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5am on Tuesday 4th I woke up having a contraction. Having never gone into labour before (2 inductions) I laid there thinking "was that a strong BH?" - another one followed 30 mins later, then anohter so at 7am I woke DH. I told him he should still go to work as i might be a while yet - he informed me he was going nowhere . I rang my Mum who set off from Yorkshire to be babysitter and DH got the older DC off to school.
At about 11ish my contractions were 8-9 mins apart so we set off for hospital (1 hour drive away) and went straight to delivery suite. Things were going great - contracting reguarly, coping with the pain etc then decided to give the G&A a whirl. Found it really good this time (hated it before) and so carried on with that (at one point, leaning on DH and breathing the G&A in his ear with that HISS HISS noise, I growled at him "Luke I am your father" )
Anyhoo. Things seemed to be going well, but then nothing changed! Contractions still really regular but getting more painful. Decided to go in birthing pool at about 8pm but I felt cold and kept slipping around so I got out at 8.20pm! Decided I need epidural by this point, so that was put in at about 9.30 (v hazy on times, sorry). At 10.30ish I suddenly couldn't hear anything and my vision was blurred. I told DH he'd better get some help and the room was suddenly full of people - 2 bloody docs, 3 MWs and anaesthetist. BP had dropped right down. It was v scary and lasted for about 45mins. By the end of it, I had 2 drips in, BP beign taken every 5 minutes, a pulse thing on my finger, epidural in place and a clip on DS's head to monitor him - this was NOT the natural birth I'd envisioned!
At 11.30pm I suddenly felt all weird - I knew something was very wrong. Isaid to the MW "If we don't get this baby out soon, something really bad is going to happen, I don't mind if I have a CS but there is something wrong". She reasured me saying its ok, we're monitoring everything etc. Then put me on that drip that speeds up contractions - nothing. Huge doctor with hands like shovels had a hand up my fanjo, telling me to push wiht next contraction so he could feel baby. No bloody contraction came. When one did come, I pushed but he couldn't feel baby. I told him that something was wrong. Baby's heart rate started to drop a little, so they decided to do the CS. I cried a bit, but was glad as I had an awful sense of foreboding. Was wheeled down to theatre (just like on the telly!) and DH was in there with me. They injected the spinal block into my epidural thing but I could still feel everything on my right hand side so they told me they had to give me a general. DH was asked to leave, mask put on me and they said I might feel some presure on my neck - nurse pressed right down on my windpipe (God kn ows why) - it was awful. Saw the big needle loom towards teh epidural tube and had tears running down my face, then nothing until I woke up. Horrible experience really.
Turned out that DS2 (!) was back to back and had the cord wrapped around his neck 4 times and then it was in a knot - apparently even if he had moved down the birth canal we would never have delivered him naturally. Thank God he was CS - I knew something was wrong. Born at 5.52am on bonfire night (well, day)
Have staples in - looks like a zip.
Spent the day on a delivery suite with a MW working in the room. I'd lost far too much blood apparnetly and was a bit of a zombie - don't remember much about the day TBH.
On ward afterwards, huge baby not getting filled with my colostum, they kept asking me if they could top him up, I kept saying no, then one of hte MWs snapped at me "this baby is starving" so I let them - cried buckets when they took him away. Was v anaemic and had a blood transfusion whcih made me feel stronger. Transferred to MLU on Friday, they were fantastic - had a lovely side room with own loo and shower, MWs couldn't do enough for me and were v supportive. BF going better, he's currently feeding what seems like ALL Night but I'm hoping htat will settle down soon.
In a nutshell - 24 hours labour. Emergency CS under general. Huge DS2 (10lb 9oz) with lots of dark hair - gorgeous, healthy (has tongue tie - diagnosed by me thanks to reading one of marslady's threads a while back lol) but they're snipping on Thursday.
Oh Mamg congrats- and well don for having the sheer guts to demand help when it was needed.
Sounds like a scary experience but so glad you all came out OK. baby will slow down on the feeding bt it does take a bit- up to six weeks isn't unusual. It's ahrd work but as you well know by now it all flies past so quickly that its worth it.
Fab name (have a Harry myself, wel, a harold but you do what you can to keep the FIL happy ) and he sounds utterly gorgeous.
Many congratulations on Harry's safe arrival . Sounds like you really went through the mill but so glad the outcome was good. Sending you lots of good wishes for a swift and relaxed recovery - hope everyone spoils you rotten after all that.
oh what a nightmare! even though you've got your lovely boy When it all settles it might be worth seeing if someone (sympathetic) can go through your notes with you. The midwife at at VBAC clinic did this with us 3.6 years after the event + even at this late stage it is like a huge cloud of depression and anxiety has lifted (and I did not think before i was that bothered)
Think wee Struan may have tongue tie as well but no one checked nad no support and nipples ripped to shreds so we moved to formula when he was 2 days old.
Congratulations on Harry's arrival, how scary that with all that monitoring you still had to impress on them that something was wrong, but thank goodness you realised. Good luck with the feeding.
Well done MamaG! It does sound horrendous though. It's very interesting to here about your sense of foreboding - I think our instincts can tell us a lot about how well the birth is going.
I hope you recover very soon and get plenty of rest, and enjoy being with your new baby.
