kate.m.
Mummy to Travis
- Joined
- Oct 28, 2008
- Messages
- 1,181
- Reaction score
- 0
I realise this should prob go in the birth announcements section, please feel free to move it there if needed, but i thought id post in here as this is where i spend all my time & i wanted to tell all you natural mammas that i know from here! 
Was thinking i could maybe get away with it as he is going to be a cloth bottomed baby (once meconium has gone- dont wanna spoil the pretty nappies!!) and once i get him in them, i will add photos!!
Anyway, this is Travis, he arrived on Sat 26th at 8:27 am. Will write up the birth story when i get a min, but heres the short version:
Planned homebirth. got to 8cm before calling midwife out! Started pushing, had to break hindwaters, found meconium. Had to transfer. Tried more pushing at hospital, Travis was originally posterior, my contractions managed to turn him half way, but he was trying to come out facing my leg! Whipped into theatre for spinal block & forceps delivery, and out came my beautiful baby boy 7lb 2oz, apgar score of 9!
Ok, heres the full story! Started having contractions on thursday, 1 minute long, 10 minutes apart but they just felt like mild period cramps. We decided to do the weekly shop around morrisons, stopping every 10 minutes & staring at the shelves whilst i breathed through the contractions!! Id had a show on wednesday, thurs and fri. By 5pm on the friday, contractions were every 5 minutes and starting to get harder to ignore. I distracted myself with running a bath: unfortunately our boiler was broken, so i had to fill up to the desired level with cold water and then keep boiling the kettle to warm it up: it took me 2 hours to fill that bath! But it worked out really well, because it really distracted me & gave me something to do instead of focusing on the contractions. The bath was lovely: i put the jets on & they massaged my tummy & back, it was great!
DH got home at 6ish. I decided to make tea, it was only a salad, but i found it really difficult to focus on following the recipe! I still didnt think it was proper labour, i was convinced i was in really slow labour & would be for days. Eventually DH came over & took over preparing the salad! lol! I couldnt even manage to chop up cheese! Had tea. DH tells me we decided to take the dog for a walk, but i dont remember that at all!! We decided to try and get some sleep at about 12:30am, as we thought things might be getting serious. Sods law, 15 minutes after we got into bed, my waters went! It was only a tiny leak, but i knew that was what it was. So we went downstairs and put the plastic sheeting down & the duvet on top of that. I was kneeling on the floor, leaning on the sofa. The contractions started getting worse. The waters kept gushing out with each contraction. I remember laughing inbetween each one and saying "omg- im leaking everywhere, its like ive wet myself!" I phoned the hospital at 1am to tell them my waters had gone. They asked if i was coping ok, i said i was, so they said to ring back when the pains got worse. By 2am the pains had got worse, but i was still coping. I wanted a midwife to come out anyway, so i phoned up again. I faked the contractions a little bit on the phone, to make it sound worse than it was, so that she wouldnt put me off again! she said theyd send someone out.
The midwife arrived at 3am & asked if i wanted her to check how far gone i was. i didnt know whetger to leave it a bit or not: if she'd have said i was at 2cm i would have hurt somebody!!! but i was curious, so asked her to check. turns out i was already at 8cms! im so proud that i managed to get to 8cms with no pain relief (or midwives! lol!), especially as he was posterior. i carried on for a couple of hours, she told me to try contractions kneeling up as they were more productive than when i lay down- but i was so knackered i just wanted to lie on my back (they hurt less then too). with each contraction, i would kneel up and rest my top half on DH's lap: i grabbed his t shirt in both hands and twisted, whilst making very loud moaning noises. DH was a saint and kept me cool by rubbing my back with damp flannels that he hadkept in the fridge: it was boiling hot and this was soooo nice! i wasnt getting very strong pushing urges, so the MW wanted to check what was going on inside! when she examined me, she found that the forewaters were still intact, so asked me if she could vreak them (yes). when she broke them they found very slight meconium. she explained that hosp policy is to transfer with meconium, but as it was only slight, and i was so close to pushing, did i want to try and finish at home. me and DH decided that it would be best to transfer.
they phoned the ambulance at 6am & i started getting dressed whilst dh grabbed all the bags. the ambulance got here so quickly: id literally only just had time to put my knickers on & when they knocked on the door i wondered who it was! got into the ambulance with the MW, dh followed in his car. had 2 strong contractions in the ambulance, which i moaned through. it took less than 5 mins to get to hosp, they wheeled me out to a delivery room on a stretcher. they got me to push for an hour, but nothing was happening. the MW checked
7 said that my contractions had been trying to turn baby from posterior to anterior, and had got half way! baby was therefore trying to come out looking at my leg, she asaid that he wouldnt be able to get out in that posiyion and called the doc in. he explained that he needed to turn the baby and pull him out- this really scared me! it sounded so painful and id already had enough, i was exhausted from all the unproductive pushing. but then the doc said "to be able to do this, i need you to be completely numb"... it was music to my ears! i know that i wanted a really natural homebirth, but id already been thinking about asking for an epidural by this point (id decided not to bother asking as i knew i was way too far gone to get 1), i was so glad to be told that id have to have this!
