Well...I'm even more crappy than I first thought. I started this up again with all good intentions, but did I update? No. Not at all. Not once.
Must try harder...I promise to do better!
Anyway! Charlie Edward is now here, he arrived the day after he was due; 10th November at 7.30pm weighing a healthy 8lbs. I can't believe he's already three weeks old and it's taken me this long to update my damned diary.
The boy's asleep at the moment, but I have no idea how long he'll stay like that for so I'm just going to poost the birth story and be done with it. I really, really will be back soon to update properly - honest!
Charlie's Birth
I woke up at 3.30am on the 10th, just three and a half hours after my due date, with a bit of a shock when my waters went with a massive gush all over the bed. I tried to wake Alex up but he thought I was telling him to stop snoring and was having none of it, so I had to sprint to the bathroom as quietly as possible to avoid waking Heather, sort myself out, mop up the mess on the way back to the bedroom and then get Alex to properly wake up when I got back in there (still not the easiest job in the world...until I said "My waters have broken. DEFINITELY" at which point he went into ultimate panic mode).
I threw Alex's dressing gown on and went downstairs to call the birth centre. They asked me to come in to see them to be assessed...I wasn't in much pain at this point, just periody cramps, so we called Alex's parents and got ourselves all ready in a pretty chilled out way. Predictably, when I went back upstairs to update Alex on what was happening, he was back in bed up to his neck under the duvet. I was more calm than he was though - strangely, I was sat on the sofa drinking tea at 4.30am, watching two and a half men and telling Alex to chill out while he ran around panicking about packing bags, getting everything ready, getting to the hospital etc etc. Heather woke up at around 5am and was thrilled when her Nana and Grandad arrived at 5.30 to take care of her. She was totally on top of the situation, telling everyone "the baby's coming out today, I'm going with Grandad"...pretty good for a two and a half year old I think!
When we got to the birth centre at about 6 I was assessed and told I could either hang about or go home to wait for labour to establish, after talking through options for induction just in case it didn't. I was booked in to be induced at 10am on the 11th if nothing had happened by then. While I was talking to the midwife I started getting some regular contractions that were increasing pretty quickly, so we hung around there for a while and had some toast to see if they'd pick up more. They were getting worse but nothing too bad, so we decided to come home to relax for a while. When we got back I called my sister to come and join us (I'd tried to call her at 4am to no avail, but she'd seen the missed call and got very excited!) She arrived at around 9am and we all sat around watching Spaced, when all of a sudden just after midday my contractions became slightly more painful, but increased to 3mins apart lasting 45 seconds. I called birth centre for advice as I wasn't in too much pain but, by the book, they ask you to go to them then. We were told to make our way to the hospital, so off we all went.
They were ridiculously busy when we all arrived so we had to wait in the reception area for a little while before being booked in. I was mid-contraction when my midwife, Fiona, walked in to start her shift! I was well chuffed; she came in and gave me a huge hug before asking the obvious "what are you doing here?" There was a small panic as my iron deficiency had me 1 point below the cut off point for birth centre, so we had to have some bloods done and then wait for those results to see if I'd managed to control my anemia with my diet and pills...luckily, after a tense couple of hours, we found out I had, so I was able to relax knowing I wasn't going anywhere!
I was booked in properly, but the adrenaline had slowed my contractions a bit so we all went for a meander together to try to get them back up again. Had some lunch in the cafe and then went back to the room, and by about 3 I was back in the swing of things. Amy and Alex were brilliant...total pains in the asses making jokes and being daft, which really helped me. Amy had told the midwives that she'd love to train as a midwife, so they were all teaching her things while they were working, which she loved. I actually had my midwife and a very friendly, very able student, which was fantastic and really calming.
Fiona knew I was in some pain, but wouldn't let me have gas and air as she didn't want me to get dopey and end up slowing my labour...she's a bulldog, but brilliant. She said that she'd examine me at 5pm and would give me a sweep then if I hadn't progressed much, but did say that she expected me to go the same way as with Heather - plodding along for hours and then suddenly going to 10cm and delivering with seemingly no warning. When she examined me I was only about 3.5cm (at which point I burst into tears...all that pain for nothing!) so she gave me a sweep, which kicked things off in style almost instantly...that'll teach me for complaning. I still had no gas and air - Fiona wanted me totally with it and I found I was able to cope with the pain just using breathing and visualisation techniques, which Amy, Alex and Fiona all helped me with. It quickly became very intense and at around 7pm Fiona said that she thought I'd be ok to get into the birthing pool and to finally have some gas and air. I must be crazy - I declined the gas and air as I wanted to wait until I was in the pool. There must have been logic there somewhere!
I got into the pool shortly after then, stopping three times on the way to have contractions that were on top of each other and that I couldn't even stand through! The pool was amazing, and combined with the first gas and air I'd had I suddenly felt a hell of a lot better. I was actually concerned that I must have hours left to go, as the pains didn't seem that bad and I was still coping ok. It seemed so much easier to handle and I thought I may have actually stalled my labour by getting into the pool...when all of a sudden I had an overwhelming urge to bear down. Alex was holding me up in the water (I would have gone face first into there if he hadn't) and Amy was helping me to have a drink (gas and air is great, but doesn't half fry you out). The midwives were still training Amy and actually got a mirror so she could see Charlie being born (I was at an awkward angle, but I don't think anyone would dared to try move me!) Fiona coached me perfectly and even throughout this we were still giving each other mock abuse - her telling everyone how her ladies listen to her and how she needs to keep control of them, me telling everyone that her ladies are too scared not to do what she says.
About four contractions and fifteen minutes of pushing later Charlie was delivered into the water at 7.30pm, and was passed through to me. He demonstrated his fantastic set of lungs for us, Alex cut the cord in the water and then he was passed out to Alex for cuddles while I was taken through to be sorted out and examined.
No tearing at all, and I was in shock at how easy it all seemed! Charlie came through to me and fed for AGES then I went for a shower while Amy and Alex shared some cuddles with him. We asked for fast discharge, which is a minimum of 6 hours after the birth. Fiona went off duty but the midwives who took over were very understanding when I said that I really didn't want to go onto the ward, so they moved us down the corridor to a different room (ours adjoined the pool so they wanted to free it up). The paediatrician came down at about 2.30am and declared him good to go, then all our papers were put together and we were discharged at 4am.
I'm totally in awe of the whole experience - it all seemed so easy! I had NO pain relief throughout the whole experience until I actually got to the pushing stage, which I think reflects really well on my birth partners. I don't hold with avoiding pain relief as I'm of the opinion that you don't get any medals for suffering...but I'm so glad I did it like this!
Charlie's a little angel...ok, he's a little grumpy about sleeping (I don't think he wants to miss anything), but he's adorable and we're so lucky to have him. Heather's being a brilliant big sister - playing up something chronic on ocassion but I guess that's to be expected! I call him my little grunt, due to the amount of noise he makes about doing anything (it's like having an overly dramatic tennis player in a moses basket; move your arm? Grunt about it. Stretch? Have a grunt. Wriggle your toes? That one needs a grunt too.)
He's having some louder grunts now, so I think there's a good chance he'll wake up before long. I'd better be off...I will be back soon though (with PHOTOS no less!)