The Birth Story of Bailey James, born 5.23am 15th March 2010


DH had woken up to settle DD, and I was about to get up for a toilet when I noticed a damp feeling, so I hot footed it to the bathroom in time for a gush to hit the bath mat! Looked at the clock and it was 1.19am – my waters had broken at pretty much the same time as they did with DD! Uncanny!

Due to being GBS+, I knew the hospital would want me to head in, but as discussed with my mw, we didn’t rush. DH tried to re-settle DD, but she knew something was up, and refused to go back to bed. About 45mins later, we called the hospital to say we would be coming in, and then wasted some more time getting everything together and getting DD organised. and dropped her off at mum and dad’s on the way to FMC.

Met the labour ward midwife in the birth and assessment centre – because I wasn’t contracting, decided not to ring in my midwife. Was given a normal labour room as the birth centres were full, and the mw organised for me to be hooked up to a cannula for 4hourly antibiotics. By this time it was 5am, so she organised a bed for Dan and told us to settle in for sleep.

My primary mw was off, so the backup mw came in and we dicussed what the plan was – I was told that we could have till Monday am and then we would discuss whether we induce or not – I was pretty happy with this as it gave me a good 30hours from when my waters broke so I was optimistic by Sunday arvo, that I would be in labour.

We were transferred to the antenatal ward, as the BAC were pretty busy, and encouraged to walk - which we did – paced the corridors and the grounds of the hospitals. I got the occasional tightenings but by 7pm, we knew we were in for the long haul! Mum and Dad bought DD in for a visit as we were missing her, and then around 9pm Dan decided to go home for sleep.

The MW came in at 12.30 to give me a dose of AB’s and I asked for some Panadol as I was beginning to get back pains.

By 1.30, I’d had 3 contractions in a row that I’d had to pace through, so I asked them to call Dan in.

I worked out early on that the best way to cope with the pain was to stomp – I lent on the window sill and stomped – I then saw a blue swivel chair in an office across the courtyard so I also focused on this during each contraction, aiming my breath towards it. This worked really well until the cleaners came through and turned the light off! By this time it was 4am, and the ward mw came back in - we decided to have an internal to see how I was going before calling in my mw – I was 3cm’s and my contractions were between 4-6mins apart so no rush I thought!

About 4.30, stomping alone wasn't working and I decided to get in the shower and the ward mw called down to BAC to make sure they had a room ready. Again, stomping was a big help and I breathed my pain away down the plug hole – the visualisation really helped! Just as the mw came in to take me down, I had 2 massive contractions where I just lost it – it turns out this was transistion! They quickly got me out of the shower, and we set off. I walked down and every few steps would have to stop and lean on the handrails on the wall to stomp through some big contractions. We met my mw and student mw at the lift and they accompanied me down. As I walked into the BAC, I had to lean on the nurses station for another big contraction, and said I need to push – my mw said lets get in a room and you can, but I thought it was much too soon – with my experience of DD’s, I wanted to push at 6cm and thought there was no way I was ready to push.

I walked into the labour room, and heard the mw ask the student for a delivery pack, and I found a work surface to lean on – the mw asked if I wanted to get on the bed to deliver but my legs were stuck! The next contraction I started pushing, still not believing that I was ready, but another 3 contractions and big pushes, and Bailey’s head was out. I listened to my body instinctively and stopped pushing for a minute or so, and then in the next contraction, Bailey’s body came out! The mw told me to reach down and I could pick him up, but I was so petrified that my arms wouldn’t hold up and he was so slippy that I would drop him, so they managed to help me to the bed with the student mw holding Bailey between my legs. And then he was on my chest! I think I was in total shock at how quick it all was. The pushing stage was only 8mins long! And I had gone from 3cm to pushing in 1hr15min. I was worried that I had teared because of how quickly it all happened, but luckily a couple of tiny grazes that the mw wasn’t worried about and no tear!

Bailey ended up in neonates as he had a raised marked for an infection so they wanted to cover him with antibiotics - speaking to my mw though and she thinks that the raised markers could have been due to his rapid delivery. By Tues afternoon, the 2nd day BT had come back clear and he was discharged from neonates to room in with me. Both of us were discharged Wednesday morning.

I had yet another great birth experience - being able to do things in my own time, with no pressure from anyone to get things moving. I didn't get a birth centre room, but hey, I was only in there for 8mins for the delivery so I wouldn't have appreciated it anyway! I don't think anyone had predicted how quickly things would progress!