Baby William’s Birth
As a couple we wanted to prepare for the best birth possible for us and baby. Our birth didn’t actually match up to our hopes but it was the safest option for mum and baby.
It all started when I woke up on Friday 10th August 2018, with pains in my back, that continued throughout the day. To start with the pain was a dull ache but got worse throughout the day, by 5pm I was pacing the house, bouncing on the birthing ball, the more I stayed still the more it hurt! At 18.30pm I was violently sick. My husband persuaded me to ring the hospital and they advised me to go in. I was examined upon arrival to be told I was only 2cm dilated, so they sent me home. I felt a little frustrated being told to go home as the car journey (40 minutes) to hospital was awful, I was in so much pain in the car, plus the labour ward was empty. Once back at home I kept getting in and out of the bath. I felt absolutely fine in the bath but once out of the bath the pain in my back was bad again. By 1.30am I felt I couldn’t manage at home anymore so I rang the hospital back and was told to go straight in. Once at hospital they did my blood pressure and a urine sample to be told I’d started with preeclampsia. This did not surprise me as I was born 9 weeks early as my mum suffered with preeclampsia from 24 weeks but doctors managed to control her blood pressure until 31 weeks. My two page birth plan had gone straight out of the window … I thought that I’d have a nice, calm, relaxing water birth! The hardest thing was walking out of the midwife led unit into the labour ward. They hooked me up to monitors, monitoring baby and to monitor my blood pressure. They gave me medication to try and control my blood pressure and put me on a drip to get fluids into me as I was dehydrated. Obviously this was not what we wanted but it was what was best and safest in this situation. I was following the midwife’s lead, but at the same time I did relate back to my birth plan and made them aware that I didn’t want pain relief unless I asked. That when my baby arrived I wanted delayed cord clamping, and for my Husband to tell me the sex of our baby. At 3.30am the midwife advised breaking my waters to help speed up my labour and move things along, I allowed them to do this. As the morning went on I started to feel unwell and exhausted and my blood pressure continued to increase. But then at 8am I had no pains and felt my normal self again, I’d stopped labouring!! I was 6cm dilated. I had to be induced to get labour to restart as it was safer for me and baby due to the pre eclampsia, however I was adamant I wasn’t having an epidural. One of the first things I’d said to the midwives on arriving at hospital that I did not want an epidural unless it’s an emergency. My midwife advised me to have one. She said if I didn’t and I needed to go to theatre that they would have to put me to sleep. I did not want to miss the birth of my baby if this happened. Plus the epidural helps lower blood pressure. Again not our first choice but sensible in this instance. I am usually petrified of injections/needles but I stayed so calm whilst being giving the epidural. I believe Hypnobirthing helped me to stay calm and overcome my fear of needles. At 9am I was induced and at 9.30am I had an epidural. By 3pm I was 10cm dilated. I put my Hypnobirthing CD on to listen to and waited for the epidural to wear off. As practiced at Hypnobirthing with Sandra, at 5pm I started to breathe and bare down to try and get my baby out. At 5.30pm the head midwife told me it wasn’t working so I would need to push. (She did not believe in Hypnobirthing) However my other midwife had done Hypnobirthing with both her pregnancies, she was lovely and supported me through everything, she understood what I wanted and why I wanted it the way I wanted it. At this point I was physically exhausted and felt very unwell. I started to push to try and get my baby out. 5.45pm, two surgeons walked into the room. They asked if it was ok to see what position baby was in. Baby was back to back with head tilted back. They asked if it was ok to try and tilt babies head forward whilst I pushed. I consented. At 6.30pm I had given it my all and felt like I wasn’t in the room … it was a really weird feeling and hard to described. The head midwife had said the Hypnobirthing CD had relaxed me too much !! luckily my other midwife had seen me early that day and said it was not due to the Hypnobirthing, it was due to my blood pressure being so high. The surgeon were worried I was going into eclampsia and was going to have a seizure. The surgeons told me to stop pushing and asked if they could take me to theatre to help assist my baby out. They topped my epidural up as it had worn off. Within a few minutes of the epidural I was like my normal self again. Once in theatre they used a suction cap to try to help deliver my baby, however this did not work as my baby was well and truly stuck! The last option was a c-section. This was the last thing I’d written on my birth plan I’d only have a c-section if it was an emergency. I couldn’t do anymore to get my baby out, I’d try everything possible before having a c-section. After a lot of pulling and tugging from the surgeon to get my baby out, my baby was born at 19.26pm. My husband told me we’d had a little boy and he cut the cord once it had stopped pulsing. My labour experience was the total opposite to what I thought/hoped it would have been like. However due to doing Hypnobirthing I stayed calm though out the whole of my labour and so did my baby. The midwives and surgeon all passed comment how calm I was throughout it all. Finger crossed when we decide to have another baby, I can have the relaxed water birth I thought I’d have this time.