they wheeled me into theatre and DH went to get changed into scrubs. the anaesthetist wasnt a people person- he was very "short" with his staff. it was horrible having strong pushing contractions and not being able to push - i just wanted them to stop faffing about and make me numb already! i barely noticed the needle at all, in fact when it did go in i just thought "good, its gonna b over in a sec!" i was numb from just under the boobs, down. they put my feet in stirrups& dh came in and sat next to me. he later said it was horrible having to wait outside the room not knowing what was going on, and found it really weird to see me just lying there smiling at him after seeing the state he'd last seen me in before theatre! i have no idea how much time it took for the doc to do his thing down there, and i couldnt tell/feel what he was doing, but eventually he said we needed to start pushing. which i found crazy, as i had no feeling in my body what-so-ever! but a nurse put his hand on my tummy to feel for the next contraction, and when it happened 2 nurses pushed my body up sort of into a ball and i did my best to push. i couldnt feel any stretching etc, but i did feel a very strange sensation when he came out. i cant really describe it, but i knew he'd just been born!
At 8:27am on the saturday morning, the doc placed travis onto my chest: i couldnt believe id just produced an actual perfectly formed baby! he seemed so long: so big! i wondered how on earth he'd fitted inside! he weighed 7lb 2.5oz, they later told me his apgar score was 9: not bad for such a stressful delivery! it seemed to take ages for them to stitch me up, and it was weird seeing the doc push my tummy to expel the placenta when i couldnt feel anything! it seemed like all the work had already been done& i was impatient to hold my baby again! Although daddy didnt get to seperate me and baby, he did sort of cut the cord: they'd left lots of it attached, and he snipped it shorter: he said it was like cutting squid with scissors! once he was all cleaned up, they brought him in wrapped in a blanket & wearing a little funny hat! We waited until we were out of theatre and in a recovery room to name him: we'd narrowed it down to either Travis or Xander. i wanted to have a good look at him without his hat on before we decided! its such a big responsibility!!! We decided to call him Travis!
x
Was thinking i could maybe get away with it as he is going to be a cloth bottomed baby (once meconium has gone- dont wanna spoil the pretty nappies!!) and once i get him in them, i will add photos!!Anyway, this is Travis, he arrived on Sat 26th at 8:27 am. Will write up the birth story when i get a min, but heres the short version:
Planned homebirth. got to 8cm before calling midwife out! Started pushing, had to break hindwaters, found meconium. Had to transfer. Tried more pushing at hospital, Travis was originally posterior, my contractions managed to turn him half way, but he was trying to come out facing my leg! Whipped into theatre for spinal block & forceps delivery, and out came my beautiful baby boy 7lb 2oz, apgar score of 9!
Ok, heres the full story! Started having contractions on thursday, 1 minute long, 10 minutes apart but they just felt like mild period cramps. We decided to do the weekly shop around morrisons, stopping every 10 minutes & staring at the shelves whilst i breathed through the contractions!! Id had a show on wednesday, thurs and fri. By 5pm on the friday, contractions were every 5 minutes and starting to get harder to ignore. I distracted myself with running a bath: unfortunately our boiler was broken, so i had to fill up to the desired level with cold water and then keep boiling the kettle to warm it up: it took me 2 hours to fill that bath! But it worked out really well, because it really distracted me & gave me something to do instead of focusing on the contractions. The bath was lovely: i put the jets on & they massaged my tummy & back, it was great!
DH got home at 6ish. I decided to make tea, it was only a salad, but i found it really difficult to focus on following the recipe! I still didnt think it was proper labour, i was convinced i was in really slow labour & would be for days. Eventually DH came over & took over preparing the salad! lol! I couldnt even manage to chop up cheese! Had tea. DH tells me we decided to take the dog for a walk, but i dont remember that at all!! We decided to try and get some sleep at about 12:30am, as we thought things might be getting serious. Sods law, 15 minutes after we got into bed, my waters went! It was only a tiny leak, but i knew that was what it was. So we went downstairs and put the plastic sheeting down & the duvet on top of that. I was kneeling on the floor, leaning on the sofa. The contractions started getting worse. The waters kept gushing out with each contraction. I remember laughing inbetween each one and saying "omg- im leaking everywhere, its like ive wet myself!" I phoned the hospital at 1am to tell them my waters had gone. They asked if i was coping ok, i said i was, so they said to ring back when the pains got worse. By 2am the pains had got worse, but i was still coping. I wanted a midwife to come out anyway, so i phoned up again. I faked the contractions a little bit on the phone, to make it sound worse than it was, so that she wouldnt put me off again! she said theyd send someone out.
