In the weeks leading up to Mia’s birth, I was in an almost constant state of excitement and anticipation waiting for something to happen. It felt like waiting for Christmas, but never knowing when Santa would show up. I was so eager to meet my baby, but I kind of didn’t want that exciting time to end. I’m the kind of person who likes the lead up to Christmas more than the actual day. I felt pretty sure I’d go in the middle of the night (I’m not sure why), and every time I woke up to pee I thought, “Imagine if my water broke right now.”
When it actually happened I was not at all prepared! On the morning of the 13th of February I didn’t think I was about to go into labour. I even made plans to go visit my Mum, even though I had been avoiding making plans for weeks, because then if I had to cancel, everyone would know what was happening (I wanted to surprise our families with her arrival, rather than have people waiting for news while I was in labour). Every year since Terry and I met, I’ve made him cupcakes or muffins for Valentines Day and Easter. On that Saturday morning, I went to the supermarket to buy the ingredients for cupcakes. And by ingredients I mean a packet mix. I’ve never made them from scratch, and I wasn’t about to start at 39 weeks pregnant! I nearly had my little sister over to help me bake, but luckily I decided it was quicker to do it on my own. On my way home from the supermarket, I was having a chat to baby Mia in my belly, telling her if she wanted to come out soon I would give her lots of hugs and kisses. I said pretty much the same thing to my belly each day, but that day I threw in something new- “You can have big cuddles from your Daddy too, and he gives the best cuddles!” I later told Terry that this must have been what did it for her, because about half an hour later, my water broke.
I was standing at the kitchen sink, quickly trying to get the kitchen clean so Terry wouldn’t notice I had made the cupcakes (I make them every year, but its still a ‘surprise’). He was due home at 1pm, and it was now 11.30am. As I was washing the dishes I felt a little bit of ‘something’ come out, and then it kept coming. I still remember the exact thoughts running through my head. “Oh… oh wait, that’s a LOT…” and then “No, I have to get the cupcakes in the oven!” I took my shorts off right there in the kitchen and waddled to the bathroom. Now, I had heard over and over, that if it’s just a small leak, it could very well just be pee. I knew to put a pad on and if it soaked through, it was the waters, and if not, it was probably pee. So I put on a pad and kept going with the cupcakes and cleaning the kitchen. At this point I thought I had probably just wet myself (how embarrassing!). I didn’t even contact Terry to let him know what had happened. When I checked the pad an hour later it was dry, and I was disappointed. I decided to message Terry and remind him to grab some mince for dinner, because I was sure I wouldn’t be having the baby that day. When Terry got home, I was laying on the bed, and I felt another small gush. It’s so strange because we had discussed so many times how it would happen and we were both waiting so excitedly for ‘that moment’, but I was suddenly too shy to say anything! I mentioned that I’d had a couple of little leaks but I guess its just pee and how annoying. He could see that I was calm and he took that as a sign that nothing was happening. He went out to sunbake on our deck. At this point id been having some back and tummy pain since the first gush, but no real contractions. I started feeling a bit worse and decided to go and sit in the sun with Terry to try and help me feel better. As I went to sit down on the deck I felt a BIG gush. I didn’t say anything to Terry, but just said that my back was hurting and I was going to have a shower and see if it helped. Just before I got in the shower, I messaged my Mum to say I might not come over, and made some excuse about having to go into town later- just incase. Once I got in the shower my back started to hurt BAD. I think I stood in there for a long time, and I remember wishing that Terry would come check on me because I just didn’t know what was happening. But of course Terry had no idea because I had been so calm, and he just continued on sunbaking! When I got out of the shower, I told Terry that I should probably call the hospital, “I’m sure its nothing, but my back just hurts so I might just call them to see what they say.” But instead of calling them straight away, I decided to blow dry my hair. And put on a bit of makeup. And straighten my hair. I had packed and re-packed and made lists to prepare for this moment, but I suddenly felt like I wasn’t ready! I just kept coming up with more tasks I needed to do before calling. I knew that when I called the hospital, they would just tell me to come in so they could check, and I just suddenly wasn’t ready. It all felt so rushed, even though at this point it had been hours since my water started leaking. I think it was just after 4pm when I eventually called. They said it could be nothing, or it could be something, but because I had tested positive for Group B Strep (a normally harmless bacteria that many women carry, but that can be harmful to a baby if it is present during delivery), I needed to come in to be checked straight away. I suddenly felt like I was being silly, and that I had probably just peed myself a few times and that we were going to be disappointed when we got to the hospital. I don’t know how many times I said to Terry, “I’m sure its just nothing, they just have to check anyway. Hopefully we aren’t there too long so it doesn’t get too late to cook dinner when we get home.” We parked in the 2 hour parking, left the bags in the car and went up to the labour ward.
