aimee-lou
Totally Outnumbered!!
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Thought it was time to post Earl's birth story while all the details are still very fresh indeed.
My contractions started at about 6pm on the Saturday (24th) - by about 10pm they were up to 5 minutes apart so I called the birth centre to check what to do next as I had been told 5 minutes apart but they weren't that strong. I had a bath, got myself all clean and tried to get some sleep. After my bath they quickly returned to 5 minutes apart and were A LOT stronger than before. I decided to go in to be checked out as I was starting to wonder what was going on and the pain was bad. (At this point I'd had a couple of paracetamol lol)
I went in at about 3am, was examined and was found to be 1cm dilated and thinning nicely. I was advised to go home and continue to take paracetamol. I managed to continue in this way until about 8pm that night, got a few hours sleep thanks to a few more paracetamol and another bath!
Went in again at 8.30 as I thought my waters had gone as I had a 'gush' of fluid. Was examined again and was found to be 3cm and thinned.....to be honest at this point after over 24 hours of contractions I could have cried! But - the midwife assured me it was good and said it could be a while but my progress was steady and baby was well. I was therefore kept in - I had keytones in my urine samples so was force-fed toast and lucozade.....not good when you're contracting every 3 minutes! This mostly came back to haunt me after about an hour or so and the pressure of being sick broke my waters!
I was put into 2 baths, and told to try to sleep a bit more. I fell alseep during the 2nd one in the bath (Hubby also fell asleep propped up against the radiator!) and woke up feeling my like contractions had doubled. I was examined at 2am and found to be 6cm and fully thinned so was offered Gas and Air and told that I could get into the water bath......bliss!
I took the gas and air and the bath for nearly 5 hours. My midwives swapped over. at about 9am I was examined again as I obviously was not going to be able to have the strength to push baby out in the water. I had a lip of cervix still left but was at 10 cm. I was told to keep on going with the contractions for a bit longer. After about an hour I was found to be fully dilated.
My transition was quite long, a lot of waters were pushed out, but by about 11am I was getting ready to push and my MW just told me to push when I felt ready. I was shattered. but at 11.30 the urge overtook me. 36 minutes of pushing later and Earl entered the world! He was caught by his Daddy and passed up to us. 9lb 6oz!
My placenta instantly came away - literally within 5 minutes the Midwife was shocked as she started to prepare to deliver it and it was there! Apparently the placenta was huge!
Unfortunately the bleeding was very heavy so I was given the injection to stop the bleeding. This made me feel awful and I had to lay flat for over an hour until the blood stopped flowing. I also had to have stitches to a tear (only minor and internal only) but in the process lost over a pint and a half of blood! Bit scary to see that all in the course of 45 minutes!!
So basically, 42 hours from start to finish, 10 hours of established labour and a heavy blood loss later, and Earl Francis was born! I had only Gas and Air, pushed him out entirely on my own steam.
My husband Drew though was the real star. He was there from start to finish, never left my side, helped me with my breathing, to stay calm and bore the brunt of the violence as I vented my frustrations at my slow progress. He suffered with me, had to watch me in immense pain and has just been wonderful. He caught Earl as he emerged, stayed with me while I was scared with the bleeding and now I'm home he's making my recovery a lot easier. I am so in love with my little family and while it was a traumatic experience, I'm on the mend, Earl is a star and Drew is wonderful! All I know is I'm the luckiest woman in the world!
Thanks for reading!
Aimee x
My contractions started at about 6pm on the Saturday (24th) - by about 10pm they were up to 5 minutes apart so I called the birth centre to check what to do next as I had been told 5 minutes apart but they weren't that strong. I had a bath, got myself all clean and tried to get some sleep. After my bath they quickly returned to 5 minutes apart and were A LOT stronger than before. I decided to go in to be checked out as I was starting to wonder what was going on and the pain was bad. (At this point I'd had a couple of paracetamol lol)
I went in at about 3am, was examined and was found to be 1cm dilated and thinning nicely. I was advised to go home and continue to take paracetamol. I managed to continue in this way until about 8pm that night, got a few hours sleep thanks to a few more paracetamol and another bath!
Went in again at 8.30 as I thought my waters had gone as I had a 'gush' of fluid. Was examined again and was found to be 3cm and thinned.....to be honest at this point after over 24 hours of contractions I could have cried! But - the midwife assured me it was good and said it could be a while but my progress was steady and baby was well. I was therefore kept in - I had keytones in my urine samples so was force-fed toast and lucozade.....not good when you're contracting every 3 minutes! This mostly came back to haunt me after about an hour or so and the pressure of being sick broke my waters!
I was put into 2 baths, and told to try to sleep a bit more. I fell alseep during the 2nd one in the bath (Hubby also fell asleep propped up against the radiator!) and woke up feeling my like contractions had doubled. I was examined at 2am and found to be 6cm and fully thinned so was offered Gas and Air and told that I could get into the water bath......bliss!
I took the gas and air and the bath for nearly 5 hours. My midwives swapped over. at about 9am I was examined again as I obviously was not going to be able to have the strength to push baby out in the water. I had a lip of cervix still left but was at 10 cm. I was told to keep on going with the contractions for a bit longer. After about an hour I was found to be fully dilated.
My transition was quite long, a lot of waters were pushed out, but by about 11am I was getting ready to push and my MW just told me to push when I felt ready. I was shattered. but at 11.30 the urge overtook me. 36 minutes of pushing later and Earl entered the world! He was caught by his Daddy and passed up to us. 9lb 6oz!
My placenta instantly came away - literally within 5 minutes the Midwife was shocked as she started to prepare to deliver it and it was there! Apparently the placenta was huge!
Unfortunately the bleeding was very heavy so I was given the injection to stop the bleeding. This made me feel awful and I had to lay flat for over an hour until the blood stopped flowing. I also had to have stitches to a tear (only minor and internal only) but in the process lost over a pint and a half of blood! Bit scary to see that all in the course of 45 minutes!!
So basically, 42 hours from start to finish, 10 hours of established labour and a heavy blood loss later, and Earl Francis was born! I had only Gas and Air, pushed him out entirely on my own steam.
My husband Drew though was the real star. He was there from start to finish, never left my side, helped me with my breathing, to stay calm and bore the brunt of the violence as I vented my frustrations at my slow progress. He suffered with me, had to watch me in immense pain and has just been wonderful. He caught Earl as he emerged, stayed with me while I was scared with the bleeding and now I'm home he's making my recovery a lot easier. I am so in love with my little family and while it was a traumatic experience, I'm on the mend, Earl is a star and Drew is wonderful! All I know is I'm the luckiest woman in the world!
Thanks for reading!
Aimee x
Well done to the both of you, and a warm welcome to the world to Earl!! What a lovely name 
xx
xxxx Hope to continue chatting to you over in baby club sometime soon!
Glad I wrote it down when I did! lol
