rwhite
Mum to Lachie and Clem
- Joined
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Hi girls - sorry this has taken so long! It's just been tricky finding the time (and effort 
) to write this out, but here it is nearly a week later!
On the morning of the 22nd (21/03/2010 for most of you, as the time difference comes in to play..), I had been for a stretch and sweep (sweeping me from 2cm to 3cm) and some acupuncture at my midwife's clinic. I believe it was actually the sweep and not the acupuncture that brought on my labour, but I guess there's no way of knowing for sure...
So my midwife did that for me at around 12pm and I continued to lose my plug/have my show until night time. Went to bed at about 10.30pm thinking "Hmmmm, this could be it" as I was having a few odd feelings, but thought not a lot of it, as midwife had said the sweep may not have worked even if I was having my show. Then I got up at 12am to tell my OH that I was pretty sure I was in early labour and that he'd best get off the PS3 and go to bed as he might regret it otherwise!!
Well, he came to bed quarter of an hour later, and by 12.30am I knew I was in labour as I began to have some dull contractions. OH was snuggled right in to me, spooning me half to death and every time I'd have a contraction I just didn't want to be held so I had to move away from him. Sadly every time I did this his grip tightened
So needless to say, I left and laboured in the lounge, making an update on BnB to say I was in early labour. Contractions were coming three times in ten minutes, lasting around 40 seconds. I went in and told my OH that I was pretty sure I was in labour, then went back out and entertained myself as best I could and breathed through the contractions.
A couple of hours later at 2.30am I decided that this was definitely the real thing, and called my midwife to let her know what was happening. I then made a call to my mum to prepare her just incase, and woke my OH up to ask him to come out and wait for midwife incase she turned up, as I was going to have a shower. He sleepily asked me why midwife was coming over, and I was like "Umm, because I'm in labour?". Apparently he'd been half asleep when I told him the first time, he was stunned
An hour later, my midwife turned up at my house to assess how I was doing. Confirmed that I was contracting as I had suspected, and that I was infact 4.5-5cm dilated already and 50% effaced. Amazingly, I was still able to talk (and joke..) through the contractions - she seemed rather impressed. Gawd knows how I managed that. She told me to ring her again when I felt that I could no longer talk through the contractions and that they were more intense, and said she would meet us at the hospital, and left. This was around 4.30, 5am.
Well not long after she had gone, maybe half an hour later, I started to have those exact feelings of intensity and not being able to talk through the pains. So I waited about an hour with the pains, still breathing through them but having to shush my OH Then it got to the point where I decided that I should probably get to hospital, and OH gave midwife a call and let her know. She said she'd fill up the birthing pool so it was ready when we got there, as I planned on having a water birth. Midwife had made me a makeshift heatpack out of a wet towel in a plastic bag, heated in the microwave for a couple minutes (great idea btw, helps with the pain a bit!), which OH was lovely and would reheat for me every little while. I was attached to it! Hehe.
We left a bit after 6am, maybe quarter past or 20 past, and collected my mum from around the corner, who was also going to be present at the birth. I was still attached to my heat pack
On the way there I began feeling nauseous, but luckily we had been advised to take an icecream container in the car in case I needed to throw up - because oh boy did I need to! As we sped down the motorway, I threw up the toast OH had made me before we had left, and the water I'd been drinking to keep up my fluids.
We got to the hospital a bit after 7am and I got out of the car, only to notice I was very wet. It was actually from the towel from the heatpack that had leaked all over my lap Not my waters - I knew this because I wasn't trickling or anything. But I felt so silly going in there looking like my waters had broken as I was in my leggings so I covered up with holding a bag in front of me I know they probably see that all the time, but still, it wasn't what they would think!!
We met midwife and went down the corridor to the birthing room. She did an assessment and we found that I was 6-7cm dilated and 80% effaced with bulging membranes. I got in to the birthing pool. It was so nice, it was a round bath that sort of looked like a jacuzzi, and if I sat cross legged on the bottom, the water came up to my shoulders. It made me nice and relaxed, it was just lovely being in there.
I laboured for about an hour, before I asked for gas and air. It didn't help any with the pain, but did help to focus my breathing more and it really took the edge off and made me really nice and relaxed between contractions.
