Baby Paul arrived on Friday 29th July at 08.19, one day early. I was a little unprepared as my previous two were both late so was rushing round packing my bags etc when labour started. He was 7lbs 3 1/2 oz so only a little on the small side (after having to have an extra scan due to a small bump) and otherwise very healthy. ds and dd are a little wary of him at the moment but certainly not jealous.
Things kicked off very slowly on Tuesday night with some twinges which continued all through Wednesday and at tea-time I had a show and mild contractions and phoned the hospital who told me to go in the following afternoon. Went in Thursday afternoon and was in the early stages of labour but not far enough to warrant staying in so was sent home. Things moved on a bit that evening and finally went in at 1.30am on Friday. However some problems arose. I never dilated further than 3 cms and started to lose blood including a rather yukky blood clot which got the medical staff concerned. They left me for a bit to try and labour more on my own but said that a caesarean section may be necessary. I have to say it was rather hard to labour on a very uncomfortable bed with a monitor strapped to me. Also after being in labour since Wednesday I was very tired. They started me on a drip to bring on the contractions which seemed to be working but the baby?s heart rate dropped suddenly and the decision was made to take me to theatre for a CS. I had to have a general anaesthetic because my blood pressure was rather low (a local anaesthetic can lower blood pressure). However it was all very fast so I didn?t have time to get scared. I was told afterwards that there was a risk of placental abruption where the placenta comes away and therefore causes a lot of bleeding and obviously cuts oxygen to the baby. This may not have happened but it?s a question of weighing up the risks and I think the right decision was made. Also with my waters broken the risk of infection was increasing all the time. I was obviously disappointed not to have had a natural birth after ds and dd's births being so easy but must be thankful that the procedure went very smoothly with of course a good outcome. It was just plain old bad luck.
However Paul came out crying lustily and perfect in every way. I was only in theatre for about 20 mins and Paul was handed over to dh immediately. It took about 20 mins for me to come round and I felt fine although obviously very sleepy. I had a few tubes sticking out of me but they didn?t hurt and were taken out the next day. I had to spend the whole of that first day in bed, mostly sleeping but Paul was tucked in beside me and I was able to feed him myself lying down. He was quite cosy beside me and just slept mostly himself. One advantage of the CS was that I had my own room with ensuite bathroom in a very quiet part of the hospital. So I made the most of my stay and enjoyed the time alone with Paul. On Saturday I was able to get up and gradually got more mobile and now feel really well apart from the obvious discomfort.
It feels great to be back home and all together at last. dh is off this week on paternity leave so can give me a hand. Paul is an incredibly easy baby to look after ? he hardly cries and breastfeeding has been so easy. He is of course absolutely beautiful too and a really lovely early 40th birthday present!