MishC
Has a little princess!!
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My Story - Elissa
Firstly I should probably start off by saying when this all happened it was my due date (2nd August) and at 4pm that evening I was over the field running around with the dog trying to bring labour on. I felt 100% healthy and had been out shopping the morning too.
I was at home watching the TV with my mam (we were watching the cottage, I remember how daft the movie was) and I started to feel unsettled it was as if I couldnt get comfortable so I was moving from position to another every 5 minutes. This unsettled feeling went on for a couple of hours and then it and seemed to turn into a bit of back ache but me been me I just ignored it and expected it to go away. Over the next half hour the pain was gradually getting worse to I told me mam I was starting to feel pains but it was in my back and it seemed to be between my shoulder blades and not the bottom of my back. Again I carried on ignoring it but after about 10 minutes I remember it got pretty intense and it was slowly making its way around to the front of my bump. I remember vividly the intensity of the pain when it made its way round to the top/front of my bump, I had to very quickly run upstairs to the bathroom because I knew I was going to be sick. I just to say made it to the loo and I was violently sick this went on for about 20 minutes and then I felt a little better. I went back down stairs and told my mam I felt better but I still had the pain in between my shoulder blades and she said this is probably the start of labour. I remember thinking YEAH, NICE ONE but I did say to her bring on the drugs because this bloody hurts. Ill never forget the look on her face and the words that came out of her mouth Michelle, this is just the beginning you need to get it together because its going to get much worse. I nearly choked and started to panic but just thought I was been a bit of a wimp but did say to her I thought contractions were suppose to come and go, this pain has been here for a good hour with no break and it really hurts. I went and got my birthing ball and sat on that for 5 minutes and then that really intense pain came to the top of my bump again and I had to quickly run to the loo to be sick again. After about 15 minutes of been up there my mam came up to see how I was and I was saying to her that I thought something didnt feel right, the pain seemed to be in the wrong place. She kept telling me to call the maternity assessment unit but I didnt want to because I was only there 3 days previous because I couldnt feel my baby move (I had my BP taken, wee sample done and all was normal) and I thought that they would think I was been a paranoid pregnant person. She tried to give my back a rub to ease the pain but when she touched me it made it 100x worse. By this point I was close to tears with the pain so after about another 30 minutes of debating with my mam what to do I eventually called the assessment unit who told me to pop in and theyd see what was going on (it was 1:30am Monday morning by this point). My mam called a taxi while I was back in the bathroom been sick and then off we went.
I thought the taxi ride took about half hour but my mam said we were there with in 10 minutes. When we got to the assessment unit I was asked to wait for a few minutes while they got a room sorted out and my detail together, they asked me to have a wee for the usual routine tests they do too. I was pacing up and down in the waiting room and my pain seemed to really ease. After about 20 minutes of waiting a midwife asked me to pop into a room while they did a trace on my baby to see how she was. I told the Midwife there was absolutely no way I could possibly sit still for longer than 5 minutes because it hurt way too much. She asked me to do the best I could and they would pop back in 10 minutes to check how the trace is going, I remember my mam and I trying to make a joke of it and we were both trying to remember funny things that had happened in the past to take my mind of the pain which was getting worse at a fairly fast pace. I had to ask my mam to get me a sick tray thing because the pain was suddenly very intense above my bump again and I was feeling very sick and starting to feel dizzy and see black dots. After been on the trace for 20 minutes a midwife came in and said she was going to do my blood pressure, she had one of the machines you put your arm in and off it went. We were all talking while it was taking it but once the machine had finished it re took it straight away. The MW looked at it confused and then said lets do that again, this time try and sit still and dont talk the machine did exactly the same thing, it took it and then as it was going down it went back up and re did it. She took the arm band thing off of me and said that the machine was broke and shed get the stuff to do it manually. So off she went and my mam and I joked about the machine I said to her the bloody thing nearly took my arm off because it went so tight. With in a couple of minutes the MW was back and she took my BP herself and kinda went huh and walked out of the room with out saying anything. I said to my mam I take it the machine wasnt broken after all.
