Yo Boozers!
Herewith me birf story. Read at your peril!
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In week 41 I had a MW appt for a potential Stretch and Sweep. MW advised that it was not poss to perform the S&S as VE confirms cervix is firmly closed. Do not pass go. Do not collect £200.
On Day 3 of week 41 ? I had a consultant appt at hossie. Dr AKA Poison Dward informs me I am being booked in for induction. They will not monitor me. Policy is 14 days late and the bubs must be out. We ask for another VE/S&S. Dr is complete madam with hand of jagged glass! Confirms cervix is still firmly closed. Locked down tighter than Alcatraz. Much confusion between me and HI as to next steps.
Day 5 of week 41 I had a third MW appt for Stretch and Sweep. Again MW advised that its not poss to perform as VE confirms cervix is firmly closed. Me and HI wonder if our dates are correct. MW informs me that at that moment in time that obs show myself and the baby are healthy. She cannot advise me on being induced as its my decision. I leave in tears as veh confuggled and dont know what to do. Decide to go to hossie and see what they say.
So we turn up to the hospital for a discussion about things but as far as they are concerned I am there to be induced and therefore that same evening I am subjected to another VE (that?s four so far in as many days) and again I am told that my cervix is very high up and very much not even thinking about birthing this child. In goes the ProPess. I found this very uncomfortable and using the loo was horrid as I could feel the urine running down the tag of the pessary on to my leg. So I quickly put on some underwear with a panty liner! I am also monitored throughout the evening and it seems I am already contracting but cannot feel them. My BP and MBs heartbeat is all good.
Next morning contractions start. I was getting them in my back. Not regular and not strong. I could still walk and talk fine. So when HI arrived we went for a walk round the hossie to see if we could give labour a helping hand. We walked past the postnatal ward to see this woman, her hubs and baby leaving. Well this woman could hardly walk and I mean hardly. She was hanging on to the wall. She spotted us and said in a very weak voice ?Its all worth it, it really is?. Well seeing her put the fear of god in to me.
That afternoon the contractions started to wear off. Once the pessary had been in 24hrs it was removed and that was the end of my contractions.
Next morning, another VE. Cervix still shut to visitors. I am administered the gel and was told I would be monitored for 8 hours but if no contractions start within the next 20 mins then chances are nothing would happen. Indeed nothing did happen. So another VE that evening and more monitoring and the Dr tells me I will be seen by a consultant the next morning.
Next morning Consultant pitches up and does another VE (yep, VE number 7) and I am told cervix still closed and that I am going to have to have a El CS that same day. I ask if I can have monitoring and I am told no. Its hospital policy all babies must not exceed 14 days overdue. This was about 11am and I was told no further food or drink and that all they could tell me was that I would be called to theatre at some point and they cant be more precise than that as the Labour ward is very very busy. So it?s a waiting game.
I had very very mixed emotions about the CS. I felt a fraud and a failure for not being able to go into labour naturally. HI reassured me I wasn?t and that I could have had a 30 odd hour labour and still have a CS which would be just as traumatic.
HI turns up at lunchtime and so we wait together. I try and sleep to pass the time and rest up. Not easy when you resemble the size of the Mary Celeste.
That afternoon a MW comes and takes bloods and puts in a canula ? blood everywhere! Useless woman. HI is told to take off my nail varnish which he does.
Eventually at 6pm we get taken to the labour ward and get deposited in a delivery room. The room has no bed. It does have a hard wooden rocking chair and a preggo ball. So HI and I keep switching seats as neither is comfortable for long.
A new Head MW comes on shift and to be blunt she is horrid. She is bloody rude to HI. If he asks a question, she tells me the answer! She wouldn?t look at him or acknowledge him except to bark orders about where to put my luggage and even then she tells him he is doing it all wrong!! She gets HI to prepare me! Eg shave my bikini line. I must have been to the loo twenty times thru nerves.
Finally over four and half hours later I finally go thru to theatre and by this time I am so thirsty, so tired, so anxious and basically a complete wreck as its 11pm and I should be sound a sleep as being a preggo is tiring work.
