childbirth Archives - A Baby on Board blog

Express delivery – Florence’s birth story

Gillian — Wed, 29 Oct 2014 12:45:00 +0000

“Wake up, I’m having contractions.” I whispered into the darkness at my husband. He sat straight up “So this is it?” “Yes!” I paused “I think…” I’d woken at 12am from a vivid dream with a burning sensation in my stomach. I was four days overdue at that point and had been impatiently waiting for something, anything to happen. But if it was contractions they didn’t seem very regular. Could it be a false alarm? I had a couple more after that, but distracted myself with messaging the only person still awake, my friend in the US. Just before 2am I timed the contractions at six minutes apart, then immediately after at four. Four minutes? That sounded…promising. They were also becoming breathtakingly uncomfortable. So I woke up my sleeping husband. Alex timed a few at just under four minutes apart; we rang the labour ward and on hearing it was a second baby they told us to come straight in. We called for a taxi and got my hospital bag ready, and I woke my parents to be on Eliza alert. It all seemed to be happening quickly. My contractions intensified, and we went from ’20 minutes wait for the taxi is fine’ to ‘Where’s the taxi?!’ pretty fast. And after that? I went to kiss sleeping Eliza goodbye, then the taxi finally turned up and I remember the quiet and rainy ride through the empty streets to the hospital, I remember the radio playing a song I’d heard shortly after Eliza was born, and I remember having a huge contraction and gripping Alex’s hand as tight as I could to avoid shouting out (although it was surely very obvious – what else would be happening to a heavily pregnant woman and her husband, on the way to the hospital in the middle of the night?) The hospital was deserted and we made it up to the maternity ward at 3am, but even at this point I still thought it might not be established labour and they could send us home (looking back I have no idea why). It turned out to be a busy night for babies and the only spare delivery room was being cleaned, so we had to wait in reception. But after a contraction that was so painful I was bent double on the floor, the midwife rushed us in. “I really hope this is it and I’m not wasting your time” I remember saying, which made her laugh. “Don’t worry! You are definitely in labour” she said as examined me “…and 8cm dilated.” I shouted out “Is that ALL?!” Which, of course, everyone thought was hilarious. It was surreal, strange and lovely to think that we’d meet our baby so soon. The lights were dimmed and we put on my labour playlist. The next hour was all at once both blurry and crystal clear, but I remember the following: * Asking for gas and air – ah, lovely lovely gas and air – which made it all better and let me breathe through the rapidly intensifying contractions * Making interim small talk between about the midwife strike, the amount of accidental Coldplay on my playlist, and my previous birth experience * Not giving a single thought to changing into my ‘giving birth’ top, but staying in the one I was already wearing, then just wearing my bra * The midwife leaving the room “She clearly thinks it’ll be ages!” I said to Alex, just before she came back in with a delivery trolley and a second midwife * Thinking it would still be a while before anything happened as my waters hadn’t broken… * My waters immediately breaking (same as with E, right at the end) * The gas and air not working, biting the mouthpiece instead * The contractions piling up and my body starting to push by itself * Being totally consumed by the pain and the moment and telling myself to just get the baby out * The midwife telling me to listen to my body and do whatever felt right * Pushing, the head being out * And then pausing… Then with one final push, Florence was born, opening her mouth with a loud wail as she was placed upon my chest. I’ve been thinking about what made it so much better this time. It wasn’t just that it was quick (although it was quick last time, this time my entire labour was officially timed as an hour and 18 minutes, starting from when we got to hospital) or that this made it any less painful – it really hurt! Especially as she came out with her hand by her face – the stitches, ouch. It helped that I wasn’t induced, that it was a different and less chaotic hospital, and that I didn’t get to 10cm on a ward with bright lights and panic, and there were a couple of other things we did differently. But this time I also knew what was happening, knew I could do it, my body took over and I felt far more in control. Our delivery midwife was also amazing – kind, calm, funny, supportive – said all the right positive things, and was really conscious of what we wanted. Post-birth I had to almost immediately go on a drip for four hours due to the blood-thinning injections I’d been taking, but she delayed cord clamping for as long as possible and gave us the option to delay the baby weighing for an hour so we could have extended skin-to-skin. After the rush of the birth, it felt like the world was on hold just for us. I held the baby, she breastfed, then Alex held her. We chatted about everything and nothing while we watched the dawn creep up and the sky turn golden on Florence’s first morning ever in the world. Afterwards we were taken to the ward where we stayed for the rest of the day, and where Eliza met […]