A couple of minutes later a consultant came in and he relayed my symptoms back to me and said it sounded like I had a classic case of gallstones. My first words to him were take them out, please just take them out. He said he could see I was in a lot of pain because I had the sick tray on my head as a hat (I was trying to distract myself lol). He told me hed get me a shot of Pethadine to help with the pain but I point black refused it. We had a bit of a debate but I told him there was no way he was coming anywhere near me with Pethadine. I said to him my Auntie is a nurse and she told me to stay well clear of it, I said Id rather have no pain medication that Pethadine After a minute or 2 he left the room and again my mam and I were joking on and I was laughing at something she said but the laughing caused me to cough and then I couldnt stop coughing, the coughing rapidly turned into choking and I was finding it very difficult to breath. I had tears running down my face so my mam very quickly shouted out of the room that we needed help, now! The consultant that had just been in the room come running back in and said the MW had just told him my BP and I didnt have gallstones I was seriously ill. He was telling me to breathe slowly so Id get my breath back. He asked me a few questions like was I seeing any dots, did I feel dizzy, did I have swollen feet or swollen any were. I answered yes to everything apart from the swelling. I had no swelling any were. At that I started to shake, my jaw looked like I was shivering and my mam kept asking why I was shivering but I just answered with I dont know. She asked if I was cold but I told her I was on fire and the pain was unbearable and I didnt know how much more I could take, the shaking was getting gradually worse and a look of worry hit everyones face.
Another 2 consultants came in my room long with 3 MV, I remember my room been full of medical staff and thinking, this cant be good! My mother asked someone if she should call my OH to come to the hospital and the consultant said if he can make it here with in 10 minutes then yes because I was going straight to theatre for a section. At that my mam dashed off outside and called my OH and asked him to get to the hospital asap, he lived 80 miles away, about an hour and half drive away.
While she was out of the room making the phone call the consultant was telling me that I was seriously ill and that if they didnt get my BP down with in the next couple of minutes I was going to have a fit which could lead to a coma. He was also telling to try and stay calm and I vaguely remember him talking but I dont remember what he said to me. I remember having my reflexes taken and a MW saying they were very brisk (at the time I had no idea what that meant) but I remember having this feeling and then just giving up. I couldnt physically take anymore. The pain was like nothing I have ever felt before, the sick feeling was killing me, the shaking was getting out of control, I was burning up, seeing dots and it was as if I couldnt hear properly anymore. I had a MW on each side of me putting IVs in both hands, 1 consultant trying to talk to me and get my attention and another consultant injecting me with a HUGE needle which was filled with Mag/Sulph (I didnt know that was what it was at the time) but it was as if I wasnt there, it was such an odd feeling. At that my mam walked back in the room to see that I had taken a turn for the worse she told me afterwards that she thought she was going to lose me because of the state I was in and the panic on everyones face in the room.
Some how with in about 15 minutes I seemed to snap out of it, it was like nothing you can imagine. Clearly the Mag/Sulph had started to do its job, my BP was slowly on its way down and all other symptoms started to ease and I was feeling human again. When I became stable I was taken over to the delivery suite and they told me they were going to induce me rather than do a section now I was in a stable condition. (it was about 4:00am). I was still in a hell of a lot of pain and my stomach was still retching but the MW I had was lovely. She gave me an IV of paracetamol which really did the trick.
