Dory85
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Only 2 weeks late but I'm finally getting round to my birth story for those who are interested. Better late than never, right?
So our little girl was due on 13th October and surprise, surprise, I went overdue! At 41 weeks I was woken by strong, regular braxton hicks which carried on for about 2 hours but then disappeared when I gave up trying to sleep and got out of bed. Later that same day my midwife came and gave me a sweep. I was 50% effaced, 1cm dilated and my cervix was in mid position. Following my sweep I had no bleeding but on the night I lost the tiniest amount of plug in the world. We're talking about a 5p piece and I only noticed because I was looking. I resigned myself to the fact that despite a further sweep being booked for term + 10, I would be going in for my induction appointment at term + 12.
At term + 9 I woke up again at 4:30am with similar contractions to the other morning which carried on til I got up at 07:30. They were still coming but I told OH to go to work because I expected them to stop like they had the few days before. I time them for 30 minutes, they were coming every 3-4 minutes and lasting 30 seconds. It freaked me out because I thought they were supposed to start irregular and everyone said they felt like period pains (not even remotely). Still, I decided I wasn't in labour because everything I read said unless it caused my back to ache or hurt, it was just braxton hicks.
10 minutes afer my OH went out the door I went to the loo because my knickers felt a bit wet and I was bleeding, period style. A quick google search told me this wasn't normal so I rangd the pregnancy assessment unit who gave the impression they thought it was just me having my show but said to go in for piece of mind. Cue me ringing OH who had just arrived at work lol.
Once getting to PAU they checked my pad and agreed that level of bleeding was a concern
So I was strapped up to the CTG while we waited for the consultant to come and do a speculum and cervix examination. I noticed on my initial triage the midwife wrote my contractions were irregular (despite me telling her they were 3 minutes apart) which kind of annoyed me. She also told me there was no way I was in established labour because I 'didn't look like the women on the telly'. Firstly, I didn't say I was and secondly, as a nurse I'm fully aware you can't make an assessment like that simply by looking at someone!!
So the CTG showed regular contractions. The consultant came and didn't even put the speculum in properly before taking it out. Turns out I was 3cm dilated, 100% effaced and had an anterior cervix. He informed us I had almost completed latent phase labour in a matter of hourse rather than 24-48 hours as is coomon and therefore I was havng an extreme show but nothing to worry about. He did say I could stop in but I chose to go home as it was only 11am and try codeine and paracetamol.
Codeine and paracetamol were rubbish lol. So was a bath, and my birthing ball. I literally sat on it, bounced twice and had to get up again. Isimply couldn't bear to have my bump touched or squashed. I drank lots of water but couldn't eat because it made me vomit.
At about 18:00hrs I suddenly got 'migrane vision' without the headache so ended up back at PAU where they found protein in my urine and my BP was sloowly creeping up but the doctor wasn't concerned. The same midwife from the morning said she wouldn't check me again because from looking at me she didn't think I had really progressed?! I told her I felt I was reaching the peak of my pain threshold but she just told me I should go home even if it was just an hour
I got home, ran the bath, got in, had a contraction and told OH to ring them back and tell them I was going in regardless lol. Fortunately when I got there the night shift had just started so I saw a different midwife. She watched me and felt my tummy as I had a contraction and went 'was that a small one?' prompting me to wonder if I had progressed at all since the morning, but when she checked me I was 6cm!! She admitted she didn't think I would be that far and I admitted I may have punced her if she'd said 3cm lol. So off we went to labour ward.
I got given the gas and air and strapped back up to the CTG because LO's heart rate was around 180bpm. She gave me the gas and air then said she'd be back in a bit. I was sucking on the gas and air whilst listening to baby's heart rate but the gas and air made me go quite deaf and I started freaking out to my OH saying I'd killed her even though he could still hear it beating away lol. After 4 hours they checked me again and I'd only progressed to 7cm (they like at least 2cm every 4 hours) so they broke my waters and at this point I asked for diamorphine too which just made me quite sleepy. There was quite a bit of meconium in my waters so she rang the registrar on call who gave me time limits in which to progress lol. Once my waters were broken I actually progressed quite quickly but then got stuck at 9cm. They strapped the monitor back on (which stayed on until I'd given delivered now) and manually 'helped' me to 10 cm - ouch!!!!!