I lay down to be checked, but honestly still thought it was nothing. Strangely, as soon as I got on the bed, I felt my first contraction. “Oh, THAT’S what they feel like!” At around 4.40pm I was informed that it was in fact my waters leaking! From there everything got moving very quickly. Because I had Group B Strep, and because I had been hanging out at home for 5 hours with broken waters and had only just experienced my first contraction, they told me I would need to be induced. They sent Terry to the car to grab the bags and took me to a birth suite. I couldn’t believe this was all happening and that I felt so normal! Terry headed home to feed the cat and I just chilled in the birth suite. I ate some dinner, took some selfies and sent Terry several messages of everything I had forgotten to bring. I was having contractions about every 10 minutes, but they weren’t overly painful. When Terry was on his way back to the hospital, my Mum saw him driving alone near our house (I had told her we were in town together) and messaged me to ask what was going on. So much for a surprise! At 7pm, the doctor broke my waters properly (as they were leaking but not completely broken, whatever that means) and I was hooked up to the drip to bring on stronger contractions. I was also hooked up to some IV antibiotics for the Group B Strep. Because of these two drips, I was stuck on the bed for my entire labour. I didn’t have a strict birth plan, and I went into it with an “Anything could happen!” attitude, but I was slightly disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to move around or get into the bath. I was open to different forms of pain relief, but wanted to see how I went on my own first. I was also open to the possibility of an epidural, but this was my ‘last option’, and I hoped I wouldn’t need it. The reasons I didn’t want an epidural were the possible side effects, the possibility of it shortening my labour and not being able to walk around. I already couldn’t walk around because of the drip, but for the other reasons I wanted to avoid the epidural if I thought I could manage without it. As soon as the drip to bring on contractions was hooked up, I started to have intense contractions every 4 minutes. At this point I was coping really well. Terry on one side of me, midwife on the other side monitoring the contractions and baby’s heart to make sure the induction was progressing safely, TV on and lights off. Everything was so calm. We chatted away, with me just stopping every few minutes to close my eyes and silently breathe through each contraction. I thought to myself, “I’m smashing this labour business! I’m awesome!”.
Now at this point the timeline of everything is pretty fuzzy to me. I always see birth stories with exact times that everything happened, but I wasn’t paying attention to the time. I was actually surprised at how fast time moved! If there was ever an event to make time move slowly, you would think it would be labour, but it was flying by! At some point, not long after I was first hooked up to the drip, my contractions went from 4 minutes apart to 1 minute apart, lasting 1 minute each. I still handled this well, and I was getting so excited to meet our baby girl. After a little while, I told Terry I thought it might be a good idea to ask for the gas, just so that it was ready in case I ended up wanting it. Everything was getting intense pretty quickly, and I thought it would be a good idea to have it there when and if I wanted it. I did end up using the gas not long after asking for it. I didn’t find it overly helpful for the pain, but it kind of made the experience a bit more fun! I still felt the pain during contractions, but just felt a bit drunk in between each contraction. Everything on the TV was suddenly pretty funny!
At some point, I realised Mia had changed positions. She had been in the same position for weeks, but now I could tell she had moved. I knew her head was still down where it needed to be, but her body had flipped onto the other side of my belly. I don’t know why, but I didn’t mention this to the midwife. I would later find out that she had gotten herself into a position that made delivery very difficult. Not long after she changed positions, I started to feel a LOT of pain in my lower back. I asked for a heat pack, which helped a little but it was still extremely painful. All this time, the midwife was regularly turning up the drip to make the contractions stronger. At one time, she told me that I was having the strongest possible contractions, and they wouldn’t get any worse. This reassured me, as I was in a lot of pain, but was handling it well (I was still pretty much silent this whole time). Well- she was wrong! All of a sudden, the pain got SO much worse. And it was pretty much all in my back.
