Birth story - Lois and baby Sofia

*Trigger warning* - mentions induction, contraction, second degree tear, stitches, sick

Pregnancy -

From 8 weeks onwards I suffered with lots of sickness majority of the day all the way until 22 weeks. Unable to keep anything down and lived off plain pasta and chips! I had 2 episodes of reduced movements however everything was always ok. All in all I really enjoyed pregnancy especially towards the end of the second trimester onwards.

On Saturday 30th July (due date) I had a sweep, I started with some cramping and also had a bit of blood after but nothing happened.

Monday 1st August -

At 10:30pm I was walking upstairs to bed when I felt a wet sensation, it felt like I had wet myself a little. I got into bed and again felt like I had wet myself. I then thought could this be my waters breaking. It was just a constant trickle for the next hour or 2. I went back downstairs to bounce on the ball to try and get things started.

After a few hours nothing happened and I decided to go to bed and get some rest. That night I struggled to sleep waiting for contractions to start, I woke at 6am and nothing! I went to get checked at my local hospital and they confirmed waters had broken and I was 3cm so if I didn’t go into labour by 7am on Wednesday 3rd I would be induced.

36 hours since waters breaking and still labour hadn’t started and I was told a bed was available. I honestly felt so betrayed by my body for not going into labour naturally after my waters breaking.

Wednesday 3rd August -

I arrived at hospital for induction at 12:30pm and requested wireless monitoring, they dimmed the lights for me and provided stool/birthing ball. By 3pm I was examined and was 3cm, the midwife’s then tried to break any remaining waters which was very intense, I used gas and air which massively helped and then at 4pm the drip started!

For the first 2 hours I was breathing through contractions using my up breathing and wasn’t in too much pain. As they intensified I then started using the ball and then gas and air. By 7:30 I was having no break from contractions and having 5/6 every 10 minutes, at this point I asked for the morphine injection, 2 more contractions came and I changed my mind and asked for an epidural (something which I really didn’t want) the midwife’s asked to examine me whilst they were waiting for the anaesthetist, just as they arrived I was told I was fully dilated.

I had been on the drip 4 hours and was ready to start pushing. The midwife’s turned down my drip and a different pushing sensation started to kick in, I just couldn’t get the hang of it, even trying my down breathing and coached pushing. 1 hour 30 minutes later the doctor came to check in and confirmed if there was no progress by 10pm (2 hours pushing) then he would perform an instrumental delivery as me and baby were becoming tired.

Baby’s heart rate was taking a lot longer to recover so I agreed for them to place a clip on baby’s head, the midwife’s then wanted me to stay laid on my back pushing which I really didn’t want as I was more uncomfortable this way.

I then started to feel baby’s head pushing down which spurred me on. At this point a number of midwife’s and doctors came into the room as baby was very distressed. I was told 1 more push and if baby’s head wasn’t delivered I would have an episiotomy. This really made me push with everything I had, I instantly felt the ring of fire!!! With the next push baby was born and placed on my chest and we started to enjoy skin to skin.

A few minutes after this my placenta was delivered and then I started losing a lot of blood. I was then given lots of drugs through the drip whilst examined and stitched up.

I honestly felt so out of it, I had no idea what was happening I had a second degree internal tear and grazing. Stitching took around 30 minutes.

In total I was in labour 6 hours. 4 hours contracting and 2 pushing. It was all very quick and I really was out of it for a good 6 hours afterwards and so thankful for my partner for supporting me when he must have been petrified seeing all the midwife’s etc working on me and also having to care for our new baby.

Due to blood loss I was in hospital 2 nights and couldn’t wait to get home. By around day 5 I started to feel so much better and the swelling reduced. It was all so worth it and I would do it all again in a heartbeat but hopefully if we do have any more children my body can labour naturally.