What you have been waiting for.. the truth about labour!

9.am Leaving the house to attend Speed Awareness Course, felt a couple of niggles but unsure whether this is the really thing

10am Middle of course and the little niggles are getting a bit more intense, now I’m really beginning to wonder

11.30am One hour left to go and every 25 mins I’m gripping the side of the chair. The trainer keeps asking if I’m ok, I felt like saying “do I bloody look it” but grinned and told him I was fine. If I didn’t stay for the full three hours I had to return to finish the course

12.30am Free to go, with course certificate in hand (probably not one I would include on CV). Another contraction on way to car, think I best ring Mr T to give him the heads up that this could be it! He has a little nervous laugh and I tell him I’ll see him at home after work

1pm Meet Becky for lunch, we take a trip to North Street and still unsure whether this is it, I keep asking Becky for confirmation that I am in fact in Labour!

3pm Contractions more regular and getting strong so we think we best get home. Mr T still nervous I think as he starts to mow the grass, as I start to breath through contractions

5pm Ok, time for tens machine

7pm We ring the hospital, cos even though you are told when we need to go into hospital during anti natal classes, this information goes out the window and at this stage I think I must be nearly there! Oh how I was wrong. As expected, hospital fobs me off and tells me to stay at home

9pm K, seriously now, this has to be been hospital time, surely contractions are fully developed! We ring the hospital; they advise me to have a bath! My initial response is to ask whether they are being serious, but Mr T runs hot bath and to my surprise it helps a bit. By this stage Mr T is fully into the swing of being a birthing partner, with breathing techniques down to a T, although by now I have bitten his head off every time he almost misses a contractions and isn’t providing the “breath in, breath out” advice which I cant possible remember for myself.

11pm By now we have visited every room in the house, I have had contractions while being sick and even quite embarrassingly wet myself during a contraction which resulting in more tears. Surely it can’t get any worse than this, we ring the hospital again and they say to come in. What a huge relief I think – time for drugs!

11.30pn We arrive at St Michaels and contractions are really strong now, we have to stop three times while we walk to the delivery room for me to grab hold of bins, railings etc during contractions. On seeing the midwife I burst into tears and beg not to be sent home.

11.40pm Midwife examines me, I’m 3cm dilated, I ask for the gas & air which I’m told isn’t allowed until I reach 4/5cm, so I ask for an epidural convinced that I can not take the pain any longer. I’m also declined this and offered pethidine – sold I’ll take it if it gets rid of pain!

12 midnight Pethidine has now kicked in, I still feel pain but sleepy at same time

2am Midwife returns to examine me and I start to pray that I’m not only 4cm. 6-7 cm, excellent!! My first question is for the gas and air, within seconds it’s in my mouth and I’m puffing away. Midwife makes a comment “this baby will here by 6am” I looked at the clock and thought “thank god, only 4 hours to go” the midwife said she needed to go and get some bits ready for delivery.

2.30am Midwife returns and I’m convinced that I need a number two! I keep telling her and she seems to suddenly snap into action, asking if my waters have broken, at which time they haven’t. Next contraction and the waters go…

2.40am The poo I thought I needed has turned into pushing… oh my god doesn’t this hurt! Very strange feeling as you can feel the baby and feel like you can feel how far it has left to come out, but the burning pain is unbelievable.

2.45am The midwife is telling me to pant pant.. oh god I think to myself, this means I’m going to rip if I don’t pant, I fully intend to listen to the midwife, but in the middle of pushing and the urge to push this seems impossible, and then its to late the damage is done.

2.50am Last contraction.. out comes the head swiftly followed by the rest of the body and apparently a gush of fluid!

Brodie George Taylor has arrived.

At this point I’m so high on gas and air, I can’t remember the point I found out he was a boy but can remember the midwife asking what his name was. Mr T looked at me, and I don’t think he dared say a name I didn’t like after the terrible ordeal he had just witnessed me going through.

They say that when they baby is put on you for the first time you forget about the pain, I can honestly say this is a load of rubbish! The pain I was experiencing was excruciating and all I could think about was the midwife sorting out the pain below.