The midwife arrived at 3am & asked if i wanted her to check how far gone i was. i didnt know whetger to leave it a bit or not: if she'd have said i was at 2cm i would have hurt somebody!!! but i was curious, so asked her to check. turns out i was already at 8cms! im so proud that i managed to get to 8cms with no pain relief (or midwives! lol!), especially as he was posterior. i carried on for a couple of hours, she told me to try contractions kneeling up as they were more productive than when i lay down- but i was so knackered i just wanted to lie on my back (they hurt less then too). with each contraction, i would kneel up and rest my top half on DH's lap: i grabbed his t shirt in both hands and twisted, whilst making very loud moaning noises. DH was a saint and kept me cool by rubbing my back with damp flannels that he hadkept in the fridge: it was boiling hot and this was soooo nice! i wasnt getting very strong pushing urges, so the MW wanted to check what was going on inside! when she examined me, she found that the forewaters were still intact, so asked me if she could vreak them (yes). when she broke them they found very slight meconium. she explained that hosp policy is to transfer with meconium, but as it was only slight, and i was so close to pushing, did i want to try and finish at home. me and DH decided that it would be best to transfer.
they phoned the ambulance at 6am & i started getting dressed whilst dh grabbed all the bags. the ambulance got here so quickly: id literally only just had time to put my knickers on & when they knocked on the door i wondered who it was! got into the ambulance with the MW, dh followed in his car. had 2 strong contractions in the ambulance, which i moaned through. it took less than 5 mins to get to hosp, they wheeled me out to a delivery room on a stretcher. they got me to push for an hour, but nothing was happening. the MW checked
7 said that my contractions had been trying to turn baby from posterior to anterior, and had got half way! baby was therefore trying to come out looking at my leg, she asaid that he wouldnt be able to get out in that posiyion and called the doc in. he explained that he needed to turn the baby and pull him out- this really scared me! it sounded so painful and id already had enough, i was exhausted from all the unproductive pushing. but then the doc said "to be able to do this, i need you to be completely numb"... it was music to my ears! i know that i wanted a really natural homebirth, but id already been thinking about asking for an epidural by this point (id decided not to bother asking as i knew i was way too far gone to get 1), i was so glad to be told that id have to have this!
they wheeled me into theatre and DH went to get changed into scrubs. the anaesthetist wasnt a people person- he was very "short" with his staff. it was horrible having strong pushing contractions and not being able to push - i just wanted them to stop faffing about and make me numb already! i barely noticed the needle at all, in fact when it did go in i just thought "good, its gonna b over in a sec!" i was numb from just under the boobs, down. they put my feet in stirrups& dh came in and sat next to me. he later said it was horrible having to wait outside the room not knowing what was going on, and found it really weird to see me just lying there smiling at him after seeing the state he'd last seen me in before theatre! i have no idea how much time it took for the doc to do his thing down there, and i couldnt tell/feel what he was doing, but eventually he said we needed to start pushing. which i found crazy, as i had no feeling in my body what-so-ever! but a nurse put his hand on my tummy to feel for the next contraction, and when it happened 2 nurses pushed my body up sort of into a ball and i did my best to push. i couldnt feel any stretching etc, but i did feel a very strange sensation when he came out. i cant really describe it, but i knew he'd just been born!
At 8:27am on the saturday morning, the doc placed travis onto my chest: i couldnt believe id just produced an actual perfectly formed baby! he seemed so long: so big! i wondered how on earth he'd fitted inside! he weighed 7lb 2.5oz, they later told me his apgar score was 9: not bad for such a stressful delivery! it seemed to take ages for them to stitch me up, and it was weird seeing the doc push my tummy to expel the placenta when i couldnt feel anything! it seemed like all the work had already been done& i was impatient to hold my baby again! Although daddy didnt get to seperate me and baby, he did sort of cut the cord: they'd left lots of it attached, and he snipped it shorter: he said it was like cutting squid with scissors! once he was all cleaned up, they brought him in wrapped in a blanket & wearing a little funny hat! We waited until we were out of theatre and in a recovery room to name him: we'd narrowed it down to either Travis or Xander. i wanted to have a good look at him without his hat on before we decided! its such a big responsibility!!! We decided to call him Travis!
x