If I remember rightly I had 2 tablets inserted at 4am and that was the beginning of the long induction. From 4am to 7am is a bit jumbled up I remember my OH getting to the hospital with my dad (my dad was in Leeds with him). I remember been monitored and still joking on with my mam. At 7am ish I felt as good as new I remember asking if I could go to the loo (I had a lot of IVs in so they needed disconnecting) and the MW was happy for me to go. Another MW came in my room and I asked her if I was having a natural birth could I still have an active birth and she was sure that I could, she didnt see what the problem would be with it. At that I really relaxed and started to get excited that I was going to have my baby in the next 48 hours. I remember jumping up and down on the spot and laughing/smiling with my mam I actually got butterflies in my stomach because I was so happy. About 10 minutes later a new consultant came into my room and shattered everything. In actual fact I nearly had an argument with her Haha. She told me that I wasnt allowed to have an active birth and that I was going to be bed bound until my baby was born. She told me that although I felt fine I wasnt (I was jumping up and down on the spot while she was talking to me) that in fact I was critically ill and very unstable. I told her that a MW had just told me that I could have an active birth and that was what I wanted to do and my worst nightmare was to have to spend my labour in a bed. She went on to tell me how ill I was and that if Id have waited another 20 minutes to go to the hospital I would have had a still born baby and that if Id have waited another 40 minutes to go Id be dead as well. That was when it hit me how bad things really were. I just felt like crying but instead I decided to listen to what the MW/Consultants had to say and just had to hope for the best. They wheeled me a comfortable bed in and that was the start of the long haul! I was told I would be having my BP taken every 15 minutes and blood taken every half hour or if not more. My baby would be on a trace now until she was born and I had to have one of those things on my finger to keep an eye on my sats.
I remember getting stupidly hot and the MW telling me it was the drugs kicking in. By this point I had a drip in my hand to bring on contractions but it didnt seem to be working. My MW told me that she would strongly recommend I had an epidural so that I didnt feel any pain and to help keep my BP down. I was on BP IV, anti sickness IV, Fluid IV, Induction gel IV and 2 other IV but I cant remember what they were. At 10am my consultant came in to see what progress I had made and wasnt very happy to see Id made none. So far the induction wasnt working. When I had my first internal examination I was 1.5cm dilated, when I was checked again 6 hours later I was still the same. My consultant said she wanted the MW to break my waters in hope that it would help me along the way. After a good 15 minutes of trying to break my waters she was unsuccessful. She informed my consultant who was adamant they needed to be broken there and then. Much to my shock a MW wheeled in a pair of stirrups and all I could think was this is going to hurt. My MW gave me the gas and air and told me to just keep breathing it. My consultant was the one who was trying to break my waters and by god did she try, I have never felt pain like it. After a good 15 minutes she finally broke them. She seemed quite pleased with herself because she said they were in the wrong place to be broken.
Anyway as time went on I decided it was time to get the epidural put in. My MW had told me that I would need to sit still for 20 minutes so if I wanted it (she strongly recommended it) I would need to get it done when I wasnt in any pain. In came the
Anaesthetist and he had a look over my chart/notes and said he couldnt give me one until they ran my bloods to see how they were doing. Another half hour passed and he said my platelets low but where ok to have an epidural at the moment so in it went.
(Monday 3rd August - 7pm ish 15 hours on from the induction) I had another examination and still I had made no progress. I was starting to feel a bit tired by this point as Id been awake since Saturday Morning. My mam and partner were still with me and been very supportive. Things start to get really blurry now I remember I was stupidly thirsty I could have killed for a drink, I kept asking my MW for one but she kept saying I wasnt allowed. 7pm was shift change in my hospital so my MW was telling the new MW what had happened and what they were doing etc I over heard the MW saying that I was dehydrated and they needed to keep it that way because my kidneys had nearly stopped working. By this point I was having bloods taken every 15 minutes from my feet because there were no other free veins to use. At 8pm (ish) my mw some how manage to knock the drip tube out of my epidural. She connected it back up herself and we hoped for the best. Anyway I remember at 9pm I started to feel odd again, not in the same way as I did when I went to the assessment unit but not in a good way. At this time a surgeon came into my room to check on me and my OH pulled him to one side and told him that the MW had knocked my epidural out and he was concerned in case it wasnt in properly. The surgeon told him hed get the anaesthesiologist to come along and take a look at it.
