These archives contain extracts from discussions held on the UK Midwives and Consumers email list, a discussion group for people interested in midwifery in the UK. Open to midwives, students, mothers, and anyone interested in improving maternity services in UK. Posts in these archives express the views of the individual authors, and not those of the Association of Radical Midwives.
On Friday 19th I had a show in the morning so I called my midwife to let her know. Shortly afterwards I started getting period pains but not contractions so I just ignored them.
I thought that maybe something was happening but I decided to wait until my waters broke. Later on Friday night I thought that the baby was moving less so on Saturday morning at about 9am we decided to go to the hospital.
[Background: this had happened several times; I'd had several false labours and some bleeding in late pregnancy, frequently felt very tired, faint to the extent of feeling like I could not breathe and was going to pass out and dehydrated nearly all the time, plus very nauseous. Doctor's comments (read by me in my notes) were not complimentary, thought I was exaggerating the situation]
We got there and went into the assessment rooms where I expected to be told that nothing was happening and that we could go home. They checked and I was just 1 centimetre dilated. When they took my temperature it was slightly high but they put that down to the heat in the hospital as it was quite hot. My blood pressure was OK but my pulse was really fast.
The two midwives checked the babies heartbeat on the monitor which showed that I was having no contractions but that the babies heartbeat was going from 190 to just over 200 which was certainly not normal so they bleeped the obstetrics registrar and, while we were waiting for him, said that they would induce the baby if her heartrate didn't stabilise. When he arrived he decided that an emergency section was needed and that it would be done straight away. [Note: epidural/spinal was offered so presumably not a time-critical emergency]
From there I was taken to one of the delivery rooms and the anaesthetist came to see me and gave me some medicine to stop me being sick in theatre and the midwife shaved off some of my hair so they could cut in the right place. They explained the procedure to me so I knew what would happen and I decided to have a spinal anaesthetic rather than a general anaesthetic because I wanted to be awake so I would know ASAP that my baby was OK.
They moved me down to theatre then, when we got there were several people in theatre, the obstetrics registrar who saw me in the assessment rooms plus another doctor, two midwifes and the anaesthetist and some others as well as Dave [husband]
They decided it would be better to do an epidural although I didn't know this at the time. They explained it and that while they put it in I would have to sit up with my back curved over and that they would not be able to keep the baby's heartbeat on the monitor while I was in that position but it was still really worrying. I was shaking like a leaf, it was all so sudden from arriving at the hospital to being in the theatre. Dave was there so I just held his hand. At the point the heartbeat went I was convinced the baby was dead.
To see if the epidural worked they sprayed some cold water on my arm so I knew what it felt like and then sprayed it up my leg (one at a time) and stomach and asked me to tell them when I felt it. At first I could feel it and I think they topped up the epidural a couple of times until I couldn't feel a thing.
Once they had done that they started the operation and it was quite a strange feeling, it didn't hurt and was less uncomfortable than going to the dentist but I could feel that they were doing something, a rummaging kind of feeling.
The baby came out quite soon at 11.50am and she cried immediately; I was so relieved and I was crying as well. We had said that we wanted to find out the sex for ourselves so they brought her over to us and let us see. I said that it was a girl and Dave could see that for himself as well. I must have been a bit funny from the anaesthetic because I then said "it is a girl isn't it?" as if there was any doubt because she was not wrapped up, just lying on a green hospital sheet.
They took her off to the side of the theatre to do her apgar score which indicates the health of the baby and she scored 9 out of 10 at 1 minute old and then 10 out of 10 at 5 minutes old which was excellent. She didn't get 10/10 at 1 minute because of her colour but this is quite normal in section babies. [Looking back now, I wonder if the c-section was really needed since she got such good apgar scores, but they did explain that her heart rate was due to the infection I had and that her heart rate would go back to normal very soon after delivery. I have to confess to being sceptical, but my daughter was alive and well so it isn't really that imporant. However, as that was my only birth experience I wish the c-section had not been needed]
Once the initial checks had been done they gave her to me to cuddle and asked us if she had a name. We agreed on Melissa so that was written down on her notes. I was able to cuddle her for quite a while as they were stitching me up and then she was taken away for more detailed checks on her condition. Dave went with them while they did this.
After he had gone I started feeling really sick and was lying there with my mouth open and felt so sick that I thought I couldn't breath so the anaesthetist got me a bowl and got the oxygen ready. Obviously I could breath because I could talk but it felt like I couldn't. She was excellent and talked me through breathing and then I started to feel a bit better.
Once they had finished I said thank you to everybody, over and over again I think. They'd all been marvellous and made it a really positive experience. Once it was over they wheeled me back to the delivery room for recovery and Melissa was already there and dressed in the clothes that I had chosen for her first outfit and Dave had been taking some pictures of her.