Not long after the pain started to become unbearable, I had a quick chat with Terry about the possibility of an epidural, and I said we would ask the midwife how much longer she thought my labour would be, and if she said I still had quite a few hours to go, then I would get the epidural. At this point, the pain was really bad, but I felt that I would be able to get through if it wasn’t going to be much longer. Right after we had this chat, the midwife came in and said, “I know your birth plan says an epidural is your last option, but we really think you should have an epidural.” I wasn’t screaming or telling them it was painful, so they must have been able to see on the monitor that the contractions were really intense. We asked her how much longer she thought it would be, and she told me that being induced meant my labour would be quite long, and that they expected me to only dilate about 1cm every 4 hours. Hearing that made the pain feel so much worse, and I felt there was no way I could continue on if this was going to be a very long labour. The epidural was ordered. I asked to get up to use the toilet, and this is where I started to feel like I was losing control of the pain. Getting up and moving made it so much more painful for me. I sat on the toilet alone and this was the only time I let out a little scream. I wanted to cry, and I hoped they wouldn’t take too long to organise the epidural.
Within a minute or so, I got up and walked out to find everything already set up for the epidural! I was relieved that they were there so quickly. I was sat on the bed, birthing singlet swapped for a hospital gown and prepped for the epidural. I was gripping onto Terry’s hand and I felt like crying. I remember thinking “I don’t know how anyone ever does this without pain relief!” I kept telling myself that I only had to get through a few more contractions before the pain would be over. But the anaesthetist decided this was a good time to train someone on how to give an epidural. I know everyone has to learn at some point, and I even happily let a medical student butcher my hand earlier on trying to get the drip in, but now that I was in pain I was pretty angry that they were using my back to practice on! (And considering I was worried about side effects, I would have preferred the experienced anaesthetist.) It felt like they took forever. I looked at Terry and mouthed, “What the fuck are they doing?!” I’m not exaggerating when I say- I LOVED the feeling of that big needle going into my back! I felt like I was finally about to get some relief!
I’ve heard a lot of people say that the epidural is amazing, and that it is instant relief. Unfortunately for me, this wasn’t the case. I still had to use the gas for an hour after getting the epidural. I had a big patch in my lower back that wasn’t numb at all. I felt quite upset that I had ended up getting the epidural despite not wanting one originally, and then it didn’t even work properly anyway. Soon after getting the epidural, I was checked again to see how dilated I was. I know this was around 11pm, because they told me that would check every 4 hours. (At 7pm, I was 1-2cm.) To my surprise and delight, I was already 8cm! I was happy, but this also made me disappointed that I had given in and gotten the epidural. I had only agreed to it because I thought I was in for a long labour, but now I was finding out that this probably wouldn’t be the case. Despite the fact that I was dilating so quickly, the midwife said she wouldn’t be checking again until it had been another 4 hours. I knew that it wouldn’t take that long for me to be fully dilated.
About 2 hours later, I was feeling pretty relaxed. The epidural was giving me some relief (although my back was still hurting) and we were once again relaxing and watching TV. The atmosphere felt positive again. The midwife had been watching the monitors, and she said she was tempted to check again because I was contracting so strongly, and I managed to convince her to do so. She checked me and said, “Wow! It’s time to have a baby!” I was so excited to start pushing! When it came time to push, the epidural had made me so numb that I couldn’t feel anything. The midwife kept telling me I was doing a great job, so I assumed I was, but couldn’t feel what I was doing at all. When she wasn’t paying attention, I laughed to Terry that I had no idea what I was doing! But the midwife just kept telling me I was doing great. And then she said, “I’ll be back in a second.” Suddenly, in walked a team of people. I recognised the doctor, who had annoyed me a few weeks earlier by ignoring the growth scan that said my baby had suddenly had a massive growth spurt and jumped up to the 97th percentile. I had gestational diabetes and was quite concerned, and also very worried about delivering a large baby, but he brushed it off like it was nothing. I now laugh that he was the doctor who had to rip my large baby out of my tiny body. I was informed that I had already been pushing for over an hour (I was shocked by this, it didn’t feel like that long!), and wasn’t making much progress. I guess the midwife was just trying to be encouraging when she said I was doing a good job! The doctor asked if I would like some help to get the baby out with the Ventouse (suction). I said yes. He then asked again, very rudely, “I was told you wanted some help, do you want me to help you or not.” Well sorry that I didn’t beg you and give you a big fucking smile. Currently trying to push a baby out over here!