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Hey, baby

Gillian — Tue, 14 Oct 2014 15:45:33 +0000

Say hi to Florence, who made a pretty speedy entrance to the world just after 4am this morning. She’s amazing and I can’t put her down…x

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37 Weeks Pregnant – Full Term And False Alarms

Gillian — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 06:18:32 +0000

Here’s my latest pregnancy update at 37 weeks pregnant (full term!) Here’s my 37 weeks But first My Baby Bump At 37 Weeks: Here#s my 37 weeks pregnant bump (the 37 weeks bump is a big one, isn’t it?) I feel huge at 37 weeks! It’s such a big bump at this stage. 37 Weeks Pregnant… “How will I know?” boomed a certain 90’s songstress some time in the last century. “How will I knooooow if HE really loves me?” Of course, she was singing about relationships and love, and I’m talking about another big L here – the one that happens at the end of pregnancy – but it’s the same premise. Braxton Hicks Contractions And False Labour At 37 Weeks The song popped into my head last week, when I was woken up by strong Braxton Hicks contractions, the type that uncomfortably turn your womb into oddly pointed sheet metal. Luckily it wasn’t a work or nursery day, so Eliza and I pottered around having breakfast. And then I realised the Braxton Hicks were happening with some regularity, and were getting much stronger. We decamped to the sofa and CBeebies. It wasn’t the best time or circumstances – Alex had gone to a work meeting, Eliza and I were in pyjamas, we still haven’t painted the dining room yet – hardly the best situation for any quick dashes up to hospital. And I just didn’t know. Was I in labour, or was it a false labour? Was it nothing, or was it…something? I’m 37 Weeks Pregnant But When Will The Baby Arrive? It may sound strange coming from someone who already has a child, but last time I was induced, which is a completely different experience. I have no idea what natural labour is like (and it’s worth pointing out that a ward of hospital staff seemed pretty clueless about what labour was first time, too). I messaged my friend Emily, mum of two, who said very reassuring things about how she’d had exactly the same in the run-up to the big event at around 37 weeks pregnant. And indeed, it did calm down after a while. So false alarm, but pregnancy, like a Bush-era Donald Rumsfeld speech, is full of the known knowns and known unknowns. I know labour is going to happen – as no-one’s pregnant forever, right? – but I don’t know when. And I don’t know what it’s going to be like, but suspect my theory about just having to cough to make the baby come out is fairly wide of the mark. I’ve read a lot about the speed of second labours, and that mums generally leave it as long as possible before going to hospital – hence lots of unexpected home births (not ideal as I’d have to chose between hard wooden floors or our new pale grey carpets, the horror!) But we’ll just have to wait and see. 37 Weeks – Full Term And Finishing Work And yes, 37 weeks pregnant and full term! I finish work today and everything is now ready. But bizarrely for someone who’s so impatient, I’m in absolutely no hurry at all. I can’t wait to meet the baby, just…not…yet. Ask me again at 40 weeks though, and I’m sure it’ll be a different story. You can read all of my second pregnancy updates over here and follow me on Instagram. Also read my post – when’s the best time to go on maternity leave?

