The long awaited arrival of Alyssa Jane

[Peta]

I wanted to share my story as I read so many of yours & was inspired by all your courage & stories. Hopefully someone will find the same strength & inspiration in my story.

Brief background: We had been trying unsuccessfully for about 6 years to have a baby. We had done 2 years naturally, 2 years of IVF & were at the final stages of being placed on the adoption register for a Qld child. On top of this, I had open heart surgery as a bub, so me carrying a child was classed as a "high risk pregnancy" and I would have to have the baby at the Royal in Brissie as per my Cardiologists orders. Our luck took a turn & we found out we were pregnant at 10 weeks.

Aly's DD was 23.05.10 (based on scans only), however from the get go I knew that was wrong. It was two weeks earlier. With this in mind, I finished work on 30.04.10 with the view to having some time to myself.

On 11th May at 430am, I awoke to find my waters had broken & I was having contractions. They were not bad at all, so I didn't really say anything to hubby, though the contractions were only 5 minutes apart from the start.

By 6am, I had emailed some people at work, made hubbys lunch, made the bed, pretty much started my daily routine. By this time I had also mentioned to DH that he may not be going to work today. He insisted I call the hospital (1.5 - 2.5 hours away depending on traffic) and just check if I needed to head in. I spoke to a lovely man who said that Yes, I should come in being that my waters had broken.

So, in a bit of a rush, we finished packing (thankfully, majority of my & bub's hospital bag was packed ready) and got in the car for the trek from the Sunny Coast to Brissie. By now it was about 630am and peak hour traffic was out! DH pulled a few manouvre's and got us to the hospital by about 815am I think.

Boy there must have been some amused motorists by the time we got to Brissie. I was out the window yelling & banging my hand on the side of the car each time a contraction came. By my timing, they were lasting 1.5 minutes & were very close together.

I just tried to keep calm & remember my breathing. The more stressed DH got, the worse my pain got, so I tried to keep him calm as well as keeping myself focused.

On the way, I had called and asked for a wheel chair to be ready as I knew I didn't have a chance of walking & catching the lift the the Birth Suite on the 5th floor. Into the wheel chair I got & then into the lift. There were 2 other groups in the lift merrily talking about me being in labour - but - they decided to get off at the 3rd & 4th floors first!! I could have punched them.

So in we wheeled to Birth Suite & I was told to go straight through & there was a room all ready for me.

The MW did an internal & said I was 4cm. I was in quite a bit of pain by now, so they asked me if I wanted gas, which I took. Anyway things seemed to progress quite well. I'm told (can't recall anything once I got that gas - brilliant stuff!!) that I asked for an Epi, but by the time I wanted it, it was too late!

Next thing the MW took my gas off me and it was time to push. So, push I did with all my mite. For me, this was the hardest part. My cardiac history means that I run out of puff quite quickly, so I had to make each push count. I listened to the MW and did exactly as I was told. If I didn't get the baby out in 1/2 hour the doctor was coming in to use forceps or a Caeser (neither of which I wanted). After 1/2 hour of pushing, our beautiful little girl arrived. It was beautiful & exhausting & very surreal.

All up my labour was 5.5 hours! Aly was healthy & perfect. She weighed in at 5 pound 6 (2450 grams) and was 48cms long. I went into pregnancy & birth with no expectations or knowledge of what to expect. I was very happy with how everything turned out & am now loving life as a Mummy. I hope this has inspired a few of you out there & thanks for reading!