Well he has arrived!!! After all the waiting our gorgeous little man is now here and we are head over heels totally in love with him. I have spent countless hours awake just looking at him, listening to him sleep soundly and sitting there in awe that we have been given such a beautiful little gift. I am one proud Mumma Bear right here! They say that the pain of labour becomes a faint memory as your child enters the world, but I was only given a short amount of time to soak in the beauty of my son as he entered into the world. As I have made a point of being brutally honest about pregnancy I will do the same for the labour I endured. I will start back at the beginning.
I was booked in to be induced on a Tuesday night, with only few people told as I did not want any phone calls or texts asking for details on the process. We kissed and cuddled our two-fur babies goodbye and drove down the driveway for the last time before our baby arrived. The 2 hour drive to the hospital was kind of surreal, as we knew this would be the last time it was just the two of us, nerves and utter excitement crept in. We arrived at the hospital and were placed into the assessment room, unfortunately there was another couple behind the next curtain and we were forced to listen to them for the next 1.5 hours until the doctor arrived. They had two children with them already and after listening to the man carry on for 5 minutes I wanted to throat punch him to get him to stop talking to his children in such a horrid manner. He talked down to them growled at them consistently and they weren’t even doing anything. There were many moments I wanted to pull back the curtains and absolutely tear strips off this man for being such an ass. Thankfully I bit my tongue and when they were just about to leave we heard that they lived in the next suburb from us, a little too close for comfort. I think then I swore that we would never raise our son like that.
The doctor finally arrived he came in, checked my cervix to see if it was ready to go and thankfully it was. All those horrible cups of raspberry leaf tea the past week had helped soften it. Then the doctor placed in the tape that would hopefully help me be ready to have a baby the very next morning. With that I was given sleeping tablets and pain relief and sent to bed and my man was sent away for the night. The next morning I was woken at 7 to shower and head up to the labour ward. I frantically text my man that it was about to happen, and I had no idea where they were taking me. He showed up shortly after that armed with coffee and ready to have this baby. The doctor removed the tape from the night before and checked my cervix again to see if they could break my waters, and promptly announced that will we not be having a baby as originally planned. Instead they were to insert a balloon catheter and this would mechanically stretch and open my cervix. With that announcement I lost my shit. I began crying hysterically and wanted to go home that very moment. If this baby wanted stubborn I would show him, I’ve been known to throw a pretty decent tantrum in my time! My gorgeous man tried to calm me down and with a baby not making an arrival anytime soon he went home to check on our fur babies, and take delivery of another type of baby…it had four wheels, and he had been eagerly awaiting its arrival for a few weeks already.
I spent the afternoon pretty devastated and thankfully I was left alone to sleep and wonder if the following day would see the arrival of my baby. That night seemed to drag on forever, and the girl in the bed next to me went into labour at 32 weeks. She was rushed to surgery and came back a little while later, talking to me about her baby and asked me what I had. I tried to sound happy for her when I congratulated her on her new addition and let her know I was still waiting! We talked for a while when we both realized that we knew each other from many years back. Over 15years had passed when we had last seen each other as teenagers. Small world it would seem. The next thing I knew it was Thursday morning and once again I was taken down to the labour ward for my babies impending arrival. The balloon was removed and my water was broken and the drip had commenced. It was finally going to happen. The midwife announced that we would definitely be having a baby today! We were introduced to a Paramedic student who was to be observing the labour with our permission, as she was only weeks away from graduating and had yet to see a baby being born. We agreed and she joined us in the delivery room.
I spent the next 8 hours in labour and I was trying my best to follow my birth plan, I wanted pain free and to stay up and active throughout it. That so called plan went out the window as my baby was Posterior and my labour pain was excruciating as my back felt like it was going to be ripped in half. I resisted the urge for drugs. I tried sterile water injections first, these I found to be a huge help in regards to back pain, but once they started to wear off I knew I couldn’t continue. I was then offered Gas…what a joke that was. I do recall throwing it at the midwife’s head and demanding an epidural, to which I was informed I was 8cm dilated and she thought I could do without it as I was handling my contractions well in her opinion. I disagreed with her and thankfully she agreed to call the Doctor in. It seemed like an eternity until he arrived and commented on how well I was managing my pain and contractions as I was not screaming and seemed like I had it all together. He then commenced to speak to me about the procedure and any risks associated with it. This wasn’t a problem until he insisted on waiting for a contraction to pass so he could continue talking. This just wasn’t going to work for me as they were coming thick and fast and he was really annoying me. I think that he finally got the drift and continued to finish talking and began the Epidural. The best relief ever came over me, and I went from a mess who could barely stand the back pain and whose eyes were firmly closed shut, to sitting up in bed laughing and telling jokes. My man thought it was a bit of a rip-off that I was cheating by having an epidural. Surrounded by women he promptly withdrew his comment.
I am unsure of the time that lapsed but sometime later I was told I was allowed to push. So I began to push with each contraction, and although I couldn’t feel the pain, I knew that I was ready to get this little bugger outta there. For what seemed like an eternity I was pushing and not getting anywhere. All of a sudden my room went from the 4 people that had been in all day to 12 or more people all crowded in wearing gowns and talking to each other. Finally when they did choose to speak to us, they informed me the baby was stuck and was becoming stressed so the best thing for both of us was to get him out fast. They were suggesting we go for an assisted delivery with forceps. Lucky for me the Epidural was working its magic and I didn’t need any further pain relief and they could get to it quickly. I chose not to watch my doctor who was about 5 foot tall and weighed next to nothing attempting to pull out my stubborn son with the forceps. From all accounts by those in the room she was bright red and if she could have put a foot up on the table to use as leverage she would have.
I don’t know how long it took for them to get my son out, but at 9.50pm on 15/1/15 our much long awaited son Fletcher arrived into the world. Within 15 minutes I had to say goodbye to both of my men as I was taken away to theatre to repair the damage that had been done from the delivery and to stop the blood loss. I was told I would be back with my family within an hour. I watched every minute of that clock tick over as I wondered what my little man was doing, who he looked like most, how much hair he had, did he have all his fingers and toes and what he weighed in at. It took 3.5 hours before I was back in my room meeting my gorgeous son and seeing his proud daddy once again. The next few hours, days and weeks passed by in a flash as I adjusted to my new role as mum. Quite honestly it is the best thing I have done in my life. It is everything I thought it would be and more. I still find myself staring at him in awe and wasting a lot of time just watching him sleep. I do still struggle with how wrong my little birth plan turned out, but at the end of the day it got him here safely and now my body is healing and I feel like myself again it doesn’t matter too much. I do know one thing though; the next kid will be coming out the hatch not the snatch!!! Yep I will definitely go back for another one, and I hope that it is sooner than later.