By 9:45 I had taken another huge turn for the worse. The sickness feeling I had when I first went into the hospital come back with a passion. I was feeling pain in my hip bones and couldnt get comfortable. The MW game me a block thing to lay on to try and help. I remember all my IVs started to bleed, there were little pools of blood on the bed were my hands were, the places were Id had blood taken started to bleed, my epidural site in my back was bleeding quite heavily. The pillow I was using to prop me up was covered in blood. And to this day I will never forget the look on my MW face. She called the surgeon, anaesthesiologist and consultant back into the room. Now I dont remember what happened for the next couple of hours but I have my hospital notes at home and it says this was when my pre eclampsia turned into severe pre eclampsia and HELLP was defiantly occurring. My liver and kidneys were starting to fail by platelets were down to 100 (which I know isnt really low but its still low) my reflexes had gotten worse and medication was starting to not be as effective.
I lost concept of all time but I do know at midnight I had another examination and I was still a 1.5cm dilated, Id made no progress what so ever. The surgeon told me he wanted to wait another 3 hours before he decided if having a section was the right way to go about it. He told me that the anaesthesiologist was going to give me a new epidural if my platelets were above 85 to try and help with the pain I was feeling. Safe to say I wasnt impressed with this one bit! The doctor took my epidural out and I point blank refused to have another one put in. I figured that the more pain I felt the higher my BP would get and the quicker I would get a section. As you can imagine this caused a right out burst in my room, I had 2 consultants in, 2 MW, the surgeon and the anaesthesiologist all telling me that I really needed to have this back in because I was dangerous for both me and my baby get any worse. My OH thought it was hilarious that Id had an outburst and decided not to go through with it, my mother was going to kill me (if I didnt kill myself first) and everyone was highly concerned. The only reason I did this was because I was getting to the point were I couldnt take much more again I was starting to give up and I knew that was a bad sign so this was my push to help me along the way. Anyway after about 45 minutes of everyone constantly going on at my I got a new epidural put in. I was very unhappy with this but I just wanted everyone to shut up and go away. After about an hour of the new epidural been in I took yet another bad turn, my catheter had turned to pure blood and I lost all energy, I was throwing up foam/bubble type stuff and generally just left like I was slipping away. My babies heart rate had dropped down to 50bpm and there was now also a concern for her.
The surgeon was called back into my room at 4am - 24 hours after the induction started and he did another examination and safe to say Id still made no progress. He had decided enough was enough and said he was going to take me down for a section and that I had just had a failed induction. I was rapidly getting worse and my baby was now in danger. They said before the could do anything I had to have my bloods taken to see what state they were in so the MW took them and the Surgeon WALKED TO THE LADS AND WAITED FOR THE RESULTS HIMSELF I remember signing paper work but I had no idea what it was (luckily ma mam did) and off to theatre I went.
I was put under General anaesthetic and my daughter was born on Tuesday 4th August @ 6:12am weighing 6lbs 13oz. She wasnt breathing when she was born and needed 15 finger presses to bring her back and the oxygen. But other than that she was a healthy baby girl I was in Intensive care for a total of 5 days and I wasnt allowed out of my bed for 4 of those days.
To this day I still feel like I missed out on so much because I wasnt conscious for the first 12 hours of my Daughters life. For 2 days I couldnt change her nappy, dress her, pick her up if she was crying etc. I know it sounds really silly and Im very very lucky for her to have been born healthy and for us to have both survived.
Ill make the rest of the story short. I got an infection from the MW putting the epidural in when it fell out so I was on antibiotics for a week with that. I had to have daily injections for a week for my blood. I had staples put in after my section and a drain. Having the drain taken out was the single most painful thing Ive ever had happen to me in my life. I nearly cried and nearly threw up with the pain. I was on BP medication for 6 weeks and thats about it (I think)
All in all a very scary and traumatic few days for me. When I went into the Maternity Assessment Unit and had my BP take it was 200/168. On several occasions they tried to cut the medication down they were giving me in the hospital through the IV but every time they did my BP shot right back up. My daughters heart rate dropped because of the sheer amount of drugs they were pumping into me. When they decided to do the section and stopped all drugs her heart rate went back up.
