Hi and thanks for all your good wishes - been home a week today and things are going really well. Phoebe is feeding well and has even been sleeping through the night the majority of the week. She's such a placid wee baby!
So, the details of her arrival: I went into hopital to be induced on Monday 12th September at 11am. My parents went in with me as DH had to go to Edinburgh to sit surgical exams that morning (we're still waiting for the results). Things were started off at around 12.30pm and things seemed to be going well with regular contractions throughout Monday. DH arrived back monday afternoon and eventually went home late monday night to get some sleep as although things seemed to be happening it wasn't imminent.
By Tuesday morning everything had stopped and I was given a second lot of prostin. Despite the regular contractions Monday, examination showed that nothing had changed - cervix still not fwd and no dilation. Many laps of the corridors and hospital grounds later, I started having contractions again late Tuesday afternoon. Unfortunately the labour ward was very busy and they were unable to admit me so my waters could be broken. DH stayed with me on the induction ward and by the early hours of Weds morning things really seemed to be moving. Still unable to go to the labour ward, we tried various things like a bath to ease things a bit - had so far just been using my tens machine. Eventually got up to the labour ward around 8am ish - to be honest things are pretty hazy from here on in - the morphine I was given made me very sleepy and I was really sore by this point.
To cut a long story short I had my waters broken shortly after arriving on the labour ward and was given a syntocin drip to push things along. I failed to progress throughout Weds - only reached 4/5 cm dilation and they also realised that Phoebe was lying back to back with me. By this point I'd had more morphine and an epidural, and was really struggling. It was decided by the docs on the evening ward round that an emergency c-section was needed and that I wasn't going to manage by myself. It was a strange mixture of relief, sadness and a sense of failure at this point (irrational I know) but I was exhausted and just wanted dd to be ok - was taken down to theatre around 8pm ish. All a bit of a shock really - eneded up having a full spinal block as my epidural wasn't complete and I was really scared I'd be able to feel stuff. The team that did the c-section were great - DH had worked with some of them previously and we were very well looked after. Phoebe was born at 8.35pm and once they'd wrapped her up she was handed to me - got to keep her with me through recovery and on up to the ward.
Whilst I was still in hospital, one of the mw's went over my notes with me to try and help me get my head around things. It looks like a combination of having a bi-cornate uterus and baby being back to back,meant that I wasn't going to manage without help. Mw also indicated that I may well need a c-section for any future pg's - will cross that one when we come to it though. All in all it really felt like we'd been through the mill. We've been really blessed to have various family members visit who've looked after us well and DH's work were able to get a locum to cover his shifts this last week so he could be at home with me and Phoebe. Still have large gaps of time from the induction/c-section missing but am gradually putting things together chatting with DH.
Today is the first day it's been just me and Phoebe - some friends bought us some lunch to the house this afternoon so we've had a bit of company - it's been tiring being on my own but good too. Am loving beign a Mum !