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The early baby days

Gillian — Thu, 29 May 2014 08:45:08 +0000

How did you feel in the first few days of new babydom? Blissfully content, wafting round full of love and all the good hormones, gazing in wonder at your baby? Or slightly confused, clueless, tired, tearful, tired? There’s no right answer – of course – and it’s not a black and white thing, but I do think lots more people feel like the second rather than the first, however hard it is to admit. I’ve read a lot of celeb mag interviews and posts and so on from new mums who talk about how amazing and wonderful the first few days are. And I think ‘really?’ Of course, for some people this is true, but it’s not for many. And I think it would be helpful to be a bit more, well, honest about it. In the first few days at home I felt pretty overwhelmed and still shellshocked from labour. Despite, on paper, having a quick natural delivery and a speedy recovery, I kept thinking “did that ACTUALLY HAPPEN?” We struggled with breastfeeding, and 2-3 hourly feeds day and night didn’t result in much sleep for anyone. And speaking of which, Eliza wouldn’t sleep anywhere but on one of us at night, so we took it in turns to sit up with her (seems crazy now!) Everything was unfamiliar and incredibly confusing and complicated. Even getting dressed. Ridiculous things – good and bad – reduced me to tears, for weeks, like some sort of hyper-hormonal new mum stereotype. Even small things made me feel ragey and I felt pretty bleak at times. And that was just a regular dose of the baby blues, mixed in with a helping of severe sleep deprivation. It’s not all bad; on the contrary. You have your baby, the most amazing thing ever. We built ourselves a cosy sofa nest with the heating cranked so high that visitors found it ‘tropical’, and didn’t do anything for ages but eat and watch films and box sets. I saw my husband in a completely different light, and was full of love for him and awe and wonder at this wriggly little old man that we’d somehow made. And it gets much easier quickly. It’s often described as a baby bubble, but it’s more of a daze really isn’t it? It’s a complicated and contrary time when you often feel a hundred different things at the same time as nothing at all. Although I’m 20 weeks off giving birth, it doesn’t seem very far away and I am wondering what it will be like the second time round. This time, I know what’s coming when the baby comes. And we’ll hopefully know what to prepare for (as looking back it’s impossible to do this first time when you have absolutely no idea what’s going to hit you). Although we’ll also have a super-active toddler who won’t want to sit around watching Mad Men boxsets. Yikes. Here’s some ideas for making the transition as easy as possible: 1) Do as little as possible. And do what you want (if you want visitors, great. If you don’t, don’t be afraid to say so) 2) Ask for help if you need it! Be it with breastfeeding, cleaning, cooking and so on. Also, get a cleaner 3) Have loads of food in so you can leave the house as little as possible. If you don’t spend your maternity leave batch-cooking lasagne (like me, who preferred napping and watching rubbishTV) then order lovely things from Cook, or just super-easy supermarket foodstuffs 4) Be kind to each other. I was always surprised when I’d read people saying they would shout at their husbands / partners for doing things wrong, as to be honest both of us had an equal amount of no clue at all 5) Take it in turns to nap. Everything is loads better if you just get some sleep 6) Eat loads of cake and comfort food. Don’t even think about a post-baby diet 7) I couldn’t get over the amount of people who said Kate Middleton wasn’t representing ‘real motherhood’ because she had her hair done and wore a dress for the post-baby media call (when the whole of the world was watching!) Who knows who or what a real mum is? Wear pyjamas for two weeks if you want. But also, if it makes you feel better to put on proper clothes and a full face of make-up, do it 8) Remember there’s always someone around on Twitter, even at 3am. And morning is never too far away.

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Pregnancy week 15: inbetweeners

Gillian — Thu, 24 Apr 2014 20:03:30 +0000

Pregnancy week 15…I’m comfortably wedged in that liminal space of pregnancy where nothing much is happening. It’s just between the ‘there’s actually a baby in there!’ excitement of the 12 week scan and then the major events after about 20 weeks leading up to the countdown (big movements, proper bump, giant flowery smocks and so on). I’m feeling lots better and slightly fatter, and I think I’ve felt the baby move, yet am not 100% sure enough to get too excited. It’s all a bit…normal. But this is no bad thing, I realised last night. Shortly after I saw some lovely flowery Zara trousers, remembered it was pointless buying them, and then remembered that I’m going to have to push something the size of *that* out of *there*, again, in a very short space of time. Probably with no pain relief, exactly like last time, because I’m that lucky. When I was pregnant with Eliza, her EDD was the end of January. So she was always due ‘next year’ and it all seemed very far away (with summer, autumn, and Christmas in the middle to distract me). This time, I’m due in October. This October. Which is right after the summer that’s waiting in the wings to start. Which seems both thrillingly and terrifyingly soon. I can’t wait, I really can’t, but I’m more than happy to. I don’t want to rush a second of the time we have left as the three of us. Having an actual bump and feeling properly pregnant would make it all very, very real. And I’m perfectly OK with not thinking about that just yet. That was pregnancy week 15 – here’s my first trimester update, and an update at 14 weeks pregnant.