(They pressed on your windpipe,for what they call "Crash Induction",just means you hadn't been starved for surgery ie. 4-6 hours,so they want to make sure nothing pops up from your stomach.)
So glad it was all ok,but pretty scary I would imagine.
Well done MamaG. A mothers instinct is mostly right.
What a time of it. Please take the time to debrief with someone you trust when you feel up to it.
at bloody mw's telling you baby was starving, If they had noticed his tongue tie, maybe you could have had some help with positioning and baby would not have needed to be topped up. I feel for you.
Hope things improve once his little tongue is done.
Mama G huge congrats!! glad you are both safe! you just know when something is not right, don't you? same happend to me emcs under GA, scary stuff!! where did you have him?
Congratulations MamaG on the safe arrival of Harry
but what an epic......good that you trusted your instincts and that they listened to you and he was delivered safely in the end. I hope the BFing is going well after your shaky start.
Congratulations and WOW GOOD FOR YOU for realizing that something was wrong and insisting that they pay attention to you. YOU ROCK. Harry James is a lucky boy to have such a fabulous mum. (Harry James as in Harry James Potter? ) I agree with everyone who said it would be a good idea to go over your notes with someone, or perhaps speak with a mental health professional, once things settle down a bit. I had a terribly traumatic birth with DS and suffered from PTSD and PND after, and for months was told to "just get over it, your baby is healthy and that's all that counts". Well, it isn't, mum's mental health is just as important. Big huge warm hugs from overseas, and congratulations again!!
Massive baby- what were your eating? . Had ECS with my first- similar situation as I knew something wasn't right too. Well done on the safe arrival of DS. Yeahhhh.
Hello, I came on today to look for your announcement.
Oh you had your pumpkin.
Well done. Oh lovvey I'm sorry it wasn't a great experience for you, sounds rather scary.
I can't believe how big he was :-) Oh almost forgot to say well done you, spotting the tongue tie nice and early poor dd's wasn't spotted until she was 7 weeks despite me suspecting it and asking the HV lots of times.
I certainly did Guad - I love Harry Potter, but DS2 isn't named after him, honest! Harry was DH's much loved grandad and JAmes is our much loved nephew
wow, good weight, epic birth but soo worth it, and great name
well done on spotting the tongue tie, and that it is getting sorted so quickly. My DS2 had tongue tie (I spotted immediately as the feeding was just wrong), but it took over 2wks for anyone to agree and another 5wks for them to fix it.......let me tell you that once it was done, his feeding was wonderful!
witchandchips and Jacksmama - you both mentioned having someone go through my notes with me at some point - I think I'd like to do this at some point (but not yet), who would I approach, GP? Hospital?
Start by calling the hospital - the Head of Mifwery, perhaps.
The hospital where I had ds1 and dd had a service precisely for this sort of situation. A specially trained midwife who would go through your notes with you at any point after the birth. I did this 2y after ds1's birth, when I was heavily pg with dd. She spent about 2h with me, listned to me - completely non-judgemental - explained what had happened according to my notes, was forthright about what should or should not have happened. She made a huge difference to my feelings about ds1's birth, and enabled me to get on with dd's birth with confidence rather than fear or anxiety.
My community midwife brought my hospital notes and went through them with me in great detail. It was really helpful to have her explain what was going on at each point and why it happened.
You just can't remember otherwise, and it's so frustrating trying to go back through events and wondering if you did something wrong or you should have stopped something happening and so on, especially as you were a bit busy at the time.
I think I will go through my notes with somebody, probably not for a bit though, as I like order and being able to remember things, it will gnaw at me if I have unanswered questions and grey areas (I know, I know, I'm a control freak)
Hi MamaG - I'm so sorry, I didn't see your post calling for me from ten days ago, was home visiting my mum and didn't spend much time on MN. You've probably gotten all the advice you need from everyone in the last few days - my recommendation would have been to ask the head midwife on the unit where you gave birth, or your GP. How are you doing? I got a copy of my notes 6 weeks after DS was born and where I live, things are bit different so there was no-one to go through them with me and reading about everything that happened to me was pretty awful. I cried for hours after. Probably at 6 weeks post-partum I wasn't ready to read all that anyway. So I think you're right to wait abit until you're ready to go through your notes, as I think no matter who goes through them with you, it will make you relive the experience. Hugs, and again, I'm sorry I didn't see your post. I hope you and HJ are doing well! xxxx
MamaG, only just read your bs. Unfortunately bp problems are side effects of epidurals. There's nothing you could have done to change that, other than not have an epidural. I think that apart from your shock at events you should be pleased at your instincts that something was not right and insisted that they heard you. Well done!
I'm so sad that you experienced this and I'm pleased to see you posting.
I asked my cmw to get my notes and go over them with me a good while after dd's birth. Although I'm not sure if the CMW is the best person. Maybe a mw trained in trauma would be better. Ask if such a person exists in your Trust. I still needed to get copies of my birth records so I did that many months later
. I rang my Mum who set off from Yorkshire to be babysitter and DH got the older DC off to school.
)
) and he sounds utterly gorgeous. 
@ your labour
.
at bloody mw's telling you baby was starving, If they had noticed his tongue tie, maybe you could have had some help with positioning and baby would not have needed to be topped up. I feel for you.
