RaspberryMini
Just the 4 of us
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I thought is write my birth story as I know how much I got out of reading others during those last few weeks of pregnancy. Be warned however, that it's not pleasant but sometimes it's more about the destination than the journey 
I was scheduled for induction on 22nd July at 10 days overdue. My midwife had attempted two sweeps, one at 40 + 4 and 41 + 4 both of which she was unable to conduct as my cervix was still thick and closed. I tried allsorts of natural methods, sex, pineapple, long walks, birthing ball wyc and had been pretty active the entire pregnancy but nothing helped.
We checked into the hospital at around 9am on the Sunday morning keen to get the process underway and meet our LO! I was placed on a monitor to check the fetal heart rate and to see if I was experiencing any contractions. Once this was assessed a progess (sp?) Pessary was inserted at 10am to soften and dilated my cervix. The midwife advised this would be in for 24 hours and there wouldn't be any need to check me until this period had ended and it could take a couple of days to get me into labour. The interbal for the Pessary was extremely uncomfortable because of the thickness of my cervix.
DH and I took a walk around the hospital grounds alto help things along and I began to get mild backache which increased in intensity so we went back to the labour ward so I could take some pain relief. Following further walks back ache increased again and contractions began around 12. I took more pain relief (codeine) and after around another hour put on my TENS machine.
The contractions continued to increase in intensity and frequency until it felt like there was no break between them. The midwives advised a warm bath for relief and to help relax me. Whilst in there a midwife came to speak to me and placed her hand on my tummy and advised she thought I needed further monitoring as there was concern the Pessary had hyper stimulated labour and would need to be removed. She explained whilst this would relieve the current back to back contractions it could also stop labour and we would have to start again. By this point the pain was so acute I just wanted the Pessary out to see if it would help!
I felt like I was failing by being so winded by what I felt was early labour but later realised was an unusual situation. The Pessary was removed and while the contractions were as intense, I started to get small breaks of maybe a minute or two between each one. I was only 2cm dilated though. I was given pethadine to help me deal with the pain as I had to lie on the bed to be monitored and I found the pain harder to deal with like that than being on my feet.
The pethadine made me a little out of it so my memories here are hazy and have been filled in by DH. There were some concerns for the baby's health and so a consultant was monitoring his heart rate. I was still contracting regularly and it was decided I needed fluids so was hooked up to an IV and the attempted ro take bloods which i couldnt give. I later found out I was being prepped for a section.
Baby's heart rate was rocketing to 200 bps and crashing at 98bpm, DH could see this on the monitor but I was blissfully unaware, they belived baby was squeezing the cord too. They decided to try and break my waters to check there was no meconium in them. They attempted this and for reasons I cannot recall couldn't do it even though I had dilated to 4cm by this point.
At that the room filled with people and I was whisked off to theatre leaving poor DH stood there without a clue what was going on. In theatre I was continually monitored while the decided whether to put me under or give me a spinal. As baby's heart rate began to stabilise I was given a spinal and DH was allowed in theatre.
At 8.41pm Leo Winston arrived and began to cry immediately it was such a relief. He weighed 8lb 8oz. Unfortunately I also lost a litre of blood but luckily escaped a transfusion.
We went up to the ward and because I suffered from extreme shakes after the spinal block I was unable to hold my bubba until the following day. That was probably the worst part about the whole procedure. We were unable to have those first precious few moment together.
Whilst its not the way I would have picked my birth story to be, I'm glad that Leo is here safe and sound because that's all that matters.
Apologies if there are any spelling mistakes - I'm typing on my phone whilst watching Leo dream
I was scheduled for induction on 22nd July at 10 days overdue. My midwife had attempted two sweeps, one at 40 + 4 and 41 + 4 both of which she was unable to conduct as my cervix was still thick and closed. I tried allsorts of natural methods, sex, pineapple, long walks, birthing ball wyc and had been pretty active the entire pregnancy but nothing helped.
We checked into the hospital at around 9am on the Sunday morning keen to get the process underway and meet our LO! I was placed on a monitor to check the fetal heart rate and to see if I was experiencing any contractions. Once this was assessed a progess (sp?) Pessary was inserted at 10am to soften and dilated my cervix. The midwife advised this would be in for 24 hours and there wouldn't be any need to check me until this period had ended and it could take a couple of days to get me into labour. The interbal for the Pessary was extremely uncomfortable because of the thickness of my cervix.
DH and I took a walk around the hospital grounds alto help things along and I began to get mild backache which increased in intensity so we went back to the labour ward so I could take some pain relief. Following further walks back ache increased again and contractions began around 12. I took more pain relief (codeine) and after around another hour put on my TENS machine.
The contractions continued to increase in intensity and frequency until it felt like there was no break between them. The midwives advised a warm bath for relief and to help relax me. Whilst in there a midwife came to speak to me and placed her hand on my tummy and advised she thought I needed further monitoring as there was concern the Pessary had hyper stimulated labour and would need to be removed. She explained whilst this would relieve the current back to back contractions it could also stop labour and we would have to start again. By this point the pain was so acute I just wanted the Pessary out to see if it would help!
I felt like I was failing by being so winded by what I felt was early labour but later realised was an unusual situation. The Pessary was removed and while the contractions were as intense, I started to get small breaks of maybe a minute or two between each one. I was only 2cm dilated though. I was given pethadine to help me deal with the pain as I had to lie on the bed to be monitored and I found the pain harder to deal with like that than being on my feet.
The pethadine made me a little out of it so my memories here are hazy and have been filled in by DH. There were some concerns for the baby's health and so a consultant was monitoring his heart rate. I was still contracting regularly and it was decided I needed fluids so was hooked up to an IV and the attempted ro take bloods which i couldnt give. I later found out I was being prepped for a section.
Baby's heart rate was rocketing to 200 bps and crashing at 98bpm, DH could see this on the monitor but I was blissfully unaware, they belived baby was squeezing the cord too. They decided to try and break my waters to check there was no meconium in them. They attempted this and for reasons I cannot recall couldn't do it even though I had dilated to 4cm by this point.
At that the room filled with people and I was whisked off to theatre leaving poor DH stood there without a clue what was going on. In theatre I was continually monitored while the decided whether to put me under or give me a spinal. As baby's heart rate began to stabilise I was given a spinal and DH was allowed in theatre.
At 8.41pm Leo Winston arrived and began to cry immediately it was such a relief. He weighed 8lb 8oz. Unfortunately I also lost a litre of blood but luckily escaped a transfusion.
We went up to the ward and because I suffered from extreme shakes after the spinal block I was unable to hold my bubba until the following day. That was probably the worst part about the whole procedure. We were unable to have those first precious few moment together.
Whilst its not the way I would have picked my birth story to be, I'm glad that Leo is here safe and sound because that's all that matters.
Apologies if there are any spelling mistakes - I'm typing on my phone whilst watching Leo dream
