Yes, I had a baby

right after giving birth

Hello Everyone!!  So as you’ve noticed, I’ve been absent for a little while.  I do have a good excuse, I promise!!!  Brace yourselves (because it’s not like you saw this coming or anything…)… I had a baby!!!!!!!!!!!

Monday, 8 August, I was trying to get some last minute things done (vacuuming, making some meals for Hannah to put in the freezer, etc.), when my water broke.  Now I’m not talking about just a little trickle.  No sir, this was like a flood.  I was standing there peeling an apple, and WHOOSH!!  Niagra Falls in my pants.  Without all the boats.

I ran to the bathroom, stripped my pants off and sat on the toilet.  It kept coming and coming.  Sigh.  My phone was in the kitchen.  Aaron had just taken Hannah to the park.  I grabbed a pad, held it to my nether regions and made a run for it, hoping and praying that none of the neighbours happened to be looking in the direction of my open window as I dashed around the house half-naked and leaking.

Back to the toilet.  I called Aaron.  No answer.  Crap.  I called again.  No answer.  Crap.  I called Grandma’s house.  She wasn’t home.  Crap.  I called her phone (that she wore around her neck vigilantly whilst awaiting this very call).  She was on the bus, but she answered.  She hopped off that bus, ran as fast as an 81-year old with a pinched nerve, arthritis, and shopping trolley full of stuff can, and got a cab straight here.

I finally got a hold of Aaron in the mean time and he came home too.  I still sat on the toilet, the liquid contents of my uterus leaking out.

The hospital wanted me to come in for a check.  Make sure no meconium (first baby poop) was in the fluid.  There wasn’t any, but they made me stay overnight anyway.  Baby Boy’s head had moved back up, and since my waters broke, the cord could prolapse.  I wasn’t even in labour by the way.  Just leaking and wearing 2 giant maternity pads in my underwear.  They were going to induce me in the morning, so I just had to go to the antenatal ward and sleep until then.

I woke at 12am to pee.  I went back to bed and started getting contractions.  I put my TENS machine on and went back to sleep.  Well, between contractions anyway.  I did manage to get some sleep on and off until 4, when I could no longer sit or lie in bed.  Contractions suck way more when laying or sitting.  I needed to walk.  Everyone else was asleep.  This was, after all, the antenatal ward.  No one else was actually in the process of having a baby.

I paced the halls, one hand on my sore belly (for some reason, the contractions were really painful on the bottom of my stomach, not my back as you’d expect in a posterior labour), the other holding my TENS machine for dear life, cranking it up during each contraction.  The staff asked me how I was doing, and were pleased when I told them I was in labour.  No induction needed, thank you.  I painfully paced the dark empty halls by myself for an entire hour, updating my facebook status between contractions (there was nothing else to do, and I had my phone with me).

At 5 I asked if I could call Aaron, the pain was getting quite severe and I wanted him there for moral support.  They said he could come at 6, but not before because everyone else was asleep.  Antenatal ward remember.  These ladies needed their sleep.  They tried to get me a delivery suite to pace around in instead (and so my husband could come), but none were free.  So I paced some more.

By 5:30, they felt sorry enough for me that they called one of the midwives and told me she’d be up soon so I wouldn’t be alone.

The midwife came up and decided to check me out.  There was now 1 delivery suite available and they wanted to keep it free for someone who may come in and urgently need it.

Ring ring.  Aaron wanted to know if he had time to stop and get some breakfast.  “Sure.” I told him.

The midwife manually checked my progress “call him back, no time for breakfast, you’re 8cms dilated.”

Oh my gosh!  I wasn’t expecting that!  We went straight down to delivery, shocking all the staff.  No one thought I was that far along. I hide it well.

I paced around my delivery suite for a little bit, Aaron arrived, then it was time to push.  I got on the bed with an exercise ball, leaned my torso over it, put my knees on the bed and waited for the next contraction.

Oh.  My.  Gosh.  Pushing is hard!  I Probably should have done my pelvic floor exercises after giving birth to Hannah.  I felt like my every ounce of effort was doing nothing.

I pressed on.  It seemed like hours passed.  Finally the head started coming.  Oh.  My.  Gosh.  It felt like a giant red-hot knife was going to town on my nether region.  But there was no turning back, I had to keep going.  Finally the head was free.  One more push and out came Baby Boy, 22 minutes after I started pushing, 7 hours after my first contraction and only 3 hours after established labour.

They passed him to me between my legs as I grabbed him and turned around to lie on the bed for a cuddle.  We named him Daniel.  Our precious little Daniel, 7lb, 3oz (3.2kg), 50cm long.

They stitched me up and then I had a shower. I was covered in blood and poo.  Yeah poo.  Daniel did a poo as he came out and until then I hadn’t noticed it was actually all over me.  Ew.

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