I love a good birth story. When I was pregnant I devoured them. I would be reading tales of induction and ventouse and epidurals with One Born Every Minute on in the background, occasionally breaking from my reading to frown and feel queasy at the crowning going on.
My family and friends thought I was mad. 'Why are you doing it to yourself?!' I was terrified of giving birth. Terrified and curious. When I first found out I was pregnant, my honest first thought was 'oh my god. I am going to have to give birth.'
At ten days overdue, I was getting frustrated, and annoyed. And annoyING no doubt. I ached. I was tired. I couldn't look another Rennie in the eye. My feet were swollen, so for the past two weeks I had been wearing Austin's shoes. Turning over in bed required military precision planning and most of all - I was bursting with excitement to meet my baby boy. So at 3 AM on the 10th of October 2013, I woke up for my four hundredth wee of the night. Sighing at the effort it was going to require to get out of bed, walk down the stairs (we had a downstairs bathroom.) I heaved myself up off the bed, and felt a trickle run down my legs. I thought nothing of it, (once that dark cross appears you will never be able to rely on your bladder again,) and went about my business. An hour later, I needed the toilet again. This time I stood up and felt more of a gush. Okay, so I definitely hadn't wet myself, something was occurring. I got back in bed, and lay there, as I felt my tummy tighten up and release, not hurting at first. I I turned my stopwatch on my phone on and timed them, they were very irregular so I thought it was either I false alarm, or very slow labour. I turned over and tried to go to sleep.
Oh sleep, how you have eluded me from this very point. Safe to say, I could not sleep. The pain was getting worse, and beginning to feel like period pains, lasting for about ten seconds at a time. This was at about 5 AM, and I debated waking up Austin. What if it was just a false alarm? 'Austin...Austin...AUSTIN... (he's a deep sleeper) I think something is happening.' That woke him up. As the pain gradually increased, I thought I should get a move on. I rung the birth centre where I was planning my water birth and told them I thought I was in labour, they told me to come in to get checked, but I would probably get sent home at this early stage. I got in the shower, and hunched over wincing as each wave of pain came over me. Must...condition...hair...must...exfoliate...elbows...
I rung my dad, who was our designated taxi driver, and rung my mum at work. But warned them both to not get excited, it was probably a false alarm. I remember my dad coming to pick us up, and he brought his present for the baby, a mobile for the cot. In my pained and emotional state I almost cried. He is a man of few words my dad, but he looked like he was about to burst with excitement.
The pain hotted up in the drive to the hospital, and I was breathing heavily as my dad and Austin chatted about football and the weather, and aware of Austin worriedly watching me as I closed my eyes and leant my head back. When we were shown to a room in the birth centre and the midwife came to check me, the first thing she said was 'look at those feet! Has somebody been keeping an eye on them pet? Any headaches? Lets check your blood pressure.' She suspected pre-eclampsia, and if I did have it, it was extremely dangerous as I was so overdue. She checked to see if my waters had gone, and confirmed my back waters had gone, which is why I hadn't felt that famous 'gush.' 'I may aswell give you another sweep while I'm down here pet!' Oh god. I stared at the ceiling and held my breath as I tried not to cry. There are no words to describe what it feels like to have another woman's fingers 'sweeping' your cervix. She frowned at the monitor as my blood pressure was checked, it was very high. 'Looks like you won't be going home pet. I will have to send you to the ward for monitoring.' Turns out being 'monitored' is having some bands strapped to you, while you sit in the worlds uncomfiest chair behind a curtain, I felt like the man behind the curtain from the Wizard of Oz, except he probably wasn't half naked in a 2x2 room, with three people excitedly watch the screen as it monitors your contractions. After about an hour of this, the pain was really beginning to increase. A lovely midwife on ward (the only 'lovely' midwife I encountered unfortunately) came in to offer me some pain relief. Anticipating a long road ahead, I opted for some cocodamol, wanting to pace myself. After being monitored for almost two hours, and coming to the conclusion that I did not have pre eclampsia, just Shrek's feet, I was put into another room, while I waited for a bed on the antenatal ward. As Austin, my mum and my dad snacked on ham sandwiches and ready salted crisps from the over priced hospital shop, I began to feel like I was losing control. I walked in circles around the room, with Austin following me and rubbing my back, and letting me lean against him when I needed to. At this point the pain was at a level which made me want to sob. It felt like it would never end, and when a doctor came in to tell me I was only 2-3 centimetres dilated, I think I did, especially when she informed me they expect first time mothers to dilate a centimetre an hour. At some point, my mum made my dad leave. It was getting to the point where I couldn't formulate a sentence, and I began to want to be left alone.