A few hours later at 10am I was ready to push. I've heard a few ladies say that pushing is the best part...personally it was my least favourite part of the whole thing! It just made me feel frustrated when I was told to "Push past where you got up to last time"
Very hard work!! I got in 2-3 pushes per contraction. By about 10.30 midwife could see a tiny peek of baby's head coming through. To mine (and his!) surprise, OH managed a look at baby's head when it was crowning. He's later told me he regrets it because it was gross I personally really wish I'd seen it, it would've been amazing. My mum had a look too 
My membranes were still intact, and hindering pushing a little, so midwife broke them and the contractions increased in strength a bit though it helped me push much easier than before.
Things got really difficult towards the end of the pushing, as I started to feel as if bubs was never going to arrive, and I kept feeling that I needed to poo. Infact, I stated for sure that I was doing a huge poo when I was halfway through pushing! I actually did end up going (only a couple of tiny nuggets which midwife scooped out with a net much to OH's amusement) but I'm not surprised after how bloody hard you have to push to get anywhere...
The pressure really was building up and I thought "Stuff it, this is horrible and it burns to push, but I'm going to get a baby out of this so here goes" and gave it all it was worth. The midwife told me to reach down and have a feel. Baby's head was finally out! OH laughed at me because I said "Helloooo!" in a really funny voice apparently Well what did he expect, this baby's been in me so long and I'd waited all that time to meet him and there he was! Then I needed to push out his body...was a bit frustrated by this point, and asked the midwife if she would help me, so she told me to push nice and hard and pulled bubs a little annnd finally, at 11.02am on 23/03/2010, baby Lachlan Leonard McBride was born in the water, nice and calm. The cord was around his neck 3 times apparently 
Not an issue, but his cord was really long so that was good! Midwife handled it really well. He weighed 7lb11oz (3.48kg) and was 56cm long. I was so amazed and almost in shock at all that had just happened.
Baby was calm the whole way through labour. He had an apgar score of 8 after 1min and 10 after 5min and breathing was established by 2min. We waited until the cord stopped pulsing, and then it was offered to OH to cut but he was a bit weird about it so I let my mum cut it and that was lovely So if we're stopping counting the labour time when baby was born, I was in labour for about 11 hours.
Then it was time to birth the placenta. This is when things started to go a little bit belly up...
I had originally planned on a physiological third stage, meaning just natural, pushing out placenta within the 30 min mark naturally...my placenta however had other plans! It did not want to budge. I felt awful, my stomach was still crampy and a bit tender and it was weird walking around with the umbilical cord hanging between my legs - felt rather surreal.
Midwife suggested I go to the toilet to push, as she had encouraged me to try and I couldn't, it just hurt too much and my muscles down there felt so weak from all the other pushing! I should have been able to push it out, but the placenta was just hanging on for dear life.
We got back on the bed and I tried again, and I thought that maybe they thought I was just being lazy but I really was trying really hard to get it out because it felt terrible still being in there. I ended up with several nurses/midwives in and out of the room and they determined that it just was not going to come out
One of the medical staff was pushing firmly on my stomach and I kept pushing her hands out of the way because it was so unbearably painful and tender 
I felt like a bitch doing that, and I later apologized, but she was quite curt with me about it all and it was all a bit scary because I wasn't sure what would happen. I heard something about them getting the IV ready and I freaked out because that was something I had specifically wanted to avoid - and I'd done so well in doing so by having my lovely natural water birth, so I sat up in alarm and said "No, no I can do it!" and pushed really really hard but still to no avail.
So they put the Syntocinon drip in to shrink my uterus down, but it was still hardly helping the placenta move so they decided to put in a catheter, as I was unable to pee when I'd gone to the toilet. I was also really unhappy about this, as it was yet another thing I had desperately tried to avoid, and it felt horrible going in...
We were waiting a while, and I had a clamp up there trying to help move the placenta, and me trying to push again but it felt useless. I was beginning to worry that I would need an operation to physically remove the placenta, and that was something I REALLY hadn't wanted. I expressed this to my midwife a couple of days ago and she said it had gone through her mind as well, so obviously I had reason to be concerned. But luckily, with a bit more pushing and some tugging on the placenta by the midwives, the placenta was birthed. A whole daunting hour and a half later. The membranes were ragged, and they were a bit concerned that I may have a bleed later on so I was advised to stay in for a night and to keep the IV in my hand incase I needed to have another drip. I really had just wanted to go home, but luckily I stayed in as I had a bit of trouble with latching bubby on so it helped to give me some time. I stayed at the hospital for one night but didn't like how loud it was (was sharing a room with another woman whose baby cried SO much!) and sterile, so transferred to a birthing unit for a night then came home the following evening - was very ready to by then!
