AT LAST...Birth story for Baby Bell #3!

Nau mai, tauti mai ki te ao mārama taku tama, te pōtiki o te whānau - Quinn Heta Robert Bell!

I left you last time with the possibility of an induction on the cards.  Needless to say, my midwife came to check me just over 41 weeks and found me to be 4cm dilated and 80% effaced.  She said that in terms of an induction, all they would do is break my waters and then let things progress naturally from there as I was already showing such good signs of labour and wouldn't need much to get me going.  I would still have to go to Chch Womens but would be able to avoid all the drugs and other interventions to induce labour which made me feel much happier about the process.  So my midwife, hubby and I decided that Sat 6th July was the day and we were to meet at Christchurch Womens Hospital at 9am that morning.  I went to bed early on Friday night having made my peace with the fact that tomorrow would be our baby's birthday!

Murphys Law - the first contraction hit that night, at 2.15am.  It felt like a good, strong Braxton Hicks and I went straight back to sleep.  Then another one hit at 2.25am, and again at 2.35am so by the time the next one hit at 2.45am I knew it was finally the real deal and I was having contractions, 10 mins apart.  They were noticeable and uncomfortable but nothing too painful yet.  I let J my hubby sleep, waking him around 3.30am to ring his Mum and get her to come down so we could head to Lincoln Hospital when we needed to.  Yay-back to my original birth plan!  I will give you a blow by blow timeline account of what happened from that point on...

4.30am - Text my midwife to say I was having contractions 10 mins apart but they were not too bad yet, I would keep resting and let her know when they cranked up a notch

5.30am - Spoke to midwife and arranged to meet her at Lincoln

6.30am - Settled in at hospital, we were the only people there and had the place to ourselves, it was lovely

7-8am - Contractions 5mins apart, used the gas for pain relief and LOVED it, was laughing, making jokes & thoroughly enjoying myself!

8.15am - got in the birthing bath, contractions 2-3 mins apart still using gas but starting to feel the bearing down urge through the gas, beginning to hurt more

8.30am - Things get ugly!  They took my new besty, the gas, off me so I could start pushing. I was not happy with this and things were at the screaming and OMG this hurts like hell stage.  A back up midwife arrived and so the 3 of them started to encourage me to get this baby out! Which at that point, I was all for, so I started pushing and it was really hard as the baby was still in its membranes, like all 3 of my kids, my waters never broke and the pressure when this happens is INTENSE, however apparently its better for the baby...not so much the Mum trying to push the baby out still in its waters!  I watched the head come out around 8.40am, still in the bag of waters and with the next couple of pushes the shoulders and body followed, I was never more relieved to have something over and done with!

8.50am - Quinn Heta Robert Bell was born, weighing 9pd 7oz, a big, beautiful boy!  Heta is my fathers middle name and a family name from his mothers side and Robert is my husbands middles name and his fathers name.

 

To be honest, once the baby came out and was pulled up into my chest, I was so exhausted I couldn't even check to see whether it was a boy or girl for a good 5 minutes.  I desperately wanted to and the other 3 were saying hurry up and have a look but I didn't even have the energy to lift my arm to turn the baby over!  I didn't have tea the night before or breakfast stupidly so I was really running on empty. There were two things I was thinking at that point - obviously, what sex is the baby and the next thought was, when I realised I needed to rest for a few minutes before I could even check, was how the hell do women do the painful pushing stage for hours?  In fact, how does any woman cope with being in labour for 12 or 24 or 36 hours!!!!!  And push for a long time or have to have forceps, stitches etc?  I have always respected and sympathised strongly with my mates who have had labours like this, but this was the first time I felt truly shattered after giving birth and it gave me a tiny insight into what it is like for them.   And I do mean tiny - yes, this time I lost some sleep as laboured during the night and he was big and it was longer than I expected but overall - it was a short period of time and I didn't need any interventions or stitches so still a pretty great outcome.

Once I rested for a couple of minutes I finally arrived at the moment we had been waiting 9 months for - is it a boy or a girl?  I didn't know it at the time but my hubby filmed this part for us (since he had time waiting for me to rest first) and I thought I'd share the most exciting part of the birth with you all:

Afterwards things went really smoothly and it was a lovely day.  My midwife went quietly about  in the background getting everything sorted, cleaned, checked, measured, recorded and organised while I had a shower, a HUGE breaky of toast and muesli and somewhat came back to life while J had some skin-skin time with our new son.  Once I was fed, clean and resting I breastfed Quinn and he took to it immediately, no problems there.

J and I were moved into our own room with Quinn at the hospital and our girls arrived to meet their new little brother.  They were not too fussed with him and after a quick look and a few questions they went off to find the toys! The soon left with their Grandma while we had a yummy lunch and rested some more.