Since having the diamorphine my contractions became more spaced out again but still as painful. Due to a combination of this, her high heart rate and the meconium, the registrar told my midwife I could have an hour to try and push baby out or they would have to talk about intervention The diamorphine really knocked me for six (I'd been awake for over 24 hours at this point without any food) so I slept between contractions, with my legs in stirrups and the midwife staring at my foof 
When I had a contraction I would wake up, hallucinate (nothing like telling your OH to get rid of the skateboarders because it was really inappropriate), push and then fall back to sleep. What a lovely image!!
After an hour I still hadn't managed to push her out so the registrar, 2 paeditricians and the head midwife person turned up. I remember initially thinking the room was massive but all these people barely fit in. The reg said I could do 3 pushes with ventouse, then 3 pushes with forceps and if they didn't work they would need to take me for section. This was the first point where it occured to me maybe things were a bit more serious than they had been letting on.
They had to give me an episiotomy but I honestly did not care at this point. In fact, I wonder if the injection helped because I didn't experience any 'ring of fire'. On push number 2 with ventouse I managed to get her head out
I then saw the look on my midwife's face and the 'eye contact' she made with the registrar. For a grand total of about 10 seconds I thought she was going to get stuck (my biggest fear). Fortunately on the next push we managed to get the rest of her out and despite everything her Apgar score was a 9!! Delivered at term + 10 07:04am weighing a whopping 8lb 11 (first baby!!).
She had to be checked for a sacral dimple which she was given the all clear for and had a couple of extra visits from the midwife because she was a little but jaundiced after we were discharged but apparently thats common in babies born by ventouse for some reason.
She's an absolute dream and both me and my OH are in awe of her. The only problems we've had are a bit of oral thrush (easily cleared up), sore nipples because I have difficulty getting her to latch properly every time and getting her down to sleep on a night. She only wakes twice in the night, 4 hours apart which is amazing for a bf baby apparently but getting her to stay asleep when you put her into her moses basket is a nightmare lol. We're off to buy a Ewan the dream sheep tonight to see if that helps because I refuse to co sleep (it scares me too much).
She's also the absolute spitting image of her Dad which I'm a little bit jealous of lol
So our little girl was due on 13th October and surprise, surprise, I went overdue! At 41 weeks I was woken by strong, regular braxton hicks which carried on for about 2 hours but then disappeared when I gave up trying to sleep and got out of bed. Later that same day my midwife came and gave me a sweep. I was 50% effaced, 1cm dilated and my cervix was in mid position. Following my sweep I had no bleeding but on the night I lost the tiniest amount of plug in the world. We're talking about a 5p piece and I only noticed because I was looking. I resigned myself to the fact that despite a further sweep being booked for term + 10, I would be going in for my induction appointment at term + 12.
At term + 9 I woke up again at 4:30am with similar contractions to the other morning which carried on til I got up at 07:30. They were still coming but I told OH to go to work because I expected them to stop like they had the few days before. I time them for 30 minutes, they were coming every 3-4 minutes and lasting 30 seconds. It freaked me out because I thought they were supposed to start irregular and everyone said they felt like period pains (not even remotely). Still, I decided I wasn't in labour because everything I read said unless it caused my back to ache or hurt, it was just braxton hicks.
10 minutes afer my OH went out the door I went to the loo because my knickers felt a bit wet and I was bleeding, period style. A quick google search told me this wasn't normal so I rangd the pregnancy assessment unit who gave the impression they thought it was just me having my show but said to go in for piece of mind. Cue me ringing OH who had just arrived at work lol.
Once getting to PAU they checked my pad and agreed that level of bleeding was a concern
So I was strapped up to the CTG while we waited for the consultant to come and do a speculum and cervix examination. I noticed on my initial triage the midwife wrote my contractions were irregular (despite me telling her they were 3 minutes apart) which kind of annoyed me. She also told me there was no way I was in established labour because I 'didn't look like the women on the telly'. Firstly, I didn't say I was and secondly, as a nurse I'm fully aware you can't make an assessment like that simply by looking at someone!!So the CTG showed regular contractions. The consultant came and didn't even put the speculum in properly before taking it out. Turns out I was 3cm dilated, 100% effaced and had an anterior cervix. He informed us I had almost completed latent phase labour in a matter of hourse rather than 24-48 hours as is coomon and therefore I was havng an extreme show but nothing to worry about. He did say I could stop in but I chose to go home as it was only 11am and try codeine and paracetamol.