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19 pieces of advice to my formerly pregnant self, on the eve of giving birth

Gillian — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 09:43:27 +0000

What would you go back and tell yourself on the night before you gave birth, armed with what you know now? I was watching the BBC2 Midwives programme – responsible for a recent attack of the broods – and started thinking about both Eliza’s birth story and how the actual birth process is such a big focus for future parents, but only a really tiny part of the parenting story. There’s so much that you have absolutely no idea about at the time. Which is probably a very good thing. Last month, to mark Eliza’s 18-month-iversary, I wrote a letter to the future-her of 18 years. As she’s reached her next monthly milestone, I thought I’d take a look back instead, prompted by the TV programme. So if my 18 month post was a letter of love to my future daughter, consider this a 19 month note to self. Here’s the pieces of advice I’d give to to the formerly pregnant me: Bad news, labour is not like period pains (thanks, Mum)… …’tightenings’ (thanks, wildly unrealistic childbirth books)… …or gentle waves of pain lapping at the shore of your uterus (thanks so much, NCT) Things labour is like; on reflection, blessedly quick And it’ll give you conversation fodder with new mum friends for months and months after Nappies go on the other way round (it would be ever-so-slightly embarrassing for the hospital doctor to have to point this out to you, wouldn’t it?) Your baby will sleep really well in the hosptial cot, but not at all at home So it’s inevitable that, as soon as you finally get the baby to sleep, the doorbell will ring and wake her up, every time And on that note, make sure you do your nursing bra back up when you answer the door to the postman… ….the delivery lady… …and the gas man If baby books really did have the answer, there wouldn’t need to be so many. Read the newspaper you bought three weeks ago instead Even though you now own 100 million muslins, you’ll end up using your expensive face cloths to wipe up sick at some point You and the washing machine will become best of friends… …but you’ll hate the washing basket with a passion. On the day you get to the bottom of it, there will be more sick and it’ll instantly be full again of sheets and expensive face cloths (that will also be the day your mum visits and innocently remarks that you ‘don’t do much washing, do you?’) Talking about what a great night of sleep you had is the new politics or religion; don’t mention it in polite conversation. Or on Twitter But hey, it’s OK – you won’t know what that is for a really long time (pregnancy insomnia really doesn’t prepare you, either). Everything really is a phase, and at 19 months you’ll look back and wonder why you spent so long obsessing over breastfeeding, rolling, crawling, weaning, breathing and so on But you’ll never quite get your head around how amazing it is that you made this completely brilliant little person that you love more than all the hours of sleep and hot cups of tea in the world. And I hope you never do.

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Transfer deadline day

Gillian — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 14:05:32 +0000

Today is the football transfer deadline day. What’s that you say, football? Really? Yes! It’s a day I’ll now always remember as a year ago today it was also Eliza’s due date, which was coincidentally fitting for a baby with a sports-obsessed father, grandfather and uncles. Throughout my pregnancy her EDD had been a pretty abstract concept as I knew that most first babies are as late as I usually am. So it was less of a full stop, and more of a TBC. However, at about eight months my consultant scheduled in an induction for the actual date. My lovely husband joked that he’d be watching Sky Sports News in the delivery room. So the 31st of January saw Alex and I and all our bags sat in the hospital labour ward waiting room, impatiently waiting for the next chapter of our lives to start. A woman with a tiny newborn was wheeled through on a bed, and I remember it suddenly hit me, along with a wave of mild panic – I’m going to actually have to get the baby out now. And then a midwife appeared and told us they were too busy, and could we come back tomorrow when they might have a bed? Talk about an anti-climax. So Alex and I and all our bags went back home, went for lunch with my mum, and actually did end up watching the football. And Eliza arrived shortly after. Photos are the pre-birthday girl dressed up as a character from a children’s book for National Storytelling Week at nursery. She’s a bear from that children’s literary classic, ‘That’s not my bear’. I’m feeling really emotional already about her birthday! Does everyone feel like this? Worried I really might spend her whole party in – happy – tears…

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My pregnancy diary in Pregnancy & Birth magazine

