Darcy enters the world - slowly
It's taken me ages to write this and the reason I wanted to post it is this....
For all the expectant new mums out there, if it sounds like labour and feels even remotely like it - it probably is and don't wait 3 days to tell someone about it, because you end up on enough antibiotics for half the continent!!
Around lunchtime on Saturday 6th May, I had ‘the show’. Irregular pains started almost immediately, but we had to go to a surprise 30th that night. DH wanted to take our EH, but I was uncomfortable and didn’t want to travel in it as it is so bumpy and stiff. We did anyways and it was awful! I couldn’t bear to stand for long periods and sat for most of the party, but no one noticed I was in pain. There were many jokes about me having her that night…. if only they knew. When I got home i felt a gush of fluid, but when I checked it was more mucousy than anything. I rang mum to check if it was my waters breaking, but she said she didn't know as she had never experienced it, and so I didn't worry.
I couldn’t sleep well due to the pain and was up early. I found it was easier if I kept walking.
The pains continued all day and the baby’s movements decreased. Our private health insurance didn’t kick in until midnight on that Sunday, so we were hanging on for dear life, but I was worried and rang the midwife at the private hospital. It never actually occurred to me though that I might be actually in labour.
We had to take the EH back to it's garage as it had started to rain. I had to sit for over an hour chatting nicely to DH's parents as we didn’t want to let anything on. I didn’t want anyone to panic or to think I was being a first time neurotic mum.
Finally we went to the hospital and they put me on the CTG, but the baby was moving fine and the nurses said the pains weren’t really enough to worry about, so we went and had a meal out – our last meal out as childless people. We had Chinese. Then we went home and watched the 2006 Logies. John Wood finally won his gold logie.
I still couldn’t sleep, but I don’t remember the pains getting worse or more regular.
Finally at 11am I was booked to see Bernie the Ob. She asked me if I was in pain and did an internal. She said, “Your 3cm dilated. We’re having a baby today!” She told me to go straight to the hospital and did I have a bag. I said no, couldn’t I go home? No was the answer and she booked me in straight away. I cried in the car on the way to the hospital. I wasn’t ready yet.
They gave me some panadiene forte and vallium to help me relax, and I was so zonked that DH had to feed me my yoghurt! However the doses after that did not work.
I laboured all that night with irregular contractions and no change. DH didn’t leave until around midnight, and I had no fear anything would actually happen overnight. The baby was very low and uncomfortable though.
Around 6.20am after very little sleep, I showered and then saw the two miners being freed from the tunnel they had been trapped since Anzac Day in Beaconsfield, Tasmania. Then I walked around to the birthing suite to wait for mum and DH.
They put the CTG on and Bernie inserted a HUGE bore cannula and started the Syntocinon drip at 10mg/hr, as there was no change to the 3cm dilation.
I had to have a scalp monitor on the baby and so had to labour on the bed.
I was OK until around lunchtime. There was still no change to the 3cm and the synto was up to 80mg/hr. The contractions were awful and I couldn’t bear it anymore. I tried the gas, but I can’t hyperventilate and couldn’t make it work so an epidural was arranged with the anaesthetist. There was almost instant relief.
Mum left to sort Dad’s dinner out and when she came back at 5pm she sent DH to get some dinner. He took himself off to Chilis, but Bernie arrived at 6.30pm, did an internal and announced she had to come out now and a c-section was on the cards, oh and that DH had 10minutes to get there!
Mum called DH. Luckily he was in the car because he got back just in time.
I was feeling about out of control and shell shocked, I wanted to be sick. I was shivering and had the rigors with a huge temperature.
Gee it’s different when you aren’t part of the theatre team. The lights seemed so bright.
The anaesthetist topped up my epidural to a spinal block and the whole thing didn’t take long at all. After a huge amount of pushing on my abdomen by the registrar (I thought he was going to break my ribs), my beautiful baby girl was delivered at 7.28pm. I told them to check again as I was sure it was going to be a boy. They asked us her name and DH faltered for a second and then said, “Darcy”. DH brought her too me, but the morphine was making me weird and I was so hot I was convinced I would make her hot and asked him to take her away.
I had to stay in recovery until 9.40pm, and when they took me back I was sick from the spinal block and very out of it. I wasn’t allowed to be by myself with Darcy. We tried a feed and had great colostrum but the little beggar scratched one of my nipples – that turned out to be a major incident later. Due to both of us having huge temperatures, and them thinking my waters had actually broken almost 4 days before, I had to have enough IV antibiotics for half of Africa!
Finally the next morning I had the catheter removed and I could hop up for a shower. Thank god Cameron was there, I was very woozy and wobbly.
Over the week as I continued to try and breastfeed that little scratch turned into a huge sucking blister. Her frustration made the other side blister and I had no milk at all. We finally made the decision to put her on the bottle as I was going to have to have medication if I wanted to start producing milk. I was surprised I was so upset by this, but made the decision anyways.
On day 5 in the evening I felt VERY unwell. I couldn’t lift my head off the pillow, and DH had to look after Darcy. My BP went up to 160/100 and the doctors were called in. It wouldn’t go down and I had to have medication for it. I had developed postnatal pre eclampsia and went home on that medication.
The next morning I woke up and felt like I had bench-pressed DH! My milk had arrived!!! So we had to decide all over again. I desperately wanted to try, and so another saga began.
However, I was determined to succeed. I am pleased also to say that I am still going strong with it at 12 weeks too.:)
Thanks for reading this far.
