From Swiss Ball to Forceps...

Friday 3rd June. 10pm. Husband and I were trying to blow up a swiss ball because quite frankly I was getting impatient and wanted to meet our little miracle, (even though his due date was not for another 4 days).

We seem to manage to get the valve stuck in the hole in the ball. Husband tried to pull it out with no success, so I had a go......It wouldn’t budge but what did happen was the start of a truly amazing adventure.....MY WATERS BROKE!

Fortunately, we have a tiled floor in the kitchen as I found myself standing in a rather large puddle. My midwife had reassured me only that morning that I needn’t worry about a ‘gush’ because that only happens on TV. There were no cameras on me at the time, thankfully, but I can tell you it’s not just on TV that there is a ‘gush’.

So now what do we do? Aah yes.... we clear up the mess and then go and make up the spare bed for my Dad to sleep in should we need to dash off and leave child number 1 and child number 2 asleep in their beds.

Spare bed made up, parents informed of water based incident and we settled down to watch Corrie. (Well I couldn’t just go to bed, I was too excited).

At about midnight, Husband suggested we head to bed as ‘we’ have a long day ahead of us. Yes he did actually say ‘WE’!

Couldn’t sleep. Too fat/too excited.

Got up at 2am and decided to lie down on the sofa downstairs.

3am – OMG! Contractions!! Realised pain threshold now very low. Thought about waking sleeping Husband but decided to hang on and manage contractions on my own.

5am – Right 2 hours on my own is long enough! Woke up sleeping beauty. Got the TENS machine on and Husband got his notebook out! His meticulous attention to detail when documenting every contraction to it’s severity and frequency was first class!

Managed to get to 9am and off we went to be assessed at the Birth Centre. We were told YES I was in labour. I KNOW I BLOODY AM BECAUSE IT HURTS! (was my answer in my head).  I was expecting the report on how dilated I was to be a big fat 8 but no, the midwife very calmly told me I was 3cm dilated. I was gutted. She tried to cheer me up by telling me 3 was good but I wanted an 8.

We were sent to hospital - heart condition/older mum – so we said our goodbyes and walked to the car. Just as I reached the car I was overcome with another contraction. Bent double and moaning for all I was worth Husband put his arm around me and suggested he got the mints out of the boot of the car! MINTS! MINTS! I dealt with that suggestion in the only way a heavily pregnant, hormonal, in labour woman could. He retreated to the safety of the other side of the car and jumped in the drivers seat!

At hospital – NO ROOM FOR ME! We were told to go to the waiting room. I was very pleased there was no one else in there as I flopped from one chair to another, over a table, on the floor on all fours and made noises I have never heard the like of before. I also turned the air blue quite a lot.

We were eventually collected and deposited into a lovely room with a lovely gas and air machine. I have a heart condition and was due to have an epidural straight away and due to me being a complete wimp that epidural couldn’t come quick enough.

I was examined again. This time I was 7cm dilated. More sitting around and waiting with lots of gas and air. I sent Husband out for a coffee, not for me, for him. He’d been pacing about and nothing seemed to be happening so off he went.

On his return nothing had changed except I was now nearly 10cm and still no sign of the bloody epidural. There was a moment of hope when the lady performing epidurals came in. Oh it was a joy to see her but how that joy quickly turned into despair.... she had only popped in to snaffle MY epidural equipment that had been waiting to be used ON ME! Nooooooo was my cry but it fell on deaf ears.

A short time later she returned with a whole team of people and set to work on me. Apart from hitting a nerve in my back which made my leg shoot up in the air all by itself, the procedure went without a hitch. I was pain free.

The only problem now was I was confined to the bed. It wasn’t long before my midwife told me I could start pushing. Husband confidently announced, ‘It’ll be all over by 6pm’.

6pm came and went. It became clear our little miracle had got stuck. The birth plan was hastily thrown out of the window, Husband was given a rather fetching pair of scrubs to wear and I was whisked into theatre for the dreaded forceps.

The team of professionals in that room were brilliant. I reduced them all to tears with my miracle baby story while they prepared everything at the business end.

Then they whisked the bedclothes off my legs and it was the strangest experience I have ever felt. ‘Whose legs are those?’, I asked. They didn’t feel like mine and I think I’d overdosed on the purge button on the gas and air machine and wasn’t thinking quite straight. Again, I expressed my concern regarding someone else’s legs being on my bed and so a blanket was placed across them and I became oblivious to them once more.

Contraction after contraction I pushed and the doctor pulled and eventually I was told on the next contraction our little miracle would be delivered into the world. We all waited with huge excitement....... NO MORE CONTRACTIONS! Baby’s heart rate dropped, I went into panic and the doctor decided contraction or no contraction baby was coming out. So with one final push, at 7.32pm on 4th June, we were blessed with our beautiful baby boy.

He was handed to me but I sensed something was wrong. ‘Why isn’t he making a noise?’ I asked. As quickly as I had asked the question he was taken off me and placed into the arms of a doctor who worked on him and brought him round.Tthose first 5 minutes were the longest of my life! That first noise I heard was amazing and emotional.

He was handed back to us and there he was, our tiny little miracle, all wrapped up with a little blue hat on. We cried, he cried!

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