June 2013 - thread 9 - not many babies left to arrive now :-)

[MrsBri]

New thread as we appear to be talking a fair bit!

Lets hope we've all given birth by the end of this one :-)

Hello. Quick update - baby bungle was born yesterday morning at 2:30am, about 9 hours after my waters broke. Quite a quick labour, but unpleasant because my epidural didn't work first time and there was no time to try again. Baby decided to be back to back (after being side-on all through pregnancy!) so I ended up having a ventouse delivery when his heart rate dropped.

All fine in the end and we're learning about breadtfeeding together. Suspect he might turn out to be good at the trumpet in later life - he has a powerful set of chops on him!

Congrats to the new parents since I was last on here, and positive vibes for the Mums-in-waiting!

learner - that elf has a lot to answer for!! think if a lot of us could track him down he'd have a few questions to answer!!

congrats bungle - hope you are enjoying snuggles.

feeling reAlly irrationally grrr at everything right now. no reason for it just feel like I could do with a good shout.

dp has booked me a facial and massage tomorrow which is ever so
nice of him - makes me feel worse for wanting to bite his head off right now.

congrats on the new arrival, Ethan is doing well with the combination feeding, taking me for 20 minutes, then ebm 10-20 ml then bottle about 50 no, sometimes starting as little as an hour and a half after finishing the last feed, sometimes getting to the 3-3.5 hours that we are waking him at so hopefully the weight will start coming back on.nicely now

Congratulations hawkmoth and bungle! Lovely news!

I'm glad your appt went well babybeann!

Mine wasn't quite as positive really. Baby is fine which is the most important thing obviously but its been quite an emotional afternoon. After an hours wait for appt ( better than I'd expected) went in. He had a good poke around my belly (and i mean GOOD- thought he was digging!)and told me that this little one is breech :-(
So I'm booked in for c section next weds when I'll be 40+8 as they can't fit me in earlier!!!! Have pre op on mon. All of this is of course assuming that nothing starts up before then. If it does he helpfully informed me that I'd need to get to hospital asap to avoid giving natural birth to breech baby and so that I can have emcs in time. To say it was a shock and I'm panicking is an understatement! So I've rapidly gone from wishing symptoms on, to praying they don't arrive at all! Or if they do, then I recognise them quickly enough. Bloody hell!

Can you describe the sensations you had when you started labour? I didn't have natural onset last time so am panicking I won't realise early enough!

He also added that if baby turns now they won't do caesarean.

Sorry for long posts- my head's all over the place.

can't they do a scan to make sure ami? surely it's unusual thing for bubs to turn so late?

the only sign for me was a bit of back ache about an hour before my waters broke, id lost a bit of my mucous plug earlier in the day, then I stood up and thought I'd peed myself but it wasn't wee

Thanks stef- it's good to have a description like that! Thank you!

That's what I don't get- surely scanning me today would make sense?! Had presentation scan about 4 wks ago and she was head down but I did have a night or so of properly crazy movement and was also feeling her hiccups quite high up after that. Mentioned it to midwife last wk and this but she just said it was nothing. The joys!

can't be any help ami as Was induced and wasn't feeling anything before then. but wanted to send a hug. can well understand your head being all over the place.
I'd be phoning the midwife at any twinge to be on the safe side. I tellnyou these babies cause analog
of worry - just as well they are worth it!!

Congratulations to all the lovely new baby's. Well done ladies

AIGM what a shock! I'm not surprised your all over the place. It's not something you expect to be told at such a stage. Contractions for me start in my back and underneath. I begin to feel like its all tightening up and it keeps getting tighter and tighter like I'm being constricted right round to my whole bump and comes with discomfort then pain. It's sticks around for a bit then starts to loosen off. The pain can be either in my back/front or both and becomes more intense. I also have constant back ache and period pains. The back ache can throb when I sit down.

After a little snooze, a bit of time with dh and a baking/bathroom cleaning/bed changing session I've started loosing my plug , no blood or bleeding yet. Back to getting contractions again. Not regular or frequent but they are there.

We plan to have an early night in clean sheets and hoping for some good sleep!

Oh dear AmI - not what you want to hear. Our hospital in Edinburgh is happy to deliver breech babies naturally but I know not all hospitals retain those skills.

For me I had back pain in my lower back for days, I then started to lose my plug for a couple of days. When contractions started they felt quite pathetic and took me a couple of hours to convince myself they were contractions. However i had a back to back baby so things took a looooong time to ramp up I.e. it was 3 days of contractions before my little lady put in an appearance.

Thank you for your support ladies and for the really helpful descriptions of what it felt like for you. I really appreciate it. I know it wouldn't feel the same for everyone but if I can get lots of descriptions then it should really help when/ if it happens ( see- I'm trying to stay optimistic with the 'if'!) Slowly trying to get my head around things.

Cupcakes- I hope the clean bed sheets are enough of a temptation for baby to want to make an appearance for you!

Poor you AIGM - that must have been a real shock. Hope that the baby stays put for you so the c-section can go to plan x

Thank you pepp!

How did your appt go?

Iam- what a shock! You poor thing your head must be all over the place. I no its not what you wanted but at least you found out today and not when you go in to labour. I hope baby stays put for you. Sending big hugs!

Pep- what happened for you?

It went ok thanks...she didn't want to give me a sweep as they were short staffed and clearly trying to get people out the door as fast as possible, so she asked me to make an appointment for next week. I burst into tears, so she took pity on me (she had SPD when she was pregnant, so was quite sympathetic!) and gave me the sweep. Bit pathetic of me!