In terms of grazing and tearing, I ended up with some internal grazing, a 2nd degree vaginal laceration and a 1st degree labial laceration (really hurts!!) which I knew I had felt when I pushed him out!! The outer perineum is all intact however so that's something.
So overall I'm really happy with my labour and birth, just the bit with the placenta was definitely not as planned and a bit unpleasant! Not traumatised by it but really wishing it had been different. But really really pleased that I got the calm water birth I wanted and that I had been strong and avoided the epidural (even if I did end up with two of the things done to me that I was avoiding it for!). The pain of labour was not at all like I had expected it to be, not that I really had an idea of what to expect...and, some girls are going to hate me for this, not as bad as I had expected either. But I know that the pain varies from woman to woman and even from birth to birth. I feel extremely lucky that I got off rather easy with my labour, as I know how hard it can be for some women
OH was really helpful during the labour and reminded me why I love him so much
And baby is a sweetie and looks just like his daddy! He is for the most part very well behaved and settled so couldn't be happier to cater to his every whim 
Sooo, the part you've all been waiting for...pictures of baby Lachie (among other things)
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0728-1.jpg
OH screwing around with the camera while I was labouring
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0731-1.jpg
Mummy's first hold and a very alert little baby!
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0732-1.jpg
Baby being checked over by my midwife
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0736-1.jpg
Daddy's first hold
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0795-1.jpg
2 days old
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0807-1.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0811-1.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/bubby.jpg
4 days old
Well done if you made it through the whole thing, and thank you for reading!!
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Just thought I would do a pic update of my little man almost 3 months later Things are going great, and I'm loving every minute of being a mummy to this wonderful little person
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/04041600x1200.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/009151600x1200.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/006131600x1200.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/0061600x12004-1.jpg
x
) to write this out, but here it is nearly a week later!On the morning of the 22nd (21/03/2010 for most of you, as the time difference comes in to play..), I had been for a stretch and sweep (sweeping me from 2cm to 3cm) and some acupuncture at my midwife's clinic. I believe it was actually the sweep and not the acupuncture that brought on my labour, but I guess there's no way of knowing for sure...
So my midwife did that for me at around 12pm and I continued to lose my plug/have my show until night time. Went to bed at about 10.30pm thinking "Hmmmm, this could be it" as I was having a few odd feelings, but thought not a lot of it, as midwife had said the sweep may not have worked even if I was having my show. Then I got up at 12am to tell my OH that I was pretty sure I was in early labour and that he'd best get off the PS3 and go to bed as he might regret it otherwise!!
Well, he came to bed quarter of an hour later, and by 12.30am I knew I was in labour as I began to have some dull contractions. OH was snuggled right in to me, spooning me half to death and every time I'd have a contraction I just didn't want to be held so I had to move away from him. Sadly every time I did this his grip tightened
So needless to say, I left and laboured in the lounge, making an update on BnB to say I was in early labour. Contractions were coming three times in ten minutes, lasting around 40 seconds. I went in and told my OH that I was pretty sure I was in labour, then went back out and entertained myself as best I could and breathed through the contractions.A couple of hours later at 2.30am I decided that this was definitely the real thing, and called my midwife to let her know what was happening. I then made a call to my mum to prepare her just incase, and woke my OH up to ask him to come out and wait for midwife incase she turned up, as I was going to have a shower. He sleepily asked me why midwife was coming over, and I was like "Umm, because I'm in labour?". Apparently he'd been half asleep when I told him the first time, he was stunned
An hour later, my midwife turned up at my house to assess how I was doing. Confirmed that I was contracting as I had suspected, and that I was infact 4.5-5cm dilated already and 50% effaced. Amazingly, I was still able to talk (and joke..) through the contractions - she seemed rather impressed. Gawd knows how I managed that. She told me to ring her again when I felt that I could no longer talk through the contractions and that they were more intense, and said she would meet us at the hospital, and left. This was around 4.30, 5am.
