Born 20th March, 2010 at 8:45pm (40 weeks and 5 days pregnant).
7lb 1oz, 48.5cm long.
APGAR at 10 minutes was 9.
Friday was Asher’s birthday. I woke up early like I had been all week, I was struggling to sleep. We got Asher up early to give him his presents before Paul had to go to work. I felt period like cramps throughout the day, but it wasn’t until Asher was tucked into bed that I started getting some contractions. They weren’t strong or regular, but I warned Paul to go to bed early ‘just in case’. I went to bed at 9pm to get some sleep.
On Saturday I woke up at 5. I was really hungry and I just knew things were happening. I was having stronger contractions and began to time them while having a snack. By 7am they were between 3-5 minutes apart and lasting just under a minute. Paul was watching the timer and kept urging me to call the hospital. I did and the midwife said I sounded fine to continue labouring at home. It was the state election day, so Paul and I drove around to the local school to vote. As we were walking across the grass I would need to stop and breathe through a contraction.
Once home I decided to go and lay down and I put a hypnobirthing track on through the laptop to listen to while timing contractions. I used my pregnancy pillow to prop my belly on and wrapped my legs around it. Paul came to sit with me for a while, but I just wanted to be alone. My contractions were still 3-5 minutes apart and just under a minute long. I spent the morning like this breathing through each contraction as they came. I called the hospital again at around midday (Paul asked me to), who again told me stay home if I felt I could and to continue labouring there. I remember the midwife saying I was doing a good job and that she’d see me before her shift was over. My contractions were strong at this stage, but I knew I’d be better off staying at home where I was comfortable. Paul continued to check on me every so often, but I just wanted to be alone.
Around 2pm I decided that it was time to go into hospital. Paul called them and confirmed I was having to breathe through contractions. They told him to bring me in. Once we got there we were given one of the low risk rooms with a bathtub. The midwife asked all the normal questions. I didn’t feel at all comfortable on their beds so I kept moving to lean over a chair during my contractions. She said when I was ready we’d do a cervical check to see how far along I was. Between contractions I lay on the bed and gave her the go ahead. Once she was done she told me I was 3cm’s and my cervix was still high. I was heartbroken. She said she’d get the monitors on to see how baby was going, but she thought it was either false labour or really early labour and gave me some Panadeine to see if that made the contractions go away. Once she left the room I cried, I felt like I was a lot further along and I felt really silly. I still thought it was the real thing. After being monitored for an hour she sent us home saying my contractions needed to be longer and stronger.
Once home I felt really negative and headed to bed again. I gave up timing contractions and I felt really tired so I had a nap. I would wake up for my contractions and during that time I tried to drink a sip of water like I did with Asher to help distract me. I can tell you now it didn’t work! I didn’t feel like my contractions were changing, they felt exactly the same to me. I continued to labour on my own in the bedroom, I wanted it to be quiet and listening to everyone else getting on with the day really annoyed me.
After napping on and off for a while I woke up at one stage with the urge to push. I didn’t believe my body was pushing and I tried to breathe through the feeling. I started to panic, I didn’t know how to get everyone’s attention without pushing more. Thankfully Paul wal
ked into the room at that stage (he later told me he was getting ready to watch a movie!). I quickly said to him ‘I think I’m pushing!’. He started to panic and said loudly ‘What?!’ before walking out quickly to ask my mum what to do. He called the hospital and my mum came and sat with me. At this stage I was on my hands and knees on the bed trying to breathe through the pushing feeling. Paul was advised to get me to the hospital now. He asked if I could go in the car, to which I replied ‘NO!’, so he called an ambulance. The pushing feeling got stronger now and I let my body go. My waters broke and I felt like I needed to go to the toilet, so I jumped off the bed and ran into there. I pushed once while on the toilet crying out and felt between my legs, I could feel her head. I think I was crying at this stage, I was terrified and everyone around me was panicking. I pushed again and I felt my baby slide out, right into the toilet.
Paul was on the phone to 000. My mum picked the baby up out of the toilet and I got on my hands and knees in front of it. There was a lot of blood and I kept asking ‘Is my baby ok? Is she ok?’. She didn’t cry for about half a minute, but it felt like a lifetime. Once she began crying I felt my whole body relax, Paul had grabbed towels and mum wrapped her up. The person he was speaking to advised me to roll onto my back and to have the baby put on my chest for skin to skin contact. It was a bit difficult, but we managed, right there in the corridor. I had no urge to deliver the placenta at this stage. Paul was massaging my tummy to help with the bleeding and I was advised to offer the baby the breast, but I had no idea what I was doing.
The ambulance arrived 10 minutes after she was born. One of the ambulance workers checked the baby and the other checked me. They clamped the cord and Paul cut it. The entire time they were talking to me and helping calm me down, they asked what the babies name was. I replied ‘Layla’ and they said it was a beautiful name. They checked my bleeding and asked Paul to put a nappy on Layla. Once that was done mum helped me put some clothes on and they moved me onto a chair and took me outside. I was then put on a stretcher and moved to the ambulance. I could see some of the neighbours standing out the front watching what was going on.
Layla was put on my chest again and we drove to the hospital. I was having some pretty b
ad cramps again, but I wasn’t ready to deliver the placenta. I ended up taking some pain relief (Morphine) and 5 minutes later I delivered the placenta in the back of the ambulance. We also stopped at one stage to check babies breathing (which was perfect).
Once at the hospital we were moved into the same room I was allocated earlier. Midwives came in to see how I was, I think I was a bit of a novelty. The midwife looking after us encouraged some skin on skin bonding time and Layla and I stayed this way for about an hour, she had a feed during this stage as well. I think it was what I really needed, I was extremely upset about how things had turned out. Afterwards the midwife checked me for tears, I had a few grazes and a little tear but nothing worth stitching. Layla was weighed and measured and then we were left alone again to get to know our beautiful baby.