Firstly I should probably start off by saying when this all happened it was my due date (2nd August) and at 4pm that evening I was over the field running around with the dog trying to bring labour on. I felt 100% healthy and had been out shopping the morning too.
I was at home watching the TV with my mam (we were watching the cottage, I remember how daft the movie was) and I started to feel unsettled it was as if I couldnt get comfortable so I was moving from position to another every 5 minutes. This unsettled feeling went on for a couple of hours and then it and seemed to turn into a bit of back ache but me been me I just ignored it and expected it to go away. Over the next half hour the pain was gradually getting worse to I told me mam I was starting to feel pains but it was in my back and it seemed to be between my shoulder blades and not the bottom of my back. Again I carried on ignoring it but after about 10 minutes I remember it got pretty intense and it was slowly making its way around to the front of my bump. I remember vividly the intensity of the pain when it made its way round to the top/front of my bump, I had to very quickly run upstairs to the bathroom because I knew I was going to be sick. I just to say made it to the loo and I was violently sick this went on for about 20 minutes and then I felt a little better. I went back down stairs and told my mam I felt better but I still had the pain in between my shoulder blades and she said this is probably the start of labour. I remember thinking YEAH, NICE ONE but I did say to her bring on the drugs because this bloody hurts. Ill never forget the look on her face and the words that came out of her mouth Michelle, this is just the beginning you need to get it together because its going to get much worse. I nearly choked and started to panic but just thought I was been a bit of a wimp but did say to her I thought contractions were suppose to come and go, this pain has been here for a good hour with no break and it really hurts. I went and got my birthing ball and sat on that for 5 minutes and then that really intense pain came to the top of my bump again and I had to quickly run to the loo to be sick again. After about 15 minutes of been up there my mam came up to see how I was and I was saying to her that I thought something didnt feel right, the pain seemed to be in the wrong place. She kept telling me to call the maternity assessment unit but I didnt want to because I was only there 3 days previous because I couldnt feel my baby move (I had my BP taken, wee sample done and all was normal) and I thought that they would think I was been a paranoid pregnant person. She tried to give my back a rub to ease the pain but when she touched me it made it 100x worse. By this point I was close to tears with the pain so after about another 30 minutes of debating with my mam what to do I eventually called the assessment unit who told me to pop in and theyd see what was going on (it was 1:30am Monday morning by this point). My mam called a taxi while I was back in the bathroom been sick and then off we went.
I thought the taxi ride took about half hour but my mam said we were there with in 10 minutes. When we got to the assessment unit I was asked to wait for a few minutes while they got a room sorted out and my detail together, they asked me to have a wee for the usual routine tests they do too. I was pacing up and down in the waiting room and my pain seemed to really ease. After about 20 minutes of waiting a midwife asked me to pop into a room while they did a trace on my baby to see how she was. I told the Midwife there was absolutely no way I could possibly sit still for longer than 5 minutes because it hurt way too much. She asked me to do the best I could and they would pop back in 10 minutes to check how the trace is going, I remember my mam and I trying to make a joke of it and we were both trying to remember funny things that had happened in the past to take my mind of the pain which was getting worse at a fairly fast pace. I had to ask my mam to get me a sick tray thing because the pain was suddenly very intense above my bump again and I was feeling very sick and starting to feel dizzy and see black dots. After been on the trace for 20 minutes a midwife came in and said she was going to do my blood pressure, she had one of the machines you put your arm in and off it went. We were all talking while it was taking it but once the machine had finished it re took it straight away. The MW looked at it confused and then said lets do that again, this time try and sit still and dont talk the machine did exactly the same thing, it took it and then as it was going down it went back up and re did it. She took the arm band thing off of me and said that the machine was broke and shed get the stuff to do it manually. So off she went and my mam and I joked about the machine I said to her the bloody thing nearly took my arm off because it went so tight. With in a couple of minutes the MW was back and she took my BP herself and kinda went huh and walked out of the room with out saying anything. I said to my mam I take it the machine wasnt broken after all.