She was brought over to the bed for me and I lay cuddling her while they sorted out getting us to a ward. While she was lying there she was grunting quite a lot and hardly stopped. This carried on after they got us to a ward and the staff decided that Melissa had to go to the special care baby unit. So I was on the same floor as her I was transferred to a different ward where it would be easier to visit her in special care.
She was put on antibiotics because of the grunting noise which may have been a breathing problem and also because of the infection I had which had caused both her and my pulse to be too fast.
Karen found out from Melissa's notes after the birth that the baby had hypothermia, RDS (respiratory distress syndrome), and Strep B.
At first Melissa was in an incubator but when we went to see her during the evening with my mother we were allowed to take her out of the incubator for a quick cuddle. I went back again at 1am and was able to have a go at feeding her and she did get some milk from me.
By the next morning she was out of the incubator and in a cot which was such a relief! Later on the same morning she was able to leave special care and come back to the ward with me. The staff there started showing me how to change nappies and feed her. They were all very good and worked hard at getting breastfeeding established.
We spent a week on the ward and then got ready to come home yesterday. The gynaecologist/obstetrician came and checked me over and confirmed that I was healthy and mobile and could go home so I just had to wait for the paediatrician to do the same for Melissa.
Everything looked OK and he was sure we could go home but then when he listened to her chest he could hear a slight murmur and that could have been a hole in her heart or a problem with her valves in the heart. He wanted to get her blood pressure checked but because they were busy in Special Baby Care it would be a 20 minute wait. Well, they were the longest 20 minutes, apart from those spent in theatre waiting to know if she would be OK. I went and called Dave and he came in.
When they were ready we took Melissa back to Special Baby Care and they did the blood pressure which was the same on each arm and each leg so that was alright. They also put her on the heart monitor which meant sticking loads of sensors all over her little chest and she didn't like that one bit. The first trace was no good because she was crying but between us and the doctor we managed to calm her down and the trace was OK. Next they did a chest x-ray of her and another doctor came and explained that they thought that one of her valves in her heart that should have closed hadn't done so but that they were calling a consultant to check the tests and x-ray and confirm what they thought.
We had to wait for the consultant to arrive so I took Melissa back to the ward with me while we waited. Dave went home for a while so he could have something to eat and get the car seat fitted to bring us home. The doctor came back and said that the consultant agreed with their assessment so we could go home and bring Melissa back for a outpatient appointment with the doctor for the special care baby unit on Thursday.
At the appointment they will do some tests again and see if the valve has closed itself. If not then she will have some medicine to make the valve close and this works in about 80% of cases. It it didn't work then she would need surgery when she is a bit older. We're sure that Melissa will be one of the 80% who it works for, although the valve will probably have closed itself without that anyway. [Update: it did go away on its own, which I expected - it sounded like a "problem" more common in section babies as the valve doesn't get the chance to close as the baby is pushed out]
I found out that I was pregnant in March 2004, which was very big surprise indeed as I had been pregnant from December 2003-February 2004. Sadly we lost our little baby due to an ectopic pregnancy.
At the end of March I was concerned that my period had not arrived and so I took a home pregnancy test, which was negative. That was on a Friday, and on the following Monday I went to see my GP and explained that my period had not yet arrived, though I had one immediately after the surgery for my ectopic pregnancy. He discounted the possibility that I could be pregnant again and explained that it took some time for periods to return to normal after an ectopic pregnancy and suggested a test again in 6 weeks time if my period still hadn’t arrived.
I wasn’t so sure about the wisdom of waiting 6 weeks and so I took another home pregnancy test that afternoon which was positive!!!!! I was officially due on November 30th 2004 – just a few weeks after my original due date of October 6th.
What a roller coaster – from pregnant, to losing a baby and then back to being
pregnant again. I thought it would make everything OK after our loss but that
was not the case. I found it easy at first and everything did seem to be OK
though we were not happy to be back on the cycle of beta HCG tests and ultrasound
scans to confirm what was happening with the pregnancy.
Thankfully we had good results from the beta HCG tests and eventually we had
an ultrasound scan which showed that our baby was growing and had a heart beat
– and was in the right place.
Apart from all the tests, the early pregnancy was not straightforward since
I was experiencing intermittent bleeding. During a short holiday to Northumberland
I picked up Melissa (though I’d been told not to lift
anything) and afterwards had a lot of bright red blood and was sure I was miscarrying.
Thankfully I didn’t and the pregnancy continued well.
The biggest problem was that I could not relax and enjoy the pregnancy as I
was sure that it would not work and that my body could not possibly do it right
and so I was just waiting for the time when I would lose our baby.
Each time the baby didn’t move for some time I would be sure he had died and
I had one moment early in pregnancy when a strange, indescribable, feeling came
over me and I was sure I had just experienced the moment when our baby had died.
Despite my worries, the bleeding stopped and all seemed to be going well and I was able to relax much more about the pregnancy and stop seeing the consultant at the hospital and just see the midwife, Helen, at the GP surgery. She was an excellent midwife who put up with all my worries and gave me a lot of reassurance about the pregnancy.
