I woke up on Saturday at 6:30am with a slight pain in my lower abdomen and thought maybe I was constipated. After a fruitless trip to the loo, I decided to have a shower, and realised I was in fact having contractions. They then came thick and fast. At 7:23 I thought, as I was finishing stuffing last-minute items into my bag, that I should time them: every 3mins
Left the house at 7:45am, arrived at the hospital at 7:50am, with the car sporting a fetching souvenir of DH's panic-stricken collision with a barrier while parking. Contractions every 40 seconds.
Someone found a MW, and she asked if I wanted to go into a bedroom or labour room, took one look at me and answered her own question. I had time to get undressed and lie down, she examined me and announced in shocked tones, "Fully dilated, your baby is here, you can start pushing." She then stuck 2 acupuncture needles in the sides of my little toes to help speed up the afterbirth. In spite of being in the throes of full labour, I said "ow" each time.
The MW whose shift began at 8 came in, bent down to look at me, poked me with a finger and recieved my waters all over her chest and neck. Pausing between pushes and yells, I said very Britishly "Oh, excusez-moi", which caused great hilarity. A couple of huge pushes, accompanied by much howling and shouts of "I can't do it", and Alexandre was born at 8:17am, less than 2 hours after the first twinge, 27 mins after arriving at the maternity hospital.
No pain relief, no episiotomy, no after effects, nothing but a huge feeling of triumph. Except when the MW ending her shift accidentally stumbled against one of the acupuncture needles still sticking out of my feet, for which I could have murdered her!
Alex had the cord round his neck, but was put on me straight away and soon recovered, was on my breast after an hour, pooed meconium all over me, and is a beauty.
3.425kg, 50cm long, blonde hair, blue eyes, and a fine line in cooing and snuffling noises. He's feeding like a trooper, and sleeping quite well, too. Long may it last.
I have minor grazes and that is it; I wanted to go home that afternoon, but had to stay in for the regulatory 3 days as there were no senior doctors around over Easter weekend to give me exceptional leave to go home, though the MW said there was no reason to stay, as I was up and walking around a few hours after the birth. So am just back. But the staff were lovely, very supportive but not intrusive, and the whole experience was fantastic.
An amazing contrast to DS1's birth, which involved epidural, episiotomy, horrible stitches and a baby who was whisked away from me at birth to be "heated up" on a glorified plate warmer, so I spent the night without him wondering if I had really given birth and what my baby looked like.
I am still buzzing, and so extraordinarily happy. If all births were like that, we'd each have 10 kids! And a very, very positive experience of birth in France, to counterbalance some other tales.