Things are very fuzzy from this point. At first I was kind of being lazy agreeing to the Ventouse. I just sort of thought, “Yeah sure, it will get her here quicker!” I thought she would be here any second now and I was so excited! None of us realised it wasn’t that simple. The doctor got the suction onto Mia’s head. She was suddenly very low, and although the epidural meant I couldn’t feel my pushing, all of the back pain came back in full force, and it was like I could feel her whole body in my pelvis. The actual pushing and delivery didn’t hurt the way I had imagined, but it felt like all the bones in my pelvis were being crushed. The doctor kept telling the midwives to tell me (he didn’t speak to me directly) to push. I couldn’t feel myself pushing and I told them that over and over. And over and over, the doctor kept saying, “She’s not pushing!” Terry tells me that the veins were popping out of the doctor’s arms trying to pull Mia out. He was pulling so hard, but she was stuck. At this point, I just closed my eyes and ignored everything. When I realised she wasn’t coming out, I felt so scared. I just didn’t know what they were going to do to get her out safely, and I needed to close my eyes and just think of her and try to stay calm. I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t communicate with anyone. All I could do was hope for the best. I just kept thinking of my baby, over and over. She was the only thing getting me through. I don’t know exactly how long, but Terry said they were trying for a long time to get her out. I heard lots of words being thrown around, I heard that her head was the wrong way, then her shoulders were stuck. I heard the word ‘episiotomy’ (I cringed a bit when I heard that). There were a lot of people in the room, and a lot of people were talking to me and about me. All I could do was nod and agree with everything. I just kept thinking to myself “As long as they get her out, as long as she’s safe everything will be fine. Whatever it takes to get her out.” In those moments I didn’t care if they had to cut me in two to get her out safely, all I cared about was her. And then I heard the words that almost made me break down- “Get a paediatrician in here.” I almost lost it. All I could think was that after all of this she wasn’t going to be ok. Terry tells me that she was blue and that everyone in the room looked worried. I was so angry, upset and scared at this point. All I wanted was my baby.
And then, at 2.48am on Valentine’s Day, out she came! She was pink and screaming and everyone was surprised. There was a chorus of, “Wow, that’s a big baby!” and I heard the paediatrician, “I was told she was flat!” and the midwives, “She was!” Someone noticed Terry wasn’t looking great, and helped him to sit down. He nearly passed out! I heard Terry and the midwives all saying that they had been holding their breath the whole time. I guess from the outside, it must have looked pretty scary. I heard talk of stitches and needles. But I didn’t care about any of it. I was just looking at her beautiful face. I still remember those moments so vividly. I remember studying her face for the first time. I was calling out to Terry, who was still sitting down. “She’s so pretty! She looks exactly like me when I was a baby! She looks exactly like we thought! She has beautiful lips and she has hair! Lucky I brought a hairbrush!” I still remember the smell of her when she came out, and the feel of her skin. I hope I never forget.
After Mia was born, I said to Terry, “You know how some people say right after the baby is born they want to do it again and have another baby? I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to do that again!” I couldn’t understand how my Mum has had 8 babies! Honestly for the first couple of weeks of Mia’s life, I thought I may only have one child. Of course I felt it as all worth it for her, but I wasn’t sure if I could bring myself to do it again. I had enjoyed my labour, but the actual delivery was traumatic for me, and the recovery was very painful. But of course, 5 months on, I look back on Mia’s birth and feel excitement! It was scary, but it was the most exciting day of my life and I can’t wait to do it again! And as all Mothers say- I would relive that day a million times for my beautiful baby.
