Birth story - Paula and baby Dominic

*Trigger warning* - Miscarriage description, induction, tear.

Pregnancy

I didn’t know whether to write our story as I’m in a country where women don’t necessarily get the option to advocate for their choices in pregnancy but with the positive birth community and the strategies practised with hypnobirthing it was a much more positive experience than it would have been without this information.

I was 40 when I realised that I was pregnant again. In the previous 6 years before I’d been trying with my husband which resulted in 3 miscarriages. The first miscarriage was a straightforward miscarriage, the second was more complicated with a D and C as the placenta didn’t come away cleanly and I nearly died from blood loss. I was put in a public hospital and abandoned in a ward without familial access and I couldn’t speak the language at the time and I bled out unconscious for 6 hours before they took me for surgery. And finally a missed miscarriage which needed surgery to remove at around 16 weeks.

After the final miscarriage I underwent a lot of testing to see what the problem was but they couldn’t find an issue. I then split from my husband and thought that my time had passed to have children. Then with my new partner I became pregnant again just after my 40th birthday. This was almost exactly 3 years after my last miscarriage.

So in the first few days of January I went to the local health centre to say I was pregnant and the first reactions of the doctors was shock as I was 40, overweight and it’s uncommon here for women to have their first child at this age so they thought I was crazy.

I was given a scan in the health centre at 12 weeks and everything seemed to be ok. I didn’t have any sickness and everything seemed to be proceeding as normal. I was booked in with a specialist at the hospital at 14 weeks for a more in depth scan as I had a high risk pregnancy. Again everything was fine I was told the sex of our baby and then 3 weeks later I flew back to the U.K. for a visit to see my mum and give her the happy news.

My pregnancy proceeded with no apparent complications until week 26.

I went for a glucose test for gestational diabetes. They do the testing slightly differently than in the U.K. so they don’t run the test for longer if you’re outside the parameters. I was 1 microgram over the threshold for the limit on the second hour so I was classed as having gestational diabetes and so then had to go for weekly check ups at the health centre.

I asked to run the test again and that wasn’t an option but I bought a glucose kit and tested 4 times a day throughout the pregnancy and I was never over the normal limits, nor did I have any symptoms, so for me I didn’t think I had gestational diabetes.

I had to have extra scans because of all the high risk factors and these showed that my baby was in the 78th percentile in size/ weight so he was going to be a big baby.

At 30 weeks I bought the Hypnobirthing Pack and started that and I felt more empowered about my options and being able to advocate for myself. I enrolled in a private hospital where I could have my partner with me (as it is not the norm here) and as I was worried about complications because he was going to be big and I’d had such a horrible experience in the public hospital before.

Everything proceeded as normal, I had a little pelvic pain from week 32 onwards but nothing too uncomfortable I didn’t really start to show until week 34.

At week 37 I went for my routine check up and the doctor announced that I had to go immediately to hospital to be induced as according to the ministry of health I was overdue due to being high risk.

I knew I didn’t want this as I wanted to try and have him as naturally as possible and I’d had a very straightforward pregnancy as far as I was concerned, I felt good so I said I didn’t want that. I had to sign a lot of forms to say that was not what I wanted and I was going against advise from the ministry of health.

I did find this very stressful but I was using my BRAIN, I asked lots of questions and they all thought I was crazy but I was worried about being stressed, my options being taken away from me and the induction not proceeding and ending up having intervention or a Cesarean.

I got the feeling that it wasn’t normal that people ask a lot of questions as all the answers given were very one sided and I don’t think many people make their own decisions.

But I still felt good, I’d done a lot of research, spoken to doctors in the U.K. and the baby was moving well and I wanted to wait for him to be ready.

The private hospital were a little different, they recommended an induction at week 38 as they also said he was big and in the 85th percentile but agreed it was my choice and were more positive as they gave me all the things that were on my side, there were no issues with my placenta, the baby was moving well, my blood sugar had never been out of range, I hadn’t put on any excess weight, my bp was consistently 110/70 and I had no swelling. So they were happy to wait if that’s what I wanted.

On the 18th July I went for my final scan with the health centre and the doctor told me my placenta was very mature and had calcification, the baby was 10lb +, so I needed to be admitted and induced. This was different to the week before at the private hospital so I was worried.

I then got my partner and we collected our things and went to the private hospital. We arrived at 11am and then after being admitted and all the testing they said it was my choice whether I was induced or not as my placenta and everything else was still fine for this point in the pregnancy.

By this point I’d psyched myself up and was positive about being induced and in the back of my mind I was worried that perhaps something was telling me that I needed to do this now as I’d pushed it for too long so I didn’t want anything bad to happen. I also didn’t want to return to have all the testing again so I agreed to be admitted and induced.

The Birth:

On the 19th at 10am I had my first induction, I returned to the room and waited watching tv while my partner snuck in subways and hot chocolate. External food, fairy lights and these things are not allowed in this particular hospital as it’s part of the military.

At 4pm I was induced for a second time as I had not progressed and my cervix was still very hard and very closed.

As nothing seemed to be happening at 7:30pm my partner went to get me another hot chocolate and to have some tea when my waters broke. I called the nurse as i wasn’t sure if I’d wet myself or if I was starting with labour etc. They called the doctor and apparently I was having contractions and was 1cm dilated. My waters were transparent and the baby wasn’t stressed.

From that point onwards I switched the lights off, did upbreathing, listened to the Freya app and tried to maintain a relaxed state. My partner sat with me but I was very calm and relaxed so he just left me to it and was there if I needed him. I didn’t count the contractions as I couldn’t concentrate on maintaining my breathing and pressing the button.

At around 10pm my contractions changed onto my back rather than my abdomen which were extremely uncomfortable but as I could move around my room it didn’t feel too bad. I also started with the down breathing as this seemed to help pass the time and diminish the pain. I asked for some paracetamol but they don’t give any pain relief other than an epidural if that is needed.

At 10:30pm I was 5cm dilatad so they took me down to the birthing suites. At this point the contractions were extremely uncomfortable and I wasn’t getting a break in between them as they were directly on top of each other. It was also more difficult to limit the pain as I had sensors on as they were worried about the baby due to the contractions being one after another without a break and was asked to move as little as possible.

So at this point I opted for an epidural as I didn’t think that I could manage the time from 5cm to 10cm without moving.

They came and gave me the epidural and I really struggled to stay still for them to insert it but eventually it was done and began to take effect.

For the next hour or so everything was serene and calm and both I and my partner rested while everything else was continuing to progress. The doctors came and checked several times and I was 10cm dilated soon afterwards.

Just after 1:05am I asked for my partner to call the doctor as felt the intense urge to push. The doctor said I wasn’t ready as the baby was still quite high up in the canal. But I said I couldn’t help it so he said go ahead and after 3 big pushes lots of down breathing my baby was born at 1:23am on the 20th July a not so big at 7lb 3oz.

We had skin on skin before the delayed cord cutting and then he was taken away for checks and weighing, while I was stitched up. It took 1.5 hours to stitch me up so I don’t know what degree of tear it was, but it felt more uncomfortable than giving birth. During this time my baby was brought back for more skin on skin and I was given an oxytocin drip.

I knew giving birth in a foreign country where English isn’t the first spoken language was going to be more difficult than in the U.K. Culturally there were a lot of differences and a lot more limited options even though I was in the best hospital in the country.

I do however feel positive about the experience as I made my own choices, used my BRAIN and used positive mindset as well as the breathing exercises to ensure that my birth was what I wanted it to be even if I didn’t have all the options available that there are in the U.K. This was all because I used the Hypnobirthing advise from the course.