Well not long after she had gone, maybe half an hour later, I started to have those exact feelings of intensity and not being able to talk through the pains. So I waited about an hour with the pains, still breathing through them but having to shush my OH
Then it got to the point where I decided that I should probably get to hospital, and OH gave midwife a call and let her know. She said she'd fill up the birthing pool so it was ready when we got there, as I planned on having a water birth. Midwife had made me a makeshift heatpack out of a wet towel in a plastic bag, heated in the microwave for a couple minutes (great idea btw, helps with the pain a bit!), which OH was lovely and would reheat for me every little while. I was attached to it! Hehe.We left a bit after 6am, maybe quarter past or 20 past, and collected my mum from around the corner, who was also going to be present at the birth. I was still attached to my heat pack
On the way there I began feeling nauseous, but luckily we had been advised to take an icecream container in the car in case I needed to throw up - because oh boy did I need to! As we sped down the motorway, I threw up the toast OH had made me before we had left, and the water I'd been drinking to keep up my fluids.We got to the hospital a bit after 7am and I got out of the car, only to notice I was very wet. It was actually from the towel from the heatpack that had leaked all over my lap
Not my waters - I knew this because I wasn't trickling or anything. But I felt so silly going in there looking like my waters had broken as I was in my leggings so I covered up with holding a bag in front of me I know they probably see that all the time, but still, it wasn't what they would think!!We met midwife and went down the corridor to the birthing room. She did an assessment and we found that I was 6-7cm dilated and 80% effaced with bulging membranes. I got in to the birthing pool. It was so nice, it was a round bath that sort of looked like a jacuzzi, and if I sat cross legged on the bottom, the water came up to my shoulders. It made me nice and relaxed, it was just lovely being in there.
I laboured for about an hour, before I asked for gas and air. It didn't help any with the pain, but did help to focus my breathing more and it really took the edge off and made me really nice and relaxed between contractions.
A few hours later at 10am I was ready to push. I've heard a few ladies say that pushing is the best part...personally it was my least favourite part of the whole thing! It just made me feel frustrated when I was told to "Push past where you got up to last time"
Very hard work!! I got in 2-3 pushes per contraction. By about 10.30 midwife could see a tiny peek of baby's head coming through. To mine (and his!) surprise, OH managed a look at baby's head when it was crowning. He's later told me he regrets it because it was gross I personally really wish I'd seen it, it would've been amazing. My mum had a look too My membranes were still intact, and hindering pushing a little, so midwife broke them and the contractions increased in strength a bit though it helped me push much easier than before.
Things got really difficult towards the end of the pushing, as I started to feel as if bubs was never going to arrive, and I kept feeling that I needed to poo. Infact, I stated for sure that I was doing a huge poo when I was halfway through pushing! I actually did end up going (only a couple of tiny nuggets which midwife scooped out with a net
much to OH's amusement) but I'm not surprised after how bloody hard you have to push to get anywhere...The pressure really was building up and I thought "Stuff it, this is horrible and it burns to push, but I'm going to get a baby out of this so here goes" and gave it all it was worth. The midwife told me to reach down and have a feel. Baby's head was finally out! OH laughed at me because I said "Helloooo!" in a really funny voice apparently
Well what did he expect, this baby's been in me so long and I'd waited all that time to meet him and there he was! Then I needed to push out his body...was a bit frustrated by this point, and asked the midwife if she would help me, so she told me to push nice and hard and pulled bubs a little annnd finally, at 11.02am on 23/03/2010, baby Lachlan Leonard McBride was born in the water, nice and calm. The cord was around his neck 3 times apparently Not an issue, but his cord was really long so that was good! Midwife handled it really well. He weighed 7lb11oz (3.48kg) and was 56cm long. I was so amazed and almost in shock at all that had just happened.Baby was calm the whole way through labour. He had an apgar score of 8 after 1min and 10 after 5min and breathing was established by 2min. We waited until the cord stopped pulsing, and then it was offered to OH to cut but he was a bit weird about it so I let my mum cut it and that was lovely
So if we're stopping counting the labour time when baby was born, I was in labour for about 11 hours.Then it was time to birth the placenta. This is when things started to go a little bit belly up...
