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I woke up early on the Monday morning, a week after my due date, with period type pains that were coming and going pretty regularly. I’d had mild period pain on and off over the past couple of weeks, but as these were coming and going I guessed they must be the start of contractions.(I’d never had any Braxton Hicks, so didn’t have anything to gauge them by). Then when I got up and went to the loo I had a show – not the little ‘plug’ I’d imagined but loads of mucousy stuff that went on for hours!! It was very strange realising that this was going to be the start of labour, but exciting as well. The contractions were coming every two minutes right from when I woke up but the pain was only very mild. I didn’t feel like being on my own though so DH phoned work and told them he was staying at home.
I phoned my mum to let her know things were underway and she warned me that it could be hours before anything really started happening – turned out she was completely right! By about 10am the contractions had stopped so DH and I went back to sleep for a couple of hours. By the afternoon they’d come back and were a bit stronger so I was doing my Mum’s breathing exercises through them. I phoned the hospital but they said to stay at home if I was managing to cope.
By evening I started to try all the natural pain relief methods – breathing, baths and eventually the TENS machine. The bath was nice to begin with, but by the late evening I was starting to really be in pain and I didn’t really know what to do with myself. I was also starting to remember that I have a really low pain threshold and wondering how I was going to manage! The breathing exercises helped – they involved breathing from different levels of your abdomen, as the contraction progressed, but they and the TENS machine were only a slight distraction from the pain.
At midnight we phoned the hospital and asked to come in but when I was examined I was only 1cm dilated – I couldn’t believe things had been going on all day and that was it! I really thought I might be one of these lucky people who gets to 10cm without realising it!
The midwife suggested that we went home again to kill a few hours and gave me some paracetomol and sleeping tablets which I took. In hindsight this was a mistake – by that stage the paracetamol could do nothing for the pain so all that happened was that I was really dozy but woke with a start every two to five minutes with each contraction. After three hours of this at home I decided I really couldn’t cope any more and wanted to go back to hospital and get an epidural in, or even a caesarean if that was on offer! All my natural birth plan went out the window at this stage I’m afraid, but as I said I have a low pain threshold!
So back we went at 6 on Tuesday morning and it all gets a bit hazy after that as I was feeling really out of it. I asked for an epidural straight away and was told that they were short staffed so I would have to wait a few hours. I agreed to try the gas and air first of all and it must have helped a bit as apparently I was clinging on to it for dear life! I had to wait two hours to be examined but when I was, I was 5cm dilated and my waters had broken at some point while I’d been in the hospital, without me realising. However, the worst thing was that I had started to get an unbearable urge to push with each contraction, which now seemed to be coming one on top of the other. This must have gone on most of the morning and then finally the anaesthetist arrived and put the epidural in – bliss! I really was like a different person and all the pain and pushing sensation went in what felt like a split second. I had been a bit sqeamish about what an epidural involved but I really didn’t notice any of the needles etc being put in – I was just so happy to be pain free! I spent the afternoon chatting to the midwives and having a doze.
Luckily I still had some feeling in my legs and could move my feet. I also didn’t need to top the epidural up, so by the time it came to push a couple of hours later, I had got some feeling back on my left hand side and had some idea of when a contraction was coming, which helped.
I’m not sure how long I pushed for but unfortunately my contractions started to die off and George’s heartrate started to dip. They put me on a syntocinon drip to try and increase the contractions and we agreed that I would need a ventouse delivery. I could see the doctor was getting anxious about the contractions and I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to get the baby out naturally. However, somehow we did it with me pushing and the doctor pulling for all she was worth, and George was born at 16.50. He came out beautifully pink and chubby, weighing 9lb and looking gorgeous. When the midwives saw how big his head was they said it was no wonder I needed a ventouse!!
Because of the epidural I didn’t feel any pain from the ventouse or from the tons of stitches I had to have afterwards. I haven’t had any real soreness from the stitches afterwards either, so for me, the idea of an episiotomy etc was far worse than the actual reality.
Life with George is great, although I am really missing my sleep! I didn’t realise what a little character he would be, right from day one, and now he’s smiling it’s even better.