In-between this pain, I’m asked if I want an injection to delivery placenta, I’m sure before I even had chance to answer the needle was stuck in and I was contracting and delivering the placenta, this part I can honestly stay I don’t really remember so the pain couldn’t have been that bad.

3am Finally the midwife is ready to repair and patch up the damage caused by the quick delivery and me not panting. This I can honest say is the part that traumatised me the most about the whole delivery, from the injections to the stitching was absolutely awful and Mr T would agree that this was a terrible scene.

3.45am Damage repaired and an hour after delivering I finally get chance to enjoy my little boy.

I fed Brodie for an hour and start looking at what an amazing, perfect little boy we have made.

Now I’m a mummy and going to truly enjoy every single minute!

Breastfeeding - hardwork but well worth the reward!

Us brit’s have mixed opinions about breast feeding, although it is becoming more popular than it has been in recent years.

From the moment I found out I was pregnant I was determined to give my little one the best possible start in live and have had friends who breastfed and talked about the great benefits. I always said I would like to do at least two months feeding, but obviously this depended on circumstances as well as how I got on with it.

I first fed Brodie an hour after he was born and at the time I though “oh this is easy” but I was wrong. After 24 hours I had sore nipples, had no sleep and was advised to stay in hospital until both Brodie and I had the technique down to a T. After a difficult first night at home, I begin to understand why so many people give up in the first few days.

On our second day at home we had our first home visit with the midwife and I was so relieved to see her. She showed us new positions to feed and gave me more confidence and since then I haven’t look back. Yes I get tired as I’m the only one who can get up in the night to feed, and yes my boobs leak and get sore…but the benefits for Brodie outweigh any problems I might be having and to me what’s a few less hours sleep compared to Brodies getting the best start in life?

Mind you, in a few weeks time I will be taking advantage of the option to express so daddy can do some night feeds!

My biggest fear about feeding, especially while I can’t express and still have to work on getting Brodie latched on, was feeding in public. But I was so surprised at the facilities available for mum’s who feed. Cabot Circus the new shopping centre in Bristol have purpose build private Family Rooms for changing and feeding. I was well impressed and this made the shopping trip so much easier and I was pleasantly surprised! I guess this goes to show the increasing demand for this kind of facilities and the growing popularly of breast feeding.

Two weeks old today!

and Brodie is getting stronger and stronger as each day passes.

We had our final midwife visit on Monday and he was weighted at 8.9lb, so I predict he’s over 9lb now which is pretty impressive. I believe the weight gain is from me feeding him, you know what they say “breast is best” and this little one certainly loves the booby!

Health visitor will start her visits tomorrow.

Meet Brodie Taylor

Brodie George Taylor has arrived..

Brodie George Taylor arrived at 2.50am on the 25th June 2009., weighing 7.7lb.

How is he? amazing, truely amazing.

How was labour? Painful - very! Quick - apparently yes -I'm one of the lucky ones who completed 2nd stage labour in 10 mins! I'll post full labour details when I have a bit more time.

Discovered a new labour trigger...

In the last few weeks people have made / given all kinds of suggestions which may help to bring on labour, some of which are listed below:

Hot curry /food - Chilly flakes have been added in almost every dish I've made recently
Sex – umm certainly not top of your list when your 39 weeks pregnant!
Bumpy roads - trips in the work van have been a regular request!
Pineapple - new one to me but cant see that working tbh

<take 30 secs out...relax> k back again now..

Well today I discovered a new technique to bring on labour - attend a Speed Awareness course!

Yep, it may cost you 60 quid (but you don’t get 3 points), and you may have to spend 3 hours of your day listening to everything there is to know about the effects /dangers of speeding but in my case there was an added plus – the contractions kicked in.

That started this morning and its now 5pm, and they are coming faster & stronger which is why I’m sat writing this blog, Mr T says it will take my mind off the pain, ha ha that’s how much he bloody knows, see how much longer he keeps that up without me biting his head off!

Looks like we have a long night ahead, so I’m signing off to go read the instructions on my tens machine.

Next blog will be a good one! Wish me luck !!!

Final Week in Work

I'm off to become a mum! Blog over at Existem