Here she is on her first official photo
As you know from my last post, I was booked in for an induction on Tuesday 10th April (11 days before my due date). So here’s what happened on that elusive day!
I was told to ring the delivery suite on the day of induction to check they had a bed etc. I rang up bang on 9am and was told to come up to the maternity assessment unit. My dad agreed to take us up to the hospital so we hadn’t got to park our car because we knew we would be there all day and as we only live 5 minute drive from the hospital it made more sense so I gave him a ring and off we went.
When we got to the assessment unit, we were booked in and settled into a bed and ready to get things going. I was the first of the ladies booked in for induction to arrive and the midwife told me that she was allowed to break 1 ladies waters so as I was there first she would break mine if she could.
I was examined, at about half past 10 and induction was started (basically a tablet is inserted into your cervix a bit like a small tampon which is left in for 24 hours to soften it) and told that I would be put on to monitor every 4 hour to check baby and see if I was having contractions. Unfortunately at that point she couldn’t break my waters as she said my cervix wasn’t soft or dilated enough! Boooo.
We were told if we wanted to go off and have a walk we just needed to be back in 4 hours so we decided to go off for a nice long walk around the hospital grounds (you know to test out the old wives tale that a long walk could start things off) and picked up some pineapple from the fruit stall for good measure then went back to the ward. By mid afternoon I was having light pains but only niggles so when we got on the birthing ball and spent the rest of the afternoon bouncing up and down on the ball.
By mid evening I was still having light pains but not what I would describe as contractions (everyone said you’ll know when your having contractions so figured this wasn’t it as it felt like period pain). At 9pm, Adam and my mum had to go home as the ward I was on was the assessment ward and no visitors were able to stay. Adam really wasn’t happy about leaving but I insisted I was fine and didn’t think anything would happen as these niggly pains didn’t feel like anything was happening soon.
All night I was still having pains on and off - again nothing I thought was the real deal and I was convinced when I was examined at half 10 the next morning I was going to be told nothing was happening and would have to have a further 6 hour peasery (if the first 24 hour one doesn’t work they put another 6 hour one in and if that does nothing they start talking C section).
At about half past 6 I had the most horrific pain which felt like a popping - just like someone had burst a balloon but inside my stomach. I was convinced my waters had gone but the bed was dry so I gave the midwife a shout and said I thought this was the start of things. She decided to pop me on the monitor for 15 minutes even though I wasn’t due to go on yet. I couldn’t have any more pain relief at that point because I had 2 paracetamol at around 4am to help with the niggly pain which kept me awake most of the night.
After 15 minutes on the monitor the midwife confirmed I was deffo having contractions and decided to examine me because at this point the pain had started to kick up a notch. At about 7am I was examined and to my great shock the midwife announced to me that I should ring my husband as I was 8cm dilated!! I couldn’t even believe it! In a complete panic I rang Adam (who didn’t answer) and my mum (who luckily did answer) and told them to get here right away and was whisked round to delivery suite before I knew what was happening.
By the time I got to delivery suite I wanted to push however the midwife told me I couldn’t until they broke my waters which they didn’t want to until adam and my mum arrived. I was given the gas and air (which is as wonderful as everyone says) and went into complete panic that Adam and my mum were going to miss the birth.
Luckily they arrived quite quickly (to which I burst into tears and sobbed “I thought you were going to miss it” - everything then happened so quickly! The midwife tried to break my waters and couldn’t, a doctor appeared who couldn’t either asked if I was sure they hadn’t already gone. I began pushing however after I had been pushing about 10 minutes, the doctor examined me and said baby was now back to back (they think this was the pain I had felt about 6.30) and they needed to turn her. When they tried to flip her face down it was too painful and baby started to get a bit distressed so they decided to take me to theatre and have a forceps delivery. Before I knew it I was signing a consent form and lying on the operating table with a spinal block in. 2 or 3 pushes later and baby Erin was on my chest!
Unluckily for me, I had to have an episiotomy and even worse I suffered a 3rd degree tear (which apparently is very uncommon once you have had an episiotomy- lucky me). I was stitched up and in recovery and back on the ward before I knew it!
Our first official photo as a family of 3
3 weeks later I still can’t believe she’s here and she is ours! It’s such a weird feeling to look at her and know that you made that! Even weirder when you have spent 9 months watching your bump grow wondering what this person will develop into, wondering what or who she will look like and then all of a sudden she is there in front of you!
Make sure you are following my instagram to keep up to date with photos as it’s totally baby spam over there! I have a whole list of baby related posts that I already want to share with you guys! So keep your eyes peeled for those! Any requests on things you want to see let me know!
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