Codeine and paracetamol were rubbish lol. So was a bath, and my birthing ball. I literally sat on it, bounced twice and had to get up again. Isimply couldn't bear to have my bump touched or squashed. I drank lots of water but couldn't eat because it made me vomit.
At about 18:00hrs I suddenly got 'migrane vision' without the headache so ended up back at PAU where they found protein in my urine and my BP was sloowly creeping up but the doctor wasn't concerned. The same midwife from the morning said she wouldn't check me again because from looking at me she didn't think I had really progressed?! I told her I felt I was reaching the peak of my pain threshold but she just told me I should go home even if it was just an hour
I got home, ran the bath, got in, had a contraction and told OH to ring them back and tell them I was going in regardless lol. Fortunately when I got there the night shift had just started so I saw a different midwife. She watched me and felt my tummy as I had a contraction and went 'was that a small one?' prompting me to wonder if I had progressed at all since the morning, but when she checked me I was 6cm!! She admitted she didn't think I would be that far and I admitted I may have punced her if she'd said 3cm lol. So off we went to labour ward.
I got given the gas and air and strapped back up to the CTG because LO's heart rate was around 180bpm. She gave me the gas and air then said she'd be back in a bit. I was sucking on the gas and air whilst listening to baby's heart rate but the gas and air made me go quite deaf and I started freaking out to my OH saying I'd killed her even though he could still hear it beating away lol. After 4 hours they checked me again and I'd only progressed to 7cm (they like at least 2cm every 4 hours) so they broke my waters and at this point I asked for diamorphine too which just made me quite sleepy. There was quite a bit of meconium in my waters so she rang the registrar on call who gave me time limits in which to progress lol. Once my waters were broken I actually progressed quite quickly but then got stuck at 9cm. They strapped the monitor back on (which stayed on until I'd given delivered now) and manually 'helped' me to 10 cm - ouch!!!!!
Since having the diamorphine my contractions became more spaced out again but still as painful. Due to a combination of this, her high heart rate and the meconium, the registrar told my midwife I could have an hour to try and push baby out or they would have to talk about intervention
The diamorphine really knocked me for six (I'd been awake for over 24 hours at this point without any food) so I slept between contractions, with my legs in stirrups and the midwife staring at my foof When I had a contraction I would wake up, hallucinate (nothing like telling your OH to get rid of the skateboarders because it was really inappropriate), push and then fall back to sleep. What a lovely image!!After an hour I still hadn't managed to push her out so the registrar, 2 paeditricians and the head midwife person turned up. I remember initially thinking the room was massive but all these people barely fit in. The reg said I could do 3 pushes with ventouse, then 3 pushes with forceps and if they didn't work they would need to take me for section. This was the first point where it occured to me maybe things were a bit more serious than they had been letting on.
They had to give me an episiotomy but I honestly did not care at this point. In fact, I wonder if the injection helped because I didn't experience any 'ring of fire'. On push number 2 with ventouse I managed to get her head out
I then saw the look on my midwife's face and the 'eye contact' she made with the registrar. For a grand total of about 10 seconds I thought she was going to get stuck (my biggest fear). Fortunately on the next push we managed to get the rest of her out and despite everything her Apgar score was a 9!! Delivered at term + 10 07:04am weighing a whopping 8lb 11 (first baby!!).She had to be checked for a sacral dimple which she was given the all clear for and had a couple of extra visits from the midwife because she was a little but jaundiced after we were discharged but apparently thats common in babies born by ventouse for some reason.
She's an absolute dream and both me and my OH are in awe of her. The only problems we've had are a bit of oral thrush (easily cleared up), sore nipples because I have difficulty getting her to latch properly every time and getting her down to sleep on a night. She only wakes twice in the night, 4 hours apart which is amazing for a bf baby apparently but getting her to stay asleep when you put her into her moses basket is a nightmare lol. We're off to buy a Ewan the dream sheep tonight to see if that helps because I refuse to co sleep (it scares me too much).
She's also the absolute spitting image of her Dad which I'm a little bit jealous of lol
glad everything went ok for you and the vontouse worked without extra intervention x