As soon as I sit on the bed to have my spinal I am in tears! The drucks lady is veh veh nice despite me being a pathetic patient and not relaxing and not doing things right but eventually I do chill out and the drucks are in. I then am told to wiggle round on the bed as I feel my bottom go hot (didn?t feel this and had visions of being one of these people who could feel everything but would not be able to tell anyone! Over active imaginiation?? Moi??? Surely not!!). Also the canula that had been put in earlier was useless and it was taken out and redone.
I then have to lean back flat on my back which as any heavily preggo knows is absolutely vile. Makes me feel very strange and vulnerable. They then tilt the bed to the left and to me it felt like a mahoosive tilt and I was like ?ooooohhhhhh? as tho I was on a rollercoaster! Hilarious. Then I began to feel sick.. Told HI to tell the nice drucks lady, so she gave me a bowl and wedged it under my ear. So I told her I had a phobia about vomming and she gave me a nice injection to take away the vommness and it did. She said she had the same phobia. HI said that immediately the colour came back in my face.
So about 10mins in HI says they are pushing my tum to get all the water out and then all of a sudden I could hear the baby cry. Which made me cry. More. HI went to discover what flavour we had. He came back and showed me the photos on his phone of the baby being wiped down and that we had a boy! We were chuffed but also in a quandry as we couldn?t decide on a name. The n MB was placed next to me but I couldn?t really see him. We didn?t get skin to skin and HI wasn?t allowed to cut the cord and they would permit the cord to stop pulsating before they cut it. Basically my entire wishlist was ignored.
I couldn?t believe MB was here finally. Couldn?t take my eyes off the bit of him I could see. Was desperate to look at him properly and to see what ?my baby? looked like. I couldn?t believe he was such a big un too! Its due to him being tall rather than a chunker.
HI then watched as they sewed me up layer by layer which took about 40mins. HI said it was strange seeing me on the table with my tummy being held wide open during the whole procedure and that it hit him then that it?s a major operation.
We got taken to the delivery room that we were initially waiting in and the MW came in and put MB on my breasts to feed him. Amazingly enough when he was all wrapped up after just being born he was smacking his lips and poking his tongue out so he was already hungry! The initial feeds were successful and once I was given the all clear I was taken to the post natal ward with MB.
HI eventually left at 3am and I was left all alone with MB.
My aftercare was shocking. Totally lacking. In short, cos I am sure you are bored of reading now! I was told off for not feeding MB, even though a MW told me not to worry as he had just been born and had been BF recently and would not need anything else for quite awhile. I was also told off for not drinking enough fluids. However, thats cos the staff when they came in to monitor me kept moving the tray table!!
The next incident was that I collapsed on the ward and nearly smacked my head on the floor luckily some random man caught me as I screamed HI?s name as I fell backwards. I had an upset stomach and the MWs ignored my pleas that I needed the loo. They insisted it was wind. I said it wasn?t. Cos they were faffing around and didn?t sort out my catheter bag quick enough I was tied to the bed and in the end that?s where I went to the loo. It seems I either picked up a bug or reacted to something. Anyways the lovely MWs (not) took me to the loo and left me there to clean myself up. Yep. Half paralysed from the boobs down, lightheaded from my collapse, in agony from the surgery and I am left to tidy myself up. Totally humiliating, I have never cried so much in the space of two days!!!
I was left in the dirty support stockings for over 4hrs despite HI asking SEVERAL times for clean ones as they really weren?t nice. Made me feel ill and made me paranoid as I was on a busy ward and I was so conscious of the other mothers and the mess I had gotten into.
In the end HI asked a staff nurse who literally went to the cupboard opposite my bed and handed him clean ones to put on me. We wanted to scream!
HI spent the first day changing MB as I couldn?t do a thing. I was in such a state.
Later that day I was moved to a private room which was nice tho I was still in a lot of pain and was finding it hard to see to MB. Getting out of bed was a bit of a task and don?t ask me how I managed it, esp as I still had my yellow handbag to work around.
So the next evening I couldn?t take any more and asked for some painkillers. Again long story short, I ended up bed ridden due to the pain and couldn?t even move out of my position due to the agony. The MW and Dr came in to see me and profusely apologise as they had just seen in my notes that I had not had any pain relief for 36hrs when I should have been having pain relief every 6 hours without fail. Can you believe it? I bloody couldn?t. HI and I were furious and it wasn?t til the next day that the pain relief finally kicked in and began to work.
I?ll call my birf story quits here as you are all probably bored and MB is about to wake up!!!!!!!