A couple of minutes later a consultant came in and he relayed my symptoms back to me and said it sounded like I had a classic case of gallstones. My first words to him were take them out, please just take them out. He said he could see I was in a lot of pain because I had the sick tray on my head as a hat (I was trying to distract myself lol). He told me hed get me a shot of Pethadine to help with the pain but I point black refused it. We had a bit of a debate but I told him there was no way he was coming anywhere near me with Pethadine. I said to him my Auntie is a nurse and she told me to stay well clear of it, I said Id rather have no pain medication that Pethadine After a minute or 2 he left the room and again my mam and I were joking on and I was laughing at something she said but the laughing caused me to cough and then I couldnt stop coughing, the coughing rapidly turned into choking and I was finding it very difficult to breath. I had tears running down my face so my mam very quickly shouted out of the room that we needed help, now! The consultant that had just been in the room come running back in and said the MW had just told him my BP and I didnt have gallstones I was seriously ill. He was telling me to breathe slowly so Id get my breath back. He asked me a few questions like was I seeing any dots, did I feel dizzy, did I have swollen feet or swollen any were. I answered yes to everything apart from the swelling. I had no swelling any were. At that I started to shake, my jaw looked like I was shivering and my mam kept asking why I was shivering but I just answered with I dont know. She asked if I was cold but I told her I was on fire and the pain was unbearable and I didnt know how much more I could take, the shaking was getting gradually worse and a look of worry hit everyones face.
Another 2 consultants came in my room long with 3 MV, I remember my room been full of medical staff and thinking, this cant be good! My mother asked someone if she should call my OH to come to the hospital and the consultant said if he can make it here with in 10 minutes then yes because I was going straight to theatre for a section. At that my mam dashed off outside and called my OH and asked him to get to the hospital asap, he lived 80 miles away, about an hour and half drive away.
While she was out of the room making the phone call the consultant was telling me that I was seriously ill and that if they didnt get my BP down with in the next couple of minutes I was going to have a fit which could lead to a coma. He was also telling to try and stay calm and I vaguely remember him talking but I dont remember what he said to me. I remember having my reflexes taken and a MW saying they were very brisk (at the time I had no idea what that meant) but I remember having this feeling and then just giving up. I couldnt physically take anymore. The pain was like nothing I have ever felt before, the sick feeling was killing me, the shaking was getting out of control, I was burning up, seeing dots and it was as if I couldnt hear properly anymore. I had a MW on each side of me putting IVs in both hands, 1 consultant trying to talk to me and get my attention and another consultant injecting me with a HUGE needle which was filled with Mag/Sulph (I didnt know that was what it was at the time) but it was as if I wasnt there, it was such an odd feeling. At that my mam walked back in the room to see that I had taken a turn for the worse she told me afterwards that she thought she was going to lose me because of the state I was in and the panic on everyones face in the room.
Some how with in about 15 minutes I seemed to snap out of it, it was like nothing you can imagine. Clearly the Mag/Sulph had started to do its job, my BP was slowly on its way down and all other symptoms started to ease and I was feeling human again. When I became stable I was taken over to the delivery suite and they told me they were going to induce me rather than do a section now I was in a stable condition. (it was about 4:00am). I was still in a hell of a lot of pain and my stomach was still retching but the MW I had was lovely. She gave me an IV of paracetamol which really did the trick.