 By 1.30pm we were wondering what to do next and actually decided to head home.  As lovely as it was at the hospital, I didn't need to be there and I had 2 main reasons for wanting to head home rather than stay overnight 1)What if another woman comes in and gives birth during the night and screams the house down...like I did! and 2) I really wanted to be home to watch the Wallabies v Lions 3rd test rugby game  : )

So overall, it was a really good birth, going exactly as I had hoped and planned...just a lot later than I thought.  Quinn is just scrummy and I can honestly say I am smitten with him and thoroughly enjoying having a newborn in the house again.  Knowing it will be our last baby, mentally you just chillax a lot more. I am just soaking it all up and enjoying it, the good and the tough!  3-6 months from now he will hopefully be sleeping through and feeding easily so it is such a short time of disrupted sleep etc.  They are soooo worth all the pain and lack of sleep.

Now I better go - my SON needs some more snuggles!

41 weeks pregnant and fed up!

I have an irrational fear of sharks.  Fearing a shark attack while swimming in the sea is not uncommon, but what I mean by irrational is that I often get freaked in situations that I know rationally would not be possible, for example, swimming in a deep pool and thinking there may be a shark in there about to attack me and the fact that I have never tried water skiing in a lake because I'm scared of sharks.  Irrational huh!

Anyway, coming up to a week overdue, I now find myself developing more irrational fears in the possibility of facing an unknown labour process - induction.   There are a lot of reasons I'm nervous about possibly being induced, like the fact the I have never gone overdue before so this is already unknown territory, that I have never been to hospital before, that I am slightly dramatic, that I have a new midwife this time, that I am slightly dramatic....

So to try to alleviate some of my irrational fears, I did what any rational person would do and googled.  What exactly are the risks of being overdue and of being induced?

Almost all websites I viewed agreed that the normal range for a pregnancy is anywhere from between 37-42 weeks, so up to 42 weeks is still considered 'normal'.  However, there are some real risks with going overdue and they are worth acknowledging:

• higher risk of uterine rupture
• bigger baby, more difficult labour and birth
• placenta and cord deterioration
• decrease in amniotic fluid
• meconium aspiration
•  and on a personal note I would like to add the risk to the mental well-being of the mother who is now very fed up and over it

Obviously the longer you have to wait while the baby remains 'inside the oven cooking', the higher chance there is of one or some of these issues affecting you and your bubba.  BUT, in the aim of trying to be rational here, rather than my usual irrational self, I thought I better look at the other side of the argument.

Risks associated with the actual procedure of induction

The induction process is a fairly invasive procedure which usually involves some or all of the following (you can read more about the process of induction here). There are a number of minor side effects associated with these medications/procedures (eg. nausea, discomfort etc.) There are also some major risks:

• prostaglandins to ripen the cervix: hyperstimulation resulting in fetal distress and c-section
• rupturing the membranes: fetal distress and c-section 
• IV syntocinon / pitocin: Mother – rupture of uterus; post partum haemorrhage; water intoxication leading to convulsions, coma and/or death. Baby – hypoxic brain damage; neonatal jaundice; neonatal retinal haemorrhage; death. There is also research suggesting that there may be a link between the use of syntocinon/pitocin for induction and ADHD (Kurth & Haussmann 2011)

The most extreme of these risks are rare but fetal distress and c-section are fairly common.

For me it comes down to the EDD (estimated due date) and your relationship with your midwive when deciding on when induction might be necessary.  In my case, I know my cycle really well and for this pregnancy I even know the conception date so I am very confident that the EDD of June 26th was accurate, which really does put me overdue.  I know that many other woman may think they are overdue but when the actually go for a late scan to check it turns out there dates are slightly off and they aren't really overdue at all.  It also raises the question of WHY this baby is overdue when my other 2 were early or on the due date.  Here comes that irrational fear again - is there something wrong with this baby?  I know I shouldn't think like this and that it's just a reality of some pregnancies, babies can come late, but it doesn't mean you won’t ask yourself these questions, especially with so much time on your hands waiting!

In terms of having a good relationship with your midwife, I think there are certain things you could both discuss and try before having to go down the induction path.  Like a stretch & sweep, (which I tried over a week ago but will ask to try again this week), and asking for a late scan to check on the health & size of the baby, the placenta and the amniotic fluid levels (for the Mums peace of mind and also to delay the need for an induction if everything looks ok).  

At the end of the day, the most important thing for us is to deliver a safe & healthy baby, whether I get to do that naturally at Lincoln Hospital or at home, having a water birth as planned or if I have to go to Chch Womans Hospital to be induced, will be decided sometime later this week.  I don't want to be induced but will happily do it if all the advice and evidence shows this will be best for baby.  In the meantime, I am asking you all to send me your 'go into labour now' vibes...perhaps that will be enough to get this party started!