Hi All,
Well instead of joining the 'due any day club' I'm a FTM. My waters went on Friday early afternoon (38+6) after spending a few hours being convinced I was wetting myself, and continuing working, it turned pink so I called my OH to come home.
We sorted oursleves and went to the hopsital about 18.00, waters and plug confirmed but as i wasn't having no contractions and wasn't ditated/effaced we were told to go home and sleep, and come back the next day. I decided the 2hr drive home didn't sound fun so we went to a hotel, and out for a pizza, about 11pm the contractions were too bad for me to cope let alone sleep so back to the hospital. I was already 3cm dialted and about 1am got a mobile epidural, which was not entirely successful as my right hip still had contraction pains which gradually got worse. So it was lots of walking around then until 5am (6cm), then the MW decided to put me on a drip as I was getting tired. It turned out that wasn't so bad after all, the contractions were more frequent but intially no more painful. At this point the only help was OH pressing on my hip to counteract the pains (lots of bruises now).
I was then checked again at 7.10am by a new MW and told I was 6cm (although she said maybe I was 7cm after she saw my disapointed face). So I got up again to lean on the standing frame, cried lots about the slow progress and pain, and then about the fact that I had hours to go and couldn't cope - turned out that was transition. About 7.20am his head dropped, so they gave me the gas and air - which they had been saving for when transition started. The MW panicked a bit asking me to get on the bed which I couldn't have done if my life had depended on it, so I stayed standing/swinging off the stand, 3 pushes later and out he dropped. A little dramatic for the MW's and staff as it was first for them, but very nice of them to let me birth as I needed to. And a local anesthetic and 3 stiches later, they brought us sandwiches and tea, while I fed our healthy, happy boy.
Hope it goes as well for the others on here waiting,
(PS, for other FTM's, beforehand I was wondering how the actual birth felt, turns out it was like having the biggest sh*t of my life.)