Birth story - Cathy and baby Willow

*Trigger warning* - post partum pre eclampsia, induction, use of the word contraction, concern over baby's heart rate.

It's probably time to share my first birth story as I'm having a planned C-section with for my second in 2.5 weeks. I didn't share it initially as I struggled post partum with pre eclampsia, carpal tunnel syndrome, tongue-tie and shallow latch then obviously national lockdown. I wouldn't say it was a completely positive experience at the time but looking back I am amazed at what my mind and body was able to endure thanks to breathing techniques learnt with the PBC course. I'm sure a lot of women would see it as positive as I had an unassisted vaginal delivery with gas and air but I felt so out of control. One thing I wish I had known was that the contractions from the pessary can be as frequent and painful as those in active labour but you may only be 1.5 cm dilated which is heartbreaking.

Pregnancy

I had a relatively good pregnancy, no morning sickness at all! I had a few readings of high blood pressure but it always lowered when checked again.

Induction

On the Wednesday morning, I dropped my husband off at the station and had a beautiful sunrise walk with my puppy and planned to meet some new mums to be from the app Peanut at a cafe. I shouldn't have been surprised but when I went to my 38 week appointment my blood pressure was high and the midwife measured my growth as reduced so I was sent to the local hospital to get checked. I got to the car and burst into tears. My birth plan was disappearing before my eyes. My husband rushed over to the hospital and my BP and bloods were checked but the doctor was in surgery so I sent to Worcester Royal 40 mins away.

There was no protein in my urine and my bloods were fine when checked for preeclampsia. I had a very pushy student midwife who said they recommended I was induced. Anyway I wasnt comfortable making that decision with the advice of a student so waited a few hours for the doctor. Meanwhile we read the NICE guidelines and wrote everything down using BRAIN and questions. The doctor was great and we decided to go with the induction. At 9pm I had the pessary inserted which was so painful but the midwife was very kind. I used up breathing to get through all vaginal examinations. I was moved to antenatal ward and my husband J went home for the night. The women in my ward were moaning (signs of things to come for me) so I wasnt able to sleep much. J couldn't sleep either so came back at 4am.

I started to get backache the next day so I was allowed to use one of the rooms in the MLU which was one of the best parts of my induction. We had space to ourselves to rest and express a bit of colostrum. We went for walks and climbed stairs. Contractions were stronger by the evening so the midwife let me go to the pool again but it escalated quite quickly and I couldn't cope with the contractions and I got too cold in the water. No one came to check on us and this was when we thought I was in active labour as the Freya app was saying I was. J felt very out of his depth and asked if my midwife would be coming. I thought I'd be transferred to delivery but when the midwife eventually examined me I was only 1.5cm.

I asked for pethedine but was rejected, it was a really tough night of contractions and shivering as my energy levels had dropped to rock bottom. By the morning the contractions had stopped and a new midwife said they could get me in delivery this morning to break my waters. Unfortunately I just kept getting pushed down to the bottom of the queue. We were moved to another room in postnatal that night with just another mum who was also waiting for a delivery room. I had a much better night's sleep and got into a good headspace. I was woken up in the early morning on Saturday to start getting ready.

Labour

My waters were broken at 7am and I was started on the syntocinon drip. 8am was the shift change so a new midwife called Jo arrived. She was very strong and no nonsense. She got me to change into a hospital gown and told me not to eat anything in case I had to have a c section. Monitor stopped picking up baby's heart rate so had to have a monitor on her head inserted, this was excruciating as my contractions were coming on strong by this point. I used gas and air to get through it but I hated the feeling of loss of control and all the wires attached to me.

We lifted the bed so I could stand and lean against it, used the TENS machine here a lot and hubby tried the gas and air which made us both laugh. I then felt the urge to squat down so got on the bed and held onto the back of the bed on all fours. It then got very intense there was a lot of screaming and the ring of fire is a pretty good description of the head coming out!

Willow was born at 12.55pm. The moment she was passed to me was magical. We had skin to skin and she latched on. We were left in the delivery room for ages which was perfect. Hubby had some skin to skin time while I had a shower! I had a graze and had the injection to deliver the placenta.

I think everyone was expecting me to need a C-section or need interventions like forceps or epidural. I'm so proud of my mind and body and absolutely love my little girl!