a second birth story - part eleven

The full story so far can be found on the birth stories page...

I had been working through my contractions really well

until suddenly I wasn't.

I was ready for an epidural

but was fighting an increasing urge to push.

Another contraction.

Another loud moan

as I fought my body.

“Lucy, if you are pushing 

then I need to do another internal before this epidural to see what's happening.”

Again, I said I wasn't pushing

even though I knew now that I was.

Everything was set up for the epidural

I was hunched over a pillow ready.

The bed had been put up high

and while Laura crouched down to talk to me,

the husband was stood to my side

with a hand protectively on my shoulder.

At that point I would have said anything to avoid having to move again,

to avoid having to have another internal

and to avoid waiting any longer for the epidural.

I burst into tears

and Laura seemed to take that as the sign she was looking for.

The anaesthesiologist did my epidural

and told me that in a few contractions time the pain would have subsided.

I was moved back into a reclined position on the bed

just as my original midwife Lynne returned from her break.

She seemed a bit surprised to see how much things had changed in an hour.

She had left a woman who was calmly breathing through her labour

and returned to a crazed looking woman who was moaning

and had just had to have an epidural.

As Laura started to handover back to Lynne

another contraction came

and I groaned and shook with the effort of fighting the urge to push.

The midwives exchanged what can only be described as a surprised and knowing look.

Laura came back over the bed

and asked me a third time whether I was pushing.

I admitted that I could feel a lot of pressure

but again felt the need to try and explain in a garbled way

that this had happened with my first labour

and I'd had to fight that pushing urge for hours.

She explained that I really mustn't push until they knew what was happening

and she set my husband the task of talking me through each contraction

and of reminding me not to push and to breathe instead.

Once the epidural had kicked in properly I would no longer feel that pushing urge as much

and if I was feeling that urge too early like last time

then the epidural would also make the coming hours far more comfortable for me.

But Lynne said that she needed and wanted to do another internal

to see what was going on.

The no-nonsense thing I'd been told about had kicked in,

Laura explained that I had been 4cms about half an hour before

but Lynne felt that things had escalated really quickly,

and that they really needed to know what was going on

as something had clearly changed.

My epidural had kicked in and I was suddenly feeling a lot calmer.

No more pain, but I could still feel a faint downward pressure.

So Lynne did another internal

and told the room to great surprise

that I was actually 10cms dilated.

I had dilated the last 6cms in less than 40 minutes

which explained why I had suddenly felt so entirely crazy and panicky.

What everyone had mistaken as me reliving my previous labour and worrying

had actually been the ramblings of transition.

Both midwives attempted to scold me

for not having told Laura when the pushing feeling first started

but I had been so focused on the fear

of not coping

and of not getting an epidural

that I just couldn't have been able.

As Laura left Lynne to continue my care

the decision was made to leave it an hour or so before starting to push.

I was calm and comfortable now and so I could hopefully regain some energy

and they could now monitor the baby properly and knew that everything was okay.

Waiting an hour also meant that the baby could descend more

and that my epidural could wear off a bit

as it was currently too strong for me to push effectively.

You can read the next part here.