Angus was due on Friday May 29th 2003. After that day came and went, mum came to stay for the weekend just in case.
At 12:30am Sunday morning I woke up to mild contractions, got up to go to the loo waking Trevor in the process. When I came back to bed we talked for a while and I went back to sleep. I woke again at 7 with stronger contractions about 7 mins apart. Trevor attached TENS for me and made me a cup of tea. We stayed in bed until Mum got up at 8. I was having reasonably strong contractions lasting for 30 seconds about 5 mins apart. At 10am I walked up to the shop to get the paper. When I came home I had a shower and the contractions stopped.
I woke up at 2:30am Tuesday morning to the same kind of contractions. I woke up Trevor and asked him to attach TENS as they were quite sharp but still only 30 seconds and 7 mins apart. I told him to go into work when he had to get up at 4am. Trevor’s mum was coming over anyway. She got to our place at 9am then 5 mins later Trevor came home as his workmates had told him to. I rang the hospital for a chat at lunchtime. The Midwife I spoke to didn’t want me to ring back until I’d had a show, waters break or been to the toilet. None of this had happened yet.
Come 4pm, Trevor was beginning to get impatient so we went for a walk around the block to try and speed things up. We came back and had dinner, and settled in front of the TV. At 9:30 I decided to go to bed, as I was pretty tired. Mother in law said I’m not in enough pain, she wanted to see me in more than I was having!
I went to sleep and I woke up at 10:20pm (not even 1 hour later) like I had been stabbed in the belly. I writhed through 3 contractions before I woke up Trev and said lets go now. He called hospital while I got dressed. Mother in law hadn’t gone to bed yet so I said to her as I cried between contractions “Is this how you wanted to see it”(By the way this was all light hearted).
I had contractions one after another in the car on the way into hospital. I could barely walk up the steps. The TENS machine had broken and was doing nothing for me. The Midwife on duty took me straight to the birthing suite and I had to be monitored while I sucked on the gas. It was excruciating being on my back on the bed. I said I wanted to be in the bath as I was with Mason’s birth so she filled the tub while the monitoring went on for 20mins.
Trev helped me into the bath and I had very strong contractions. I was sucking on the gas like mad and I felt really out of it. I noticed blood in the water. The show had come away while I was in the bath. Then the waters broke. The Midwife said I had to get out of the bath but I couldn’t. Then I had a huge urge to push as Angus moved down. The Midwife told Trevor to help me stand up. I didn’t want to, as all I could think of was the baby hitting the floor.
The birth of Angus
The Midwife phoned OB to come in. They walked me to the bed and I crawled up on all fours. They propped me up on pillows and I sucked on the gas as Midwife examined me she said “Oh my God we’ve got heaps of hair”. I had to push but tried to hold it, as I didn’t want to tear. Angus was crowning as OB came in and one push later his head was out but the cord was around his neck so he quickly unwrapped it. Then another and he was all out. Angus was born at 12:42am Wednesday June 2003, 5 days overdue.
I moved over so I could look at him and he was lying there very still. I was worried he wasn’t breathing but he was just being quiet! The OB and the Midwife were talking and poking at the cord. There was a knot in the cord and the reason it didn’t cause a problem was due to the cord being very long. Trev cut the cord and the Midwife checked him and then she brought him back for a cuddle.
The placenta hadn’t come away yet. They had given me the injection and after 10mins the OB decided I was bleeding too much so he’d try to pull it out. He told me to have half a dozen good sucks on the gas and then he tried to pull it out. It wouldn’t come out. After trying to pull and massage my tummy for what seemed like ages, my blood pressure went way up and that combined with the blood loss they decided to take me into theatre.
I woke up after theatre and they wheeled me back to my room where Trevor and Angus were waiting for me. Trevor had given Angus his first bath while I was in theatre and his hair was all fluffy. It tickled my nose. I gave Angus his first breastfeed at 3am and he latched right on.
I can’t help but think if I had waited for the show or the waters to break to go into the hospital like I was told by a Midwife earlier in the day I might have had him in the car as that time elapsed was around 20mins.
If you would like to submit your birth story for inclusion, simply send us an email – we’d love to hear from you!
