Thank you in advance for reading my birth story! I know I will go on and on, but it was such an amazing experience I wanted to share it!
Well, my
bump was due on 28th August, but as my son was two weeks late I had it in my head bubs number two would be late too... although as the date approached, and I waddled around I kind of wished it would make an appearance! I was torn between wanting to meet it, and it hanging on in there for a few days so that it was going to be a september baby - not so it was the oldest in the school year, but because for some reason I decided I would prefer two school years between by babies!?! 
Anyway, due date passed, as did another week when I was given a sweep by my midwife and found to by 3cm dilated! I was quite pleased with this as with my son I have had to be induced and wished to do it myself this time round! So I kept on the move (which is easy to do with a 21 month old!!!) but nothing happened...
Anyway, by the Tuesday (41+3) I felt grotty, so I popped to see my midwife and she gave me a second sweep - 4 cms so things were making progress, all be it slowly! Anyway, it must have stirred things up as by the Tuesday evening I was getting regular painful contractions, about 4-5 mins apart, I put on my tens machine and at midnight we packed up the car, took my little boy to my parents and made our way to the delivery suite! Only to find when I got there that my contractions died down and I was still 4cms! I stayed until lunchtime, but then came home as I was making no progress. I was booked in for induction the following evening so I knew it wouldn't be too long until I met my babe but wanted to avoid induction if possible! I was told to go back if my contractions became more regular, my waters broke or I couldn't cope with the pain.
I had a lovely afternoon with my son, went for a nice walk and they started to pick back up again after tea, although still not too close together. Then I decided I would have a bath which treally kick started things - really painful but still not regular!
What to do...? Anyway, by 11pm, I couldn't cope with the pain so back to the hospital we went! The midwife was lovely, but said they'd monitor me but I'd be going home unless things changed. She decided to do an internal at about half 12, where she accidently (!) broke my waters! 
at least then I knew the next time I would be going home I would have my baby with me! After that, my contractions became really intense and much more frequent! After about an hour and a half on gas and air (amusing my husband with drunken type ramblings...) I got the urge to push! I kept thinking that was impossible - my labout with my son had been about 18 hours so there was no way it could happen so quickly... But no, it was there and I turned to see the midwife putting on her apron... It was happening!
After about another 20 minutes of proper pushing and an epsiotomy to help her out, my beautiful daughter entered the world! It was an amazing experience and I couldn't believe how different my labour had been to when I had my son who was forceps delivery.
Then it was a bit of a blur as the cord had snapped and my placenta needed to be manually removed so there were about 10 people in the room, I had drips put in and I had quite a bit of blood loss, but luckily everything was fine in the end! Just a bit of drama to keep me on my toes!
So, my perfect daughter, Martha Sophia, was born at 2.37am on 9th September weighing in at a whopping 10lbs 5ozs, 56 cms long and with a head of black hair! She is just perfect and I am quite proud I managed to give birth with just gas and air!
Thanks again for reading my story!
