a birth story - part twelve

Things in my birth story so far

had travelled so far from my ideal plan

that it was crazy.

More than 24 hours after my water broke

things aren't progressing as they should.

I've been having to fight the urge to push for eight whole hours.

Exhasuted, drained and in agony,

I've made the decision to transfer to the main hospital 

instead of continuing at the the smaller labour unit.

And at this point my contractions have all but stopped.

Our new midwife, Emma, told us straight away that she had called the anaesthetist

and he would be on his way shortly.

She explained that she would need to put me on a hormone drip

because my contractions had slowed down so much

and they needed to be kick started again.

She explained that I would need a catheter.

But she said that both the hormone drip and catheter would wait until after the epidural

because then I wouldn't feel the pain and I had been through enough already.

Right from the first moment, Emma felt like an angel to me.  

She exuded calm and seemed to have everything under control.

She was about the same age as us,

and as a result had none of the patronising tone that we'd experienced with some of the older midwives.

From that first moment, I felt safe.

At 8 o'clock I was given my epidural by an absolutely charming anaesthetist.

He explained to me that there was a chance that the epidural wouldn't completely stop the pain

and that some people found that it only worked on one side.

He told me that in a perfect world the next contraction would be numbed slightly

and that then I shouldn't feel any more after that.

And that was exactly how it happened.

I was rigged up to a hormone drip,

a saline drip for fluids,

a blood pressure monitor

and a catheter,

as well as a heart rate monitor for me

and another for the baby.

Another internal examination was needed,

but this one didn't hurt at all.

It confirmed that I was still at 6cm.

So my hormone drip was increased

and I was told to have a sleep.

Instead of sleeping straight away, I rang my mum.

I knew that she would be worrying

because having been called 24 hours earlier with the news that I was in labour,

she surely would have been expecting a grandchild by now.

Trying to explain what had happened was interesting.

It was harder still explaining that I was in still labour

but not in any pain and that I was going to have a nap to regain some energy.

She just didn't seem to be able to get her head around what was going on.

I told her that I had been 6cm at 9.30am

and that they would be checking me again in four hours to see how things were progressing.

And so I went to sleep.

I felt safe,

I felt comfortable

and I felt exhausted

so it seemed the best thing to do.

Having had an epidural,

I was now high risk

 meaning that I had to be 1-to-1 with the midwife,

so she didn’t really leave the room apart from to get supplies.

It was lovely just knowing she was there.

She definitely had a calming influence over both me and my husband

and I felt like I was in safe hands.

You can read the next part here.