A positive labour without pain relief: Jack’s birth story
This was our first pregnancy and we had lots going on in our lives, including buying and renovating our first home. The pregnancy wasn’t great as I suffered from sickness and nausea for the duration; it was very frustrating as there was no fix for it. Unfortunately, this hindered my enjoyment of being pregnant as I could only focus on getting through each day. The Happy Parents Happy Baby course really helped me focus towards the end and it was also great to meet other expectant mums who had also experienced up and down pregnancies.
The course was so honest about birth preparation, which I was grateful for – we were prepared for any delivery and whatever happens, that’s ok.
When we moved house, we lucked out and were part of a group practice midwife set up. This meant we had the same incredible midwife Katy, for all appointments, which I had at home.
During my last few days of work I had lots of deep pain, which almost felt like my pelvis was shifting and stretching. I had a sweep the day after my due date, Katy said the baby would be here in 2-3 days. A few days later I felt a little strange, more lower back pain than usual, so I suggested to Adam that he worked from home that day. At 11am the contractions started. We got the timer going and I paced about the house - our plan was to get Katy to come to us to triage me and so we texted to keep her posted. The contractions were coming quicker. I had so many examples from friends in my head, that first time labour is hours and hours, so I assumed that I had time!
Just two hours later I very much felt the urge to push, Katy phones and said get a taxi or ambulance NOW!!! She later told me she heard my mooing contractions!
Adam called an Uber and the driver is very nonchalant about the whole thing! Adam realises quickly that we’re going the wrong way and are heading to the post office depot, rather than the hospital! We arrived to the most wonderful sight I had ever seen – Katy was waiting there for us; we were both so relieved.
I clambered up onto a bed and Katy just had time to pull some gloves on…three pushes later he was out! Jack was born at 2.20pm, 5 minutes after arriving at hospital. There was no time for pain relief and I probably could have done with an episiotomy as he came out so fast with his hand by his ear. I was in utter shock that it had all happened. But sheer amazement at the whole marvel that is pregnancy and birth. As he was literally born, Katy said, there’s your baby, you can pick him up and I just couldn’t believe the rawness of it all, I was shaking as I just didn’t want to drop his slippery body! It is the most incredible feeling seeing their face for the first time.
We had decided in our plan to wait some time before the placenta injection. After the injection nothing happened, the placenta was not shifting. There were efforts to tease it out using the umbilical cord, but then that snapped. After having an examination a doctor confirmed that my placenta needed to be manually removed.
And so what would have been an incredibly straightforward birth and a quick return to home resulted in me having a spinal tap and a doctor manually removing my placenta, which was not a very pleasant experience. I was thankful that Katy was there throughout.
We were in hospital for the first few days, which had its pros and cons. It gave us time to take stock but all we wanted to do was get home. The HPHB course really helped with the reality of breastfeeding and that it might not go to plan! We had a really tough start and even though Jack’s tongue tie was snipped a week after birth it took a long time for us to grasp it. We were in touch with the lactation consultant along with local breastfeeding clinics and multiple websites to get us to a good place.
I would absolutely recommend Happy Parents Happy Baby. It is such an honest course with a range of sessions from experts. It’s got the balance just right and you really feel like you and your situation is important and matters. We got to meet an amazing group of people who we are still in touch with daily!
Top Tops:
Be prepared for as many different scenarios, for all stages, as possible - you just never know how your body is going to react.
Remember that everything is short lived and will come to an end - so when things are not going well, it won’t last for ever!
Enjoy the early days together as a family, pull up the drawbridge and spend time recovering. What you’ve just achieved is incredible over the past 9 months, be kind to yourself.
