Harrison Millar - Born 29.01.2014
So, I pretty much had the textbook pregnancy; nausea, smell aversions, reflux, cramping, tender breasts, taste changes and those mood swings, (poor work colleagues and poor,poor Husband) from week 3 and then miraculously stopped right at week 12 just as the textbook had promised.
When I was about 13 weeks Wes & I discussed a birth plan. I did not have a birth plan that I considered abnormal, however If I wanted to conform with it I decided that there would be a chance I would need some extra support from someone other than our families so I did some research and found Shari - hallelujah! and our fantastic Doula, Kym and I must mention whilst Wes agreed about the birth plan that included a drug free vaginal birth, with minimal medical intervention, immediate skin to skin and delayed cord clamping, he WAS not fo
nd on the idea of completing a 2 day "hyp fucking nosis" course, (his words)!! I won, he came along, he loved it, he educated everyone about it and I kept it to myself. How the roles changed?
Both Kym & Shari provided the both of us with the much needed pregnancy, labour and birthing education that first time parents needed.
Pregnancy remained very easy & "normal" for me, I continued to eat my balanced diet, exercise & work a busy schedule.I managed to get to 36 weeks with 3-4 weekly checkups (instead of the usual 2-3), then what do you know it, I pop out from work in my lunch break for my appointment and blood pressure is elevated, no protein elevated or no other symptoms, so thank goodness I'm let off, then once again I'm at work (of course) at 37.5 weeks & I suddenly get this dizzy, uneasy feeling, blood pressure is elevated, off to the hospital I go for a check up, bloods and urine still clear, so I am good to go home as long as I promise not to go back to work, before having this baby & I must come in for a checkup at 38 weeks. Deal.
Unfortunately at my 38week checkup, you know it I was
hospitalised for pregnancy induced hypertension, I was devastated to say the least. Induction chatter was the first
port of call for the doctors and I managed to talk my way out of it with daily checkups as long as my bloods continued
to stay within the normal range. At this point I know my body had stopped coping normally and its time to start the natural "induction" methods to assist in letting our baby know we are ready to meet him/her earth-side. So with everyday passing I literally crossed the 14 methods off my list and spent time
relaxing and telling our baby how ready we were.
At 38+6 my body had been contracting on and off for about 3
days and an obvious loss of a mucous plug had occurred
and at this point at my checkup I broke my birth plan for the
first time when I asked for a vaginal examination and a
stretch and sweep with hope to avoid the need for a medical
induction using drugs, I was 1cm and was stretched to 2cm,
So this is when I asked If the induction date could be
prolonged, she gave me an extra 12 hours.
A 4km walk amongst the rest if the natural induction methods still didn't appear enough to convince our little cherub that we were ready.39 weeks arrived and I had booked myself in for a massage, a solitary coffee and movie date and an afternoon siesta. The surges continued on and off and at some points were hours apart and other points only minutes apart. Wes arrived home from work and we had our last dinner as Husband and Wife and another nap, not knowing that we would meet our baby in less than 12 hours time.
Arriving at the hospital at 8pm 28 Jan with our bags packed in the car, I was still hopeful that I would be sent home to labour at home. After seeing the Doctor at 845 and another vaginal examination, we learnt that our baby had turned posterior and that I was 3cm so after tears and a lot of disappointment I agreed to have the prostaglandin gel and stay in hospital to labour. The Doctor informed me he would see me at 7am to commence the syntocin drip, much to my Husbands disgust I swore at the Dr and told him how unlikely it would be!At this point I thought it was the right time to make contact with our Doula, in tears mind you and update her on the outcome, telling her to get some sleep as I would be having my baby tonight, shortly after she arrived and put us back in the right headspace before they were asked to leave as nothing would be happening tonight.
I was settled onto the ward at 1230 with a hot shower, a heat pack and some panadeine forte for the constant pressure that my back was experiencing. I was on the ward, alone, it was noisy, I was anxious but ready, I put my headphones in, as I had done for the last 18weeks every night and began to breathe and listen to the relaxation, about 12 minutes into the recording my waters broke, I stayed there alone and continued to listen for another few minutes before I alerted the staff, it was at this time that I went straight back into the shower to get clean and the surges began, 3-4 of them in a 10-12 minute time frame, time for me to forget about them and just as Shari had taught us in her class in October, I let go of all of my tension & fears, using the relaxation breathing through the surges, and with the hot water trickling down my back, the discomfort was there but it was distant and I was at peace.
Sometime (when I say sometime its because I have no idea of the timeline, however keep in mind it was rather short) later I felt nauseated and was unable to expel anything, at this point I felt uneasy and was unsure where I was most comfortable, so I came out of the shower and got dressed, I propped up the back of the bed, put my relaxation music in again and lent over the back of the bed, however the discomfort increased, the midwife listened to our baby with the Doppler and kept me there for 10 minutes whilst she felt my surges, there were 4 in 10 minutes, she went to organise the birth suite and I stripped off again and I was back in the shower. The birth suite was dark and calm and I submerged myself in the shower again, breathing through the surges and visualising our baby crowning (and I was actually surprised at how well I coped and how easy I found the surges to be) whilst the midwife phoned Wes, whilst we waited for Wes to arrive and between surges I was able to tell the midwife, "no drugs even to birth the placenta".
When Wes arrived he found me sitting on the toilet in the dark trying not to expel our baby, waiting for him to arrive. I had the urge to breathe our baby out for sometime now, I heard the midwife telling him to relax as it could be hours before we meet our baby, Wes asks her to check me to clarify her thoughts and I hear him calling Kym. Between the next surge I make my way to the bed and that is when the midwife discovers she can see our babies head and Kym is already in the room.
With no analgesics and a very simple & easy 19 minutes of pushing unfortunately (as I was convinced that I would labour for hours I had not expressed my birth preferences and the midwife convinced me to push, Wes did correct her and she began using the correct terminology but I found it difficult to stop the pushing once I had started), our beautiful 7lb 2oz of pure perfection was lying on my chest.I looked up at the man who helped me make this baby, pure love and joy was pouring from every inch of me, our baby was a boy & he was calm & alert and my birth was perfect just like I had dreamt several times during my pregnancy.2hours of uninterrupted skin to skin followed whilst Wes phoned to share the news with our families.
Emma & Wes - Rockhampton, Central Queensland
