Birth story - Emma and baby Māhi

*Trigger warning* - use of word contractions, episiotomy

My gorgeous little girl made a very unexpected appearance on the 9th May. My waters had ruptured at 30w 4d, so I was pre warned that I may go into early labour. Luckily I didn’t go into labour within the first 48 hours of my waters breaking; and was an outpatient being regularly checked for growth scans and observations for both baby and I.

From 34 weeks, I started feeling period like cramps in the evenings that were on and off, mainly in the evening but was self managing with up and down breathing and paracetamol. On the 8th May evening I used my tens machine and paracetamol for the irregular surges I would get from approximately 8pm-6am. They were more intense but still manageable. On the 9th May at 1:30pm, I went to hospital because my amniotic fluid on my pad had changed colour, and I wanted the dr to check if I had developed an infection. When he checked my cervix he was absolutely shocked to see my babies head and told me my cervix was 10cm dilated and ready for pushing!!! I was put into my own room to get ready to have our bubba. Shocked and so confused, I was settled and into my room by roughly 3:30pm. 3 other doctors came to check as they couldn’t believe it, as I wasn’t in agonising pain and showing signs that I was fully dilated. My husband and I were so confused, excited, nervous, that this was all happening so quickly. Luckily our hospital bags were in the car so Steve rushed out to grab them all. He then put up fairy lights with pictures of our little girl attached to the light clips from her 4D scan. Our birthing playlist was all set up on the speakers and galaxy light was on.

I made sure that I continued to keep hydrated with lucazade sport and my husband fed me some Percy pigs in between surges for energy😆 I found it hard to identify when I was contracting, because my cramps felt more like mild period pains and miraculously they were not intense. I kept having to remind myself that my body was designed to do this! I had no time for pain relief even if I wanted it. Thankfully my body did what it needed to do with the help of the hormone drip to intensify the frequency of my contractions, up and down breathing and the help of a suction cup (as her head was unfortunately facing sideways). Prior to pushing, I needed an episiotomy as my birth canal was too narrow. The dr numbed me so didn’t feel the incision. This didn’t hurt.

After an hour and a half of on and off pushing, we welcomed our preemie princess Māhi into the world at 20:12pm on 9th May 💜she let out the sweetest cry and this was such a relieving feeling. Skin to skin felt amazing and I was just so proud of all of us.

I was then given the injection to birth my placenta. After one push I birthed the placenta and this was such a relieving feeling!! It actually felt nice to birth it😆I needed stitches for my episiotomy and had a couple of puffs of gas and air to get me through this. But gas and air wasn’t doing much for me so just breathed in for 4 and out for 8.

Finally everything was sorted and baby girl was taken for checkups. She was then taken to neonatal as she was premature. No major complications, just needed to gain a little more weight. I really enjoyed giving birth and would do it all again in a heartbeat. Mamas you can do it. Just believe in yourself! xx