I had originally planned on a physiological third stage, meaning just natural, pushing out placenta within the 30 min mark naturally...my placenta however had other plans! It did not want to budge. I felt awful, my stomach was still crampy and a bit tender and it was weird walking around with the umbilical cord hanging between my legs - felt rather surreal.
Midwife suggested I go to the toilet to push, as she had encouraged me to try and I couldn't, it just hurt too much and my muscles down there felt so weak from all the other pushing! I should have been able to push it out, but the placenta was just hanging on for dear life.
We got back on the bed and I tried again, and I thought that maybe they thought I was just being lazy but I really was trying really hard to get it out because it felt terrible still being in there. I ended up with several nurses/midwives in and out of the room and they determined that it just was not going to come out
One of the medical staff was pushing firmly on my stomach and I kept pushing her hands out of the way because it was so unbearably painful and tender I felt like a bitch doing that, and I later apologized, but she was quite curt with me about it all and it was all a bit scary because I wasn't sure what would happen. I heard something about them getting the IV ready and I freaked out because that was something I had specifically wanted to avoid - and I'd done so well in doing so by having my lovely natural water birth, so I sat up in alarm and said "No, no I can do it!" and pushed really really hard but still to no avail.So they put the Syntocinon drip in to shrink my uterus down, but it was still hardly helping the placenta move so they decided to put in a catheter, as I was unable to pee when I'd gone to the toilet. I was also really unhappy about this, as it was yet another thing I had desperately tried to avoid, and it felt horrible going in...
We were waiting a while, and I had a clamp up there trying to help move the placenta, and me trying to push again but it felt useless. I was beginning to worry that I would need an operation to physically remove the placenta, and that was something I REALLY hadn't wanted. I expressed this to my midwife a couple of days ago and she said it had gone through her mind as well, so obviously I had reason to be concerned. But luckily, with a bit more pushing and some tugging on the placenta by the midwives, the placenta was birthed. A whole daunting hour and a half later. The membranes were ragged, and they were a bit concerned that I may have a bleed later on so I was advised to stay in for a night and to keep the IV in my hand incase I needed to have another drip. I really had just wanted to go home, but luckily I stayed in as I had a bit of trouble with latching bubby on so it helped to give me some time. I stayed at the hospital for one night but didn't like how loud it was (was sharing a room with another woman whose baby cried SO much!) and sterile, so transferred to a birthing unit for a night then came home the following evening - was very ready to by then!
In terms of grazing and tearing, I ended up with some internal grazing, a 2nd degree vaginal laceration and a 1st degree labial laceration (really hurts!!
) which I knew I had felt when I pushed him out!! The outer perineum is all intact however so that's something.So overall I'm really happy with my labour and birth, just the bit with the placenta was definitely not as planned and a bit unpleasant! Not traumatised by it but really wishing it had been different. But really really pleased that I got the calm water birth I wanted and that I had been strong and avoided the epidural (even if I did end up with two of the things done to me that I was avoiding it for!). The pain of labour was not at all like I had expected it to be, not that I really had an idea of what to expect...and, some girls are going to hate me for this, not as bad as I had expected either. But I know that the pain varies from woman to woman and even from birth to birth. I feel extremely lucky that I got off rather easy with my labour, as I know how hard it can be for some women
OH was really helpful during the labour and reminded me why I love him so much
And baby is a sweetie and looks just like his daddy! He is for the most part very well behaved and settled so couldn't be happier to cater to his every whim Sooo, the part you've all been waiting for...pictures of baby Lachie (among other things
)https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0728-1.jpg
OH screwing around with the camera while I was labouring
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0731-1.jpg
Mummy's first hold
and a very alert little baby!https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0732-1.jpg
Baby being checked over by my midwife
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0736-1.jpg
Daddy's first hold
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0795-1.jpg
2 days old
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0807-1.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/IMG_0811-1.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/Resized/bubby.jpg
4 days old
Well done if you made it through the whole thing, and thank you for reading!!<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
Just thought I would do a pic update of my little man almost 3 months later
Things are going great, and I'm loving every minute of being a mummy to this wonderful little person https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/04041600x1200.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/009151600x1200.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/006131600x1200.jpg
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v260/unmusical/0061600x12004-1.jpg
x
Dust for you xxx
x
I was a little peeved that I went through my whole labour and birth (practically) drug free and then had to have the IV at the end. And the ouchy catheter.
) too! 