After another couple of hours in this room, I was taken to ANOTHER room, this time on the antenatal ward, where I did most of my labouring. The other women on the ward were there for monitoring, or appointments, and I was the only one in labour. Aware of this, I was trying my best to stay quiet. I rocked on a birthing ball and got on the bed on my hands and knees, walked around my bed, anything buy lie down. Lying down felt like the most unnatural position. I began to get snappy with my mum and Austin at this point, my mum's favourite memory of this day (apart from the birth obviously) was when a midwife came to ask me if I wanted shepherds pie or lasagne for dinner. "Neither thank you, I have some breakfast bars in my bag.' I replied, polite as polite can be. When she left, Austin said 'Do you want me to get you a breakfast bar then babe?' to which I replied 'NO I DO NOT WANT A BREAKFAST BAR. DO I LOOK LIKE I WANT A BREAKFAST BAR?' I began to feel like I needed the toilet, if you know what I mean. I would go to the toilet on the ward, repeatedly, just to find I didn't actually need the toilet. At the time I thought I did, but what I was actually doing was pushing. I burst into tears. 'I can't do it. Mum I really can't do it. Please give me something. Go and find a midwife and tell her I want diamorphine, I can't do it.' As the midwife went off to fetch me the diamorphine, another midwife came and told me a delivery suite was available. "Do you want a wheelchair or do you think you can walk? It isn't a long walk.' If somebody had checked me at this point, they would have found that I was fully dilated and pushing. I replied that I'd walk. My mum and Austin looked at me horrified. It soon became apparent that I should have accepted the wheelchair. After a few steps I fell against the wall, crying through a contraction. As it passed I carried on walking, and again, fell against the wall and sobbed. I was aware of patients and visitors staring at me as they went past, I remember an old man asking me if I was okay. No not really old man, but thank you for asking. About five feet from the delivery suite, I screamed and fell into Austin and clung from his neck. He was also holding all of my labour bags, so this was quite a lot of weight to bear! "Okay we need to get her onto bed." The midwife said. As she opened the door I ran past her (as fast as I could...) and into the bathroom and locked the door. I was pushing. I don't know what possessed me to do this. It honestly feels so much like you are going to poo, and you don't want to do that in front of your mum, boyfriend and a stranger do you?! That is the only way I can describe it. 'Georgia! Open this door right now! OPEN IT!' My mum and Austin hammered on the door as I cried on the bathroom floor. I could hear my mum telling the midwife I had locked myself in, and her trying to open the lock. I reached up and opened it myself, my mum and the midwife picked me up and dragged me onto the bed. As the midwife checked me, she said 'She's fully. She's ready to push!' I didn't believe her, and I remember my mum telling Austin to pull himself together as his face clouded with panic. With Austin and my mum holding a leg each and my mum pushing my chin into my chest, I began to push. 'You might feel a bit of a burning stretching pain here now love but it will only last a second!' This was the part I had dreaded the most - you hear so much about the pain of crowning don't you? But I don't know if I was so eager to get this over with or just to meet my baby, but I honestly don't remember it being that bad. When he was part out, the midwife told me to stop pushing him and pant him out, to allow you to stretch gradually and hopefully avoid any tears. Unfortunately she may aswell have asked me to drop to the floor and give her 50, because stopping pushing was not something I was capable of doing at this point. I paid for it later though with two hours of being stitched up. I ended up pushing Freddie out with about four pushes. I heard my mum say 'Georgia you did it!' I looked at Austin and he was crying as he kissed me and said 'George you did it he's here!' I looked down and saw my tiny baby, purple and slimy. 'I love him! I love him so much' I shouted. There were a lot of tears. I have a lump in my throat as I write this - it was such an amazing moment. I will never forget the look of happiness and wonder on Austin's face, and the look of pride in my mums. After the midwife wrapped Freddie up and handed him to me, I looked at his tiny face and kissed him. I would do it again a million times over for him. Those few minutes at 5:33 PM on the 10th of October 2013 were the best of my life, and indescribably magic.
Austin walked slowly around the room holding Freddie while I was stitched up, which took almost two hours - ignoring the midwife's advice to pant him out had earnt me a second degree tear, with internal muscle lacerations and an external graze. (GRAZE. What an insult.) I remember being desperate to hold him, but I was clinging on to the gas and air, which was the only time I had touched it, while I was stitched up. Again, I don't remember this being so bad, I think the worst part was the 15 little pin pricks of the local anaesthetic onto very, tender, sore and bruised parts. The sensation of the tug of the thread is something that will never leave me, and that one time she stitched somewhere she had forgotten to numb...
So there is my birth story.
I never did get that diamorphine.
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