My birth Story:

My waters spontaneously ruptured at 5pm on Wednesday, whilst I was lying in bed waiting for DH to get home from work. Luckily, I'd literally just changed the bed and put a plastic sheet on to it catch anything during the labour. There wasn't a hugh amount of water and it was totally clear so I kind of wondered if this was it or if I'd just peed myself a little!

Anyway, I put on a normal pad which was soaked within 2 minutes and then moved onto a mat pad. Much more successful. I phoned the labour and delivery ward who told me to come and get checked to make sure it really was my waters. I phoned Neil who came home quick sharpish and we went in both feeling really excited although as I said to my MW I was going to feel a right numpty if it wasn't my waters.

Spent an hour on the monitor and pad was checked. MW was totally convinced that it was my waters and the toco monitor showed that I was having some mild and minor contractions but not in any real pattern. We were sent home to try and make contractions start and was advised to bounce on my ball, keep my legs open as much as possible and be as active as possible.

I phoned my mum to let her know what was happening and she decided to drive up that night. She arrived at about midnight and we all went to bed feeling really excited that this must mean something was about to happen.

I slept really well that night (oh dear!) so no contractions then. Had breakfast and Mum and I decided to go for a long walk. I had a couple of reasonable contractions during the walk but again they didn't turn into anything exciting. We prepped the house for the planned home birth still expecting that that was what was going to happen. Beds remade, kitchen cleaned, bathrooms cleaned etc. However, still nothing.

Went into hospital again to be checked out. Baby was still happy. I was still losing loads of water. Sent home again to carry on bouncing and try and make the baby be born but was told that I would need to be in the hospital for 9am to be induced if contractions didn't start during the night.

I tried so hard to make contractions start and they got to the point that they were about 6 minutes apart but not particularly strong. This went on for a couple of hours and then tapered off and disappeared during the night. At 10pm I started crying realising that things weren't going to go the way I had hoped. I told my husband that I felt like I'd failed our baby because something had happened that had stopped my body from responding in the way that it should do. I was really scared by the idea of being induced having heard any number of horror stories about synto inductions but we decided to take each step at a time. I knew the hospital had made a note of the fact that we'd wanted a home birth and they decided to let me have some time in the Midwife led Unit when I arrived instead of going straight to the labour ward. I was so hopeful.

After a lot of waiting around I was examined and found to be posterior and unfavourable. I was given the pessary and contractions started within about 30 minutes. Everything was going well until I had a big gush of waters which moved the pessary. A new one was put in and contractions continued. Unfortunately the same thing happened about 6 hours later. The MWs were hopeful that the pessary had been enough to kick-start my labour and I was left to carry on in peace. I'd sent my mum and DH home by this point and at about 9pm I phoned them to tell them that contractions had stopped. The MWs were still hopeful that the contractions would start during the night but yet again they didn't. When I had to tell them that they had stopped completely, a decision was made to induce me in Labour and Delivery using the synto drip. I am given IV antibiotics because by this point my waters had been broken for about 60 hours. I'm all prepped and am hooked up to the monitors again. I didn't realise it but this was going to be my constant companion for the next 24 hours. The baby appeared to be happy and healthy and was still moving around nicely which was quite a feat given that there weren't any waters left.

I phoned my DH at that point as I had been told that I would be going as soon as possible as they weren't happy about how long the baby had been without waters. Mum and he arrived at about 8am and then we waited, and waited, and waited. I was seriously worried about the baby by the point because although the monitor was looking fine I couldn't help but think about how long my waters had been gone. Eventually, after 8 hours of waiting, I was brought down to Labour and Delivery, given more antibiotics, more monitoring and the synto drip was started. I was examined and was found to be a finger-tip dilated but still needing further effacement.

My contractions started pretty much immediately. I had asked about mobilisation and was told that as long as I didn't pull out my drip I could bounce on my ball and move around as much as I wanted. This was music to my ears and I spent the next 13 and a half hours moving, swaying, bouncing and generally getting to grips with the contractions. They kept asking me if I wanted any pain relief but in all honesty I didn't. It took 1.5 hours to turn it up to maximum but even on that dose I was doing fine. The baby was still fine and I was feeling great. I was examined at the end of this time and was found to be... 1cm dilated but fully effaced. I was a bit disappointed. I had been fantasising about finding out I was 6 cms and was about to have a baby. But this was not to be. The MW checked with the Doctors who decided to leave me where I was because I was making some progress. I was to stay on the drip for another 4 hours.

For some reason, I felt that the contractions were getting worse so I asked for G and A which I loved although it did make me talk rubbish! I felt like I was finally getting somewhere as they were more directed and more painful than they had been. AFter 4 hours I was checked again and was found to be 1cm dilated and fully effaced so, effectively, there had been no change at all. I felt really deflated but knew the decision was now out of my hands. I knew that I was going to have a c-section.

This was arranged and I talked it through with the Doctor, signed the consent forms and was taken to theatre. I was a given a spinal, everything was set up. My DH arrived in scrubs and pretty soon afterwards our beautiful baby Astrid was born.

We hadn't known her gender but where both delighted that she was a girl. We were told she weighed albs 13.5ozs and that as a result it is unlikely that I would have been able to give birth to her in any case without help. This is some consolation as I do sort of feel that I didn't get anything that i had hoped for in the birth I had. She makes it all worthwhile but I'm having difficulty getting to grips with what happened.

We are all so lucky that after 84 hours of no waters neither she nor I had any ill effects and both of us are happy and healthy. I'm finding the recovery from the c-section difficult because I've been getting spasms in my right shoulder. I know it's just referred pain from my diaphragm but they're horrible and nothing seems to make any difference to them.

There is a bit of a story about what happened after the birth for the 2 days I was in hospital but I'll write that some other time as I'm not sure I can cope with it at the moment. The MWs and the care I was given can't be faulted but I think what happened was the product of all the stress of getting to that point.

When I write this down, it's difficult to really see what the problem was. It was a logical progression from one thing to another which meant that Astrid arrived in the best way for her. I feel, however, that I didn't get the opportunity to actually give birth, I never felt the urge to push and I feel like my body has let me down. I'm really sad about the things we had planned and I'm upset that I wasn't able to give that to my DH or Astrid.

I had made the decision to go with whatever happened and to make the best of it. My DH says that I was great during the labour part and showed great strength of character. My MWs said that it was such a shame that I didn't get the labour I deserved.

I'm concerned about what happened because I want to know what will happen next time around, about how the c-section will limit my choices and if the same thing will happen again. I'm no longer concerned about the pain or coping with it but I just want to know that it doesn't have to be like that.

I'm going to stop writing here because I don't think I'm really getting to grips with what I'm trying to say. At the end of the day, Astrid is worth everything I went through but I feel cheated and upset by what happened.