Towards the end of the pregnancy, things started to get harder. I had a scan in late October which suggested that the fluid round the baby was reduced, this was followed by another scan after a period of low movement, which was requested because I was measuring large for my dates. That scan actually showed that the growth rate of the baby had slowed down and so another scan was requested two weeks later – which again showed that the growth rate had dropped. A further scan showed that it had dropped again, this time down to the 25th centile. At the time time, I was losing weight – 6 pounds over a week and was fitting back into clothes that I had not been able to wear for a long time. His movements had also slowed down more than I had expected – and I was getting increasingly worried and sure that that I was going to lose this baby as well.
I tried to deal with all this as I really wanted to have a VBAC, but after losing our last baby this was so hard. In the end I asked to be induced and this was arranged for two days later – on Sunday November 28th. The midwife did a stretch and sweep but it didn’t work so I went to the hospital on the 28th and was given some prostin gel to try and induce labour but that didn’t work either. We walked around a lot and up lots of stairs, but no luck.
On the morning of the 29th I was really sad when I woke up and felt like I had to say goodbye to the baby that we lost in February (22nd February 2004) and move on but that I didn’t feel ready to move on. I spoke to the midwife about it and she was lovely and understanding and explained that the way I was feeling was perfectly normal. She also said that it would be normal after the birth to feel excited and sad and sometimes to feel resentful to the new baby and then guilty about that and then happy about the new baby and guilty about that because it would be like saying I was glad about losing the other baby. I had never thought of that, but she was right.
The registrar came and tried to break my waters and then said “Your waters can’t be broken” Very abrupt and to the point. I knew then that it would be a c-section, though I suppose I could have said I wanted to wait for a natural labour to start. I never thought of that, but mindful of what I’d been advised by an independent midwife that I respect, the c-section was the right thing to do.
I was due to be the second woman to have a c-section that morning but for some reason I ended up going first, this meant it all happened very soon after the decision was made and I’d signed the consent forms.
I walked down to the operating theatre and had the epidural put in, that was quite painful and much more so than last time. I got really quite worried then, not because of the epidural but because I suddenly thought that we were so close to finding out if something was wrong with the baby because we’d declined the AFP and amniocentesis because we knew we would keep the baby regardless.
I got worried that the epidural wouldn’t work, no idea why I felt this as it had worked well last time. The anaesthetist was excellent and checked and double checked that I couldn’t feel anything. I asked him how he could be so sure that I wouldn’t feel anything, his reply was “Because I’ve been doing this for 28 years” He was pleasant and didn’t mind me asking – I expect he has been asked lots of times before.
One really difficult thing was that the room where I had the epidural was a carbon copy of the room I had my anaesthetic in before the surgery for my ectopic pregnancy, that was so hard and I cried about that.
When we got into the operating theatre they set up the sheets over me, though
I don’t remember them doing this, but left out the screen so (as
requested) I could see what was happening. The time when we went in was some
time after 11am and I realised that it was the similar time of day to when Melissa
was born and wondered how close our son would be delivered to the time that
his big sister was born. I said to the doctors that it was very close to when
my daughter was born, they asked when she was born, I told them and commented
that it was funny that our son was going to be born at close to the same time,
to which they responded “Well, let’s try and make it happen”
I could feel them pulling around at me and asked how close they were to delivering the baby and the doctor said they were pretty close. Very soon after that he was born at 11.48am – just one minute earlier than his big sister!
My first thoughts were that he was ugly! He wasn’t, but he had very puffy eyes and nose for a while and looked quite odd. When they went down, he looked gorgeous. The funny thing was, I told Paul that he looked ugly (the baby, not Paul!) and then the midwife came and said how much like Paul he looked – so I insulted both of the men in my life in one fell swoop – oops!
My next thought that he was smaller than Melissa, he looked it. The midwife, however, thought he was about 8 pounds compared to Melissa’s 6 ½ pounds. He was actually 7 pounds 11 ounces – a good size as far as we were concerned, but apparently below average – though we find that hard to believe.
After he was born he was weighed and checked over by the midwife and pronounced to be fine. The midwife then got Paul cuddling him with skin to skin contact, which was what we wanted.
I was often told that he was breech, after he was born I could see why – he didn’t have an ounce of fat on his bottom.
Once they had finished the operation, I was moved onto a trolley bed and transferred to the recovery room. This was the best bit of the whole birth as far as I was concerned because I got to have skin to skin contact with him and he latched on and started feeding really well – and was still like that 2 hours later when I was in my room on the post-natal ward. What a fantastic start!
We went home the next day.
Karen
fairisleshannon@yahoo.co.uk
Karen's suggestions for mothers and midwives are on the planning a good caesarean archive page.
LW updated August 16, 2006