If I remember rightly I had 2 tablets inserted at 4am and that was the beginning of the long induction. From 4am to 7am is a bit jumbled up I remember my OH getting to the hospital with my dad (my dad was in Leeds with him). I remember been monitored and still joking on with my mam. At 7am ish I felt as good as new I remember asking if I could go to the loo (I had a lot of IVs in so they needed disconnecting) and the MW was happy for me to go. Another MW came in my room and I asked her if I was having a natural birth could I still have an active birth and she was sure that I could, she didnt see what the problem would be with it. At that I really relaxed and started to get excited that I was going to have my baby in the next 48 hours. I remember jumping up and down on the spot and laughing/smiling with my mam I actually got butterflies in my stomach because I was so happy. About 10 minutes later a new consultant came into my room and shattered everything. In actual fact I nearly had an argument with her Haha. She told me that I wasnt allowed to have an active birth and that I was going to be bed bound until my baby was born. She told me that although I felt fine I wasnt (I was jumping up and down on the spot while she was talking to me) that in fact I was critically ill and very unstable. I told her that a MW had just told me that I could have an active birth and that was what I wanted to do and my worst nightmare was to have to spend my labour in a bed. She went on to tell me how ill I was and that if Id have waited another 20 minutes to go to the hospital I would have had a still born baby and that if Id have waited another 40 minutes to go Id be dead as well. That was when it hit me how bad things really were. I just felt like crying but instead I decided to listen to what the MW/Consultants had to say and just had to hope for the best. They wheeled me a comfortable bed in and that was the start of the long haul! I was told I would be having my BP taken every 15 minutes and blood taken every half hour or if not more. My baby would be on a trace now until she was born and I had to have one of those things on my finger to keep an eye on my sats.
I remember getting stupidly hot and the MW telling me it was the drugs kicking in. By this point I had a drip in my hand to bring on contractions but it didnt seem to be working. My MW told me that she would strongly recommend I had an epidural so that I didnt feel any pain and to help keep my BP down. I was on BP IV, anti sickness IV, Fluid IV, Induction gel IV and 2 other IV but I cant remember what they were. At 10am my consultant came in to see what progress I had made and wasnt very happy to see Id made none. So far the induction wasnt working. When I had my first internal examination I was 1.5cm dilated, when I was checked again 6 hours later I was still the same. My consultant said she wanted the MW to break my waters in hope that it would help me along the way. After a good 15 minutes of trying to break my waters she was unsuccessful. She informed my consultant who was adamant they needed to be broken there and then. Much to my shock a MW wheeled in a pair of stirrups and all I could think was this is going to hurt. My MW gave me the gas and air and told me to just keep breathing it. My consultant was the one who was trying to break my waters and by god did she try, I have never felt pain like it. After a good 15 minutes she finally broke them. She seemed quite pleased with herself because she said they were in the wrong place to be broken.
Anyway as time went on I decided it was time to get the epidural put in. My MW had told me that I would need to sit still for 20 minutes so if I wanted it (she strongly recommended it) I would need to get it done when I wasnt in any pain. In came the
Anaesthetist and he had a look over my chart/notes and said he couldnt give me one until they ran my bloods to see how they were doing. Another half hour passed and he said my platelets low but where ok to have an epidural at the moment so in it went.
(Monday 3rd August - 7pm ish 15 hours on from the induction) I had another examination and still I had made no progress. I was starting to feel a bit tired by this point as Id been awake since Saturday Morning. My mam and partner were still with me and been very supportive. Things start to get really blurry now I remember I was stupidly thirsty I could have killed for a drink, I kept asking my MW for one but she kept saying I wasnt allowed. 7pm was shift change in my hospital so my MW was telling the new MW what had happened and what they were doing etc I over heard the MW saying that I was dehydrated and they needed to keep it that way because my kidneys had nearly stopped working. By this point I was having bloods taken every 15 minutes from my feet because there were no other free veins to use. At 8pm (ish) my mw some how manage to knock the drip tube out of my epidural. She connected it back up herself and we hoped for the best. Anyway I remember at 9pm I started to feel odd again, not in the same way as I did when I went to the assessment unit but not in a good way. At this time a surgeon came into my room to check on me and my OH pulled him to one side and told him that the MW had knocked my epidural out and he was concerned in case it wasnt in properly. The surgeon told him hed get the anaesthesiologist to come along and take a look at it.
