctors and midwives, telling me not to panic and to quickly roll over onto my side whilst somebody quickly pricked me and put a line in my hand to get fluids into me, ive never been so scared in all my life! after the commotion was over they told me babys heartbeat had really dropped and I had a lot of blood in my waters which is why everybody dashed in to help. After me and baby got stabilised I enjoyed some tea and toast whilst waiting for things to start.

Because the gel the day before hadn’t worked I had to be put on a hormone drip to force my body to contract, did I ever tell you I hate needles? well I do… and I had one permently In my hand feeding me this drip. anyway I scoffed my toast and got comfy waiting for things to start having a gossip with the midwife and Mr M who bless him really didn’t know what to do. Half an hour later I had a few pains come and go and I thought to myself if these are contractions then I’m totally going to boss this! as time went by each one got worse and worse to the point I was moaning like a dying cow. I had to stand up and lean on Mr M as the pain was so bad I just couldn’t sit down, then all of a sudden I get that feeling deep in my stomach… you know the one where you just know you are going to see your breakfast, that’s right I threw up all over the bed and all over myself. I thought this was the most embarrassing thing to happen so far until I was told I needed to pee in a bed pan in front of Mr M. Bless him. My contractions started getting stronger and stronger to the point I was doubled over in pain screaming every swear word under the sun. Its the oddest feeling because for 60 seconds I was in the worst pain imaginable then it would suddenly go and I would be ok laughing and joking with the midwife again. About 3ish hours in and id had enough, sprawled on the bed screaming begging for an epidural they arranged for the doctor to come round and get the epidural in! until then I was on the good gas and air, that stuff is banging! its worth having a baby just to have a go on that bad boy! it made me feel like id had about 10 vodkas!

For anyone who’s had an epidural I’m sure you will agree with me I thought it was just a quick injection in the spine, well its far from that! I had to sit up on the bed and bend forward like I was a prawn whilst they could find the exact spot they needed, the most impossible thing you can do is sit still whilst contracting! completely out of it on the gas and air and trying to stay still whilst they put the needle in my spine was one of the worst parts bloody hell did that hurt!! it took about half an hour and countless injections to get the right part of my spine but they managed it and I felt so relieved! so my understanding of the epidural is you have port taped to your back that goes into your spine which had a tube going up my back over my shoulder which was connected to a bag containing the solution and I had a little button to press every 25 minuets which released the solution into my spine. Less than 10 min after having it put in I had no pain whatsoever! yay! my legs were paralysed now which means I needed a catheter. For anyone who doesn’t know what that is basically its a tube going up into your bladder and the pee goes into a bag because for obvious reasons I could no longer get up and pee! I cant tell you how comfortable I felt pain free I could have cried infact I think I did. So now was just a waiting game… until my bloods came back saying I had picked up an infection and needed IV antibiotics quickly, so again about 4 doctors rushed in to get a line in my hand to get the antibiotics in quickly, I’ve since learnt it was suspected sepsis!

After all the drama it was actually time to rest try and have a sleep and wait for this baby to come, we are now about 12-13 hours in both me and Mr M are exhausted, I could see me being in so much pain earlier on was killing him but he’s trying to be brave for me. By this time I think I was about 8cm dilated and the plan was to start pushing at 11pm once I reach 10cm. 11pm came and we went for it! I had no idea when I was contracting because of the epidural so I had to be told when to push and I honestly couldn’t feel much happening, until the nurse examined me and I let out this almighty fart right in her face! Mr M is laughing his head off and I’m so embarrassed I don’t know weather to say anything or not!!

The plan was to push for 2 hours, one hour of pushing and the midwife examined me and it looked like baby’s head was in a really awkward position and if they couldn’t rectify it I would have to be taken to theatre for a forceps delivery which also meant I needed to be prepped for a C-section should the forceps not work. by this time I’m mentally drained crying my eyes out scared out of my wits, there was no anaesthetist available which meant we had to wait. then we had the news they had called one in and all a sudden the sides went up on my bed and I was being quickly wheeled to the theatre crying and screaming for Mr M as he had to wait until I was prepped. The only way I can describe it is like a scene from casualty I was looking up at these bright lights and white ceiling tiles surrounded by doctors all introducing themselves and telling me what was going to happen, the anaesthetist was the one doctor who explained everything to me held my hand and reassured me , her job was to give me the medicine stronger than the epidural I was crying asking what if it doesn’t work what if I feel it, so she sprayed this really cold spray on me and asked me if I could feel it which I couldn’t. Finally ready and in comes Mr M dressed in his lovely scrubs and crocs they made him wear, he looked more frightened than me!

I’ve never been so scared in all my life as they strapped my paralysed legs up in these strip things and put up a screen so we couldn’t see what was happening. From here on I saw nothing what happened so I can only tell you what I heard, Same as before I couldn’t feel the contractions but I was told when I was having one and that I needed to push as hard as I could whilst the forceps are used to pull my baby out, after a few moments of pushing and this really hard pulling sensation in my stomach (I felt like my insides were being ripped out) they told me his head was born, one more massive push and a big pull the other end and my baby was born and thrown over The screen onto my tummy, so overcome with emotion I cried my eyes out, My beautiful baby Rex was born 7lb 8oz of pure perfection all of a sudden though the doctors started to panic as I was losing a lot of blood fast I later found out I lost 2liters and almost needed a blood transfusion, still laying down whilst they stitched me up all of a sudden they started to panic again and quickly told me that my womb isn’t moving back to where it should be and I needed an injection that was going to make me very sick and they weren’t wrong!! 10 seconds after injecting me I started to be violently sick and as I’m lead down I have no choice but to just puke all over myself over and over again until I’m soaked in my own sick which meant I couldn’t hold my baby boy after he was born which broke my heart…

Still completely out of it in pain emotionally drained and still being sick I’m wheeled onto an observation ward to recover, by this time its about 4am and I don’t even know my own name feeling absolutely rotten sick and drained from the blood loss the midwife plonks the baby onto my breast and gets him to have his first feed, something I was unsure if I wanted to do or not but I’m glad she did it as it encouraged me to try again later. We managed about 5 feeds breastfeeding . My baby was also whisked off to get some pain relief as he has some cuts from the forceps on his head.

A couple of hours later still not having had any sleep the epidural started to wear off and oh my fucking god I have never been in so much pain in my entire life!! my lady parts and my bum were in agony I was lead on my bed screaming and begging for a nurse to come in I cant explain the amount of pain I was in, I got given morphine which did absolutely nothing then some other drugs which took the edge off but I couldn’t sit up move or even hold my baby again. I’ve never been so frightened in my whole life I want to cry now just writing this story, anyway it turns out because of the heavy bleeding they had packed the inside of my vagina with what I can only describe as bandages to soak up the blood, they had to stay in for 6 hours and when the nurses came round to take them out I could not believe my eyes at how much was coming out! she just kept pulling and pulling for what felt like about 10 minuets and when it was all out I had a quick look and couldn’t believe my eyes at what had just come out of me! Next up was a back passage examination as id had severer pain up my bum they had to check I hadn’t torn which I hadn’t  (thank god)

After I proved I could sit up and take a few steps and have some toast I was allowed to move into a private room in recovery and finally able to cuddle my son properly for the first time. My labour was the scariest but best thing to ever happen to me, the staff at the john Radcliff hospital went above and beyond to take care of me and my baby and made what was an unbearable experience somewhat bearable. stay tuned for my next post about the amazing aftercare me and Rex  received!

this post is dedicated to all the staff at the john Radcliff hospital who do such an amazing job every single day!