"In my first pregnancy I was induced, so this time around I really had no idea what to expect in terms of knowing when to go to the hospital. I was due on the 10th of May 2020 and on the 6th of May, I had lower back pain and lots of early labour contractions. That night, I barely slept, had painful Braxton hicks all night and period like cramps all morning. I went and did the grocery shopping that morning with Lane in tow and went home and put lane to bed for his nap. By this point I was having constant contractions and lower back pain and messaged Jordon at around 10:30 am to say, “I think this is it!”. But I told him not to come home yet because I’d hate to have these types of pains for days on end and keep bringing him home from work, so I said ill text him when I really need him. I had my original OB appointment at 2:30 pm the same day so Jordon had already planned on tagging me out of parenting at 1:30 pm so I could go to the hospital for my 39-week appointment.
Jordon arrived home and my contractions were consistently 6 minutes apart and painful, I knew I couldn’t drive myself to my appointment, so Jordon drove with lane in the back. By the time I got to my appointment, my contractions were 2.5-3 minutes apart and I was just sitting in the waiting room hiding the fact I was in labour and in so much pain. When the OB called me in, I just said, “I think I’m in labour now” and he did a very painful check to find I was 3 cm dilated. He told me to go straight to the birth suite because, by the time I got home, they’d probably be too full-on, and I’d come straight back anyway. Well, we had lane with us, and they were waiting out in the car because no one else was allowed in any appointments due to covid. But he also couldn’t come into birth suite. We had to drive 15ish minutes to pick Jordon’s mum up from work, while having contractions every two minutes, and then drop her and lane to her house which was an additional 15 minutes away. That drive was horrific. In hindsight, I would have just stayed in birth suite until Jordon came back! Doing the 45 minute-ish round trip back to the hospital was awful.
Once we arrived, I remember getting my temperature checked on the way through and being asked a bunch of questions before being let through to birth suite. The room was stark white, so bright and intimidating. It really should never be like that. I met my midwife for the first time, she was lovely and supportive. I let her know I’d like to go without an epidural if I can but if I really need it, you had better get me it! Haha. My waters were broken by the doctor as I had bulging membranes and his head was stuck in my pelvis apparently. I asked for the gas, it did absolutely nothing. I kept asking Jordon to turn it up. I ended up just pushing it aside after trying to get some benefit from it for ages without any reprieve. The most relief I had was in the shower with hot water on my stomach and on my lower back. In the shower is when I was asking for the epidural and my midwife kept saying “it’s coming” but I knew they thought it was too late. My OB walked in, and Jordon asked him for the epidural and his response to me was “I can call and ask but I’ll have to apologise when she gets here and it’s too late.” I didn’t know it was possible to also feel so furious mid labour! At 7pm I started pushing, really the only thing I said during my whole labour was during the pushing phase and it was “I can’t do this!” over and over. I felt his head go out and come back in a couple of times, and I knew it was because the pain was so bad, I would just stop pushing only realising there was only one way out! He was born at 7:19pm weighing 7 pound 13 ounces.
I had a third-degree tear, and my placenta wouldn’t come out. Even after the injection and the pushing on my belly which meant I had to go into theatre for surgery. Some part of me was relieved that I didn’t have to be stitched up in birth suite but the other part of me was sad I had to leave my baby after I gave birth to him. I asked if I could feed him before going to theatre and I got five minutes to feed him. I went up to theatre and I was just uncontrollably shaking, I had that after both births. They had to hold me still so they could do a spinal block and then I was stitched up and my placenta manually removed. Funny that the anaesthetist was required to come in regardless, for the spinal block anyway. I sat in recovery for a few hours and finally got to be with Jordon and Emerson around 10:30 pm."