Apparently my cervix is mid-posterior, 'not very thick', softening, and 1cm dilated. Not sure if that's good, but i guess it means things are on the way at least? She was quite gentle with the sweep though - I barely felt it - and no signs since then so I'm not sure it's worked. Another one booked for Tuesday.....

AmI that really sucks - Millie was a suspected breech for a month of appointments then we got her scanned and it turned out she just had a boney bottom. The first on call midwife who came out on the morning of my labour even said she felt very breech-like, so I'm really surprised they aren't scanning to make sure as it seems an easy mistake to make? (Our local antenatal/EPU unit do this, the kit seems more basic than other scans)

While we weren't sure what was up our CMW was discussing options with us, she said home birth and MLU would be out, however apparently the local MLU very regularly deliver undiagnosed breeches, apparently it's now recommended breech births are quite hands off anyway and the transfer rates are low. The local CLU will "allow" you to try and give birth naturally, they just like you to be on all fours on a bed so they can see what's going on, so that's what we were looking at doing.

This is all just to say breech doesn't have to mean scary/no-no, if there aren't any other risk factors do you maybe have the option of going to a different hospital where they might be more positive about it? Might then take the pressure off the whole EMCS scenario if you're really nervous about that.

Good luck, hopefully it will all go to plan with your CS anyway, or your baby might turn in an obvious way in the meantime making this all moot!

congratulations hawkmoth and bungle!!

pepp - I think in those circumstances, tears are definitely justified. Especially if you get the result you need!

AmI - sorry to hear about the breech. Can the baby really have turned so late? It does sound a bit rubbish that they can't scan to confirm for you, or can you tell yourself which way they are lying? As for symptoms, can't comment with number 1 as it was long and drawn out and involved pitocin, but with number 2, I found it hard to tell. I had BH all day (which I'd had lots since ~20 wks) which didn't seem any more intense than usual, didn't seem to spread round my back, and times varied from 4-15 mins apart, so not what I would call regular. I thought contractions would be more regular. I lost a tiny bit of mucous plug (like just streaks of red globby stuff in the shower). I did have a slight bit of diarrhea. But I only properly realised I was in labour when the contractions started hurting much more, i.e. actually painful rather than just uncomfortable. By which point it was obviously quite late on as she was born a few hours later. Not sure if that helps but I suppose if I were in your position as soon as contractions were somewhat regular even if not painful I'd call the hospital.

babybeann - glad you've got a date to look forward to!

things are settling down here with the toddler. doing my best to go out each morning to wear him out, either for an hour to the playground while dd is sleeping, or this morning taking her with us in the sling. he's behaving better now he's rested but has in the last few days started hitting/kicking when we don't let him do something. urgh. according to dr google he's 'testing boundaries'. need to get my nerve up to go further afield as the playground is going to get boring for both of us very soon, it's just hard trying to work out what to do if i need to BF when we're out and don't have hands free to restrain/entertain toddler.

AmI, the same thing happened to me recently; they discovered late on that baby was breech and not long afterwards I had a section. We suspect baby was breech for a while but that the midwife hadn't spotted it, as I hadn't felt any large movements and he midwife only decided that baby might be breech at the last minute during the final check (she'd told me baby was head down a couple of minutes earlier!). She referred us for a scan as she wasn't sure. To be fair to the midwife, the consultant we saw before the scan couldn't tell either, so the scan confirmed it (they weren't sure if it was baby's head or a bony bum!) I was really upset and in shock when I found out baby was breech as I really didn't want a c-section, but as I have posted before, I had an amazing experience and would definitely choose a planned section again, so try not to worry about that side of it.

Thank you all so much! This is such a supportive thread and I'm really appreciating everyone's advice and general empathising.

I am now getting my head around the c section ( still hoping for elective rather than emergency though!) But it does seem a little crazy still that no scan was ordered yesterday to check it out. I guess he must have felt pretty certain but thought he might have scanned anyway seeing as the last scan 3-4 wks ago said head down.
I think that as I've now gotten my head around elcs, if they turn around and change it again, I might well have a meltdown.

Pepp I'm so glad that they caved and did the sweep for you. It's good that your consultant was sympathetic in the end. And I wouldn't worry about tears- they're a regular occurrence throughout the day for majority of people at this stage of pregnancy I reckon!

Aloha I'm glad that things are getting there with your DS. It must be really difficult but you sound like you're coping really well- well done!

ami - would it be worth phoning mw and asking if it would be possible to have a scan to double check what bubs is up to?
I would have thought they would rather that and know for sure and avoid an emcs unless it was really needed.

aloha - ah testing boundaries... don't forget with the move as well he has a lot of New boundaries to test!! he will settle back down. and don't worry that it's the New baby/move that's
'caused' it - he could well have been about to go through this without anything having changed!

violets been an hour early with everything over night, has confused Me no end.

Maybe she thinks the clocks have changed?!

The mw is coming to the house this morning as I have to have a bp check. Funnily enough, after the news yesterday my bp was sky high. Will see what she says.

Can they change back now?!

Surprising about the bp yesterday! Hope it's settled today and that the MW can reassure things a bit more

Good luck amI - I would definitely try asking for a scan! But I'm so pleased your head is in the right place whatever happens, that's really positive for you and LO.

OMFG.... Afterpains! 'Nuff said

This isn't a smug brag more of a wtf has happened to the world. It's half 11 and we are all up dressed, had breakfast, done the hoovering, dusted, tidied, put washing away, put washing on, cleaned the bathrooms and done the dishes. How the hell did that happen?! Still the dog has just come back from her walk and dripped crud all over the floor so will have to Hoover again but I'm still feeling very chuffed with myself.

We're introducing Lily to her great grandfather today. Hoping for a good day as he is getting increasingly confused and can get quite stressed.