By 9:45 I had taken another huge turn for the worse. The sickness feeling I had when I first went into the hospital come back with a passion. I was feeling pain in my hip bones and couldnt get comfortable. The MW game me a block thing to lay on to try and help. I remember all my IVs started to bleed, there were little pools of blood on the bed were my hands were, the places were Id had blood taken started to bleed, my epidural site in my back was bleeding quite heavily. The pillow I was using to prop me up was covered in blood. And to this day I will never forget the look on my MW face. She called the surgeon, anaesthesiologist and consultant back into the room. Now I dont remember what happened for the next couple of hours but I have my hospital notes at home and it says this was when my pre eclampsia turned into severe pre eclampsia and HELLP was defiantly occurring. My liver and kidneys were starting to fail by platelets were down to 100 (which I know isnt really low but its still low) my reflexes had gotten worse and medication was starting to not be as effective.
I lost concept of all time but I do know at midnight I had another examination and I was still a 1.5cm dilated, Id made no progress what so ever. The surgeon told me he wanted to wait another 3 hours before he decided if having a section was the right way to go about it. He told me that the anaesthesiologist was going to give me a new epidural if my platelets were above 85 to try and help with the pain I was feeling. Safe to say I wasnt impressed with this one bit! The doctor took my epidural out and I point blank refused to have another one put in. I figured that the more pain I felt the higher my BP would get and the quicker I would get a section. As you can imagine this caused a right out burst in my room, I had 2 consultants in, 2 MW, the surgeon and the anaesthesiologist all telling me that I really needed to have this back in because I was dangerous for both me and my baby get any worse. My OH thought it was hilarious that Id had an outburst and decided not to go through with it, my mother was going to kill me (if I didnt kill myself first) and everyone was highly concerned. The only reason I did this was because I was getting to the point were I couldnt take much more again I was starting to give up and I knew that was a bad sign so this was my push to help me along the way. Anyway after about 45 minutes of everyone constantly going on at my I got a new epidural put in. I was very unhappy with this but I just wanted everyone to shut up and go away. After about an hour of the new epidural been in I took yet another bad turn, my catheter had turned to pure blood and I lost all energy, I was throwing up foam/bubble type stuff and generally just left like I was slipping away. My babies heart rate had dropped down to 50bpm and there was now also a concern for her.
The surgeon was called back into my room at 4am - 24 hours after the induction started and he did another examination and safe to say Id still made no progress. He had decided enough was enough and said he was going to take me down for a section and that I had just had a failed induction. I was rapidly getting worse and my baby was now in danger. They said before the could do anything I had to have my bloods taken to see what state they were in so the MW took them and the Surgeon WALKED TO THE LADS AND WAITED FOR THE RESULTS HIMSELF I remember signing paper work but I had no idea what it was (luckily ma mam did) and off to theatre I went.
I was put under General anaesthetic and my daughter was born on Tuesday 4th August @ 6:12am weighing 6lbs 13oz. She wasnt breathing when she was born and needed 15 finger presses to bring her back and the oxygen. But other than that she was a healthy baby girl I was in Intensive care for a total of 5 days and I wasnt allowed out of my bed for 4 of those days.
To this day I still feel like I missed out on so much because I wasnt conscious for the first 12 hours of my Daughters life. For 2 days I couldnt change her nappy, dress her, pick her up if she was crying etc. I know it sounds really silly and Im very very lucky for her to have been born healthy and for us to have both survived.
Ill make the rest of the story short. I got an infection from the MW putting the epidural in when it fell out so I was on antibiotics for a week with that. I had to have daily injections for a week for my blood. I had staples put in after my section and a drain. Having the drain taken out was the single most painful thing Ive ever had happen to me in my life. I nearly cried and nearly threw up with the pain. I was on BP medication for 6 weeks and thats about it (I think)
All in all a very scary and traumatic few days for me. When I went into the Maternity Assessment Unit and had my BP take it was 200/168. On several occasions they tried to cut the medication down they were giving me in the hospital through the IV but every time they did my BP shot right back up. My daughters heart rate dropped because of the sheer amount of drugs they were pumping into me. When they decided to do the section and stopped all drugs her heart rate went back up.