Gillian — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 13:06:09 +0000

I’m really thrilled to have been asked to appear in the December ‘Pregnancy Diary’ feature in Pregnancy & Birth magazine, along with lots of photos of all three of us (I loved reading P&B when I was pregnant, and also appeared in it last year). Although I did document lots of my pregnancy highs and woes on this blog, it’s great to see it all in the article. Despite some of the not-so-good parts such as having problems conceiving, being high risk, and practically living at the hospital, I loved being pregnant and feel really nostalgic about it now. And in spite of having a pretty eventful birth story – with one continuous contraction, getting to 10cm dilated while still on a ward, having to give birth without any pain relief, telling myself never again immediately after – I think I now have the new mum amnesia that makes you forget most of it (is it true that everyone gets that?) My pregnancy must-haves in the green box-out are: Cowshed stretch mark cream, Isabella Oliver maternity clothes, the book What Mothers Do, Especially When it Looks Like Nothing by Naomi Stadlen, and this blog also gets a mention. Thanks Pregnancy & Birth for having us. Here’s some separate scans of the article which might make it easier to read (click on each one to enlarge it).

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Eliza’s birth story – an unexpectedly quick induction of labour

Gillian — Sat, 05 May 2012 22:02:19 +0000

I thought I’d post my induction of labour birth story (a propess induction story) today to coincide with International Midwife Day. I received such amazing care from midwives, both in the hospital (despite it being incredibly busy) and from the community midwife team at my doctors surgery (who came out to our house for three weeks after we’d taken Eliza home from the hospital after our induction of labour). I’m lucky that I had access to such great care, as I know that so many people aren’t so fortunate. “I have to tell you; you’re already 10 cm dilated, and your baby will be here before your epidural. You are going to have to deliver her without it,” the midwife said to me to my horror, mere minutes after we finally made it to a delivery room. “Now, do you feel ready to push?’ But before we move on to Eliza’s imminent – and unexpectedly speedy – arrival, let’s rewind back to the start. It actually began with a false start, on my due date, with an propess induction story that progressed as far as the King’s College Hospital labour ward waiting room. At this point I’d had two sweeps and everyone was convinced I’d spontaneously go into labour. But she stayed stubbornly put, so we went in for a propess induction of labour as planned – but were then sent straight home due to an unprecedented south London baby boom meaning there were no free beds. “You didn’t expect to actually have a baby on your due date did you?” a midwife said wryly. The next day we were back, although I was convinced we’d be turned away again, right up until Alex and I were ushered into one of the beds in the induction bay. After monitoring, they gave me the induction of labour drugs via propess and told us to expect a long wait as nothing was likely to happen for at least 24 hours. Yet the early evening dinner brought with it back-ache and stomach cramps. “Sounds promising!” said a midwife when I mentioned it, although she was soon contradicted by the doctor, who said it was too soon to be anything more than pre-labour pains and Braxton Hicks. The pain quickly got so bad that I couldn’t get comfortable at all, and nothing – lying down, walking, my long-practised labour breathing – seemed to help. Alex tried using the contraction timing app we’d downloaded, but as there was no start or end point to the pain, we figured I couldn’t possibly be in labour. Wrong, wrong, wrong, as it turned out. The midwife gave me some paracetamol and hooked me up to the monitor; the delivery ward was still so busy that she was needed elsewhere and left us alone until midnight. After one look at the monitor printout she called the doctor back, as it turned out that the pain was actually off-the-scale back-to-back contractions with no gap in between, and I was now 3cm dilated. We all had a laugh about how I was a ‘difficult’ patient, as the doctor said that due to the method of induction they wouldn’t have expected anything to happen until morning. It stopped being quite so funny when she told me even though I was in so much pain I couldn’t have an epidural until I was 4cm and a delivery room was free; however, they said they’d check me again in four hours and let me have gas and air. This really helped, and encouraged by the tantalising promise of imminent proper pain relief, I lay on the bed feeling blissfully relaxed. Alex even had a brief amount of sleep on a special ‘dad mat’ on the floor. This didn’t last long. At about 2am I realised that I was no longer feeling any relief from the gas and air and the constant pain was getting worse. There were still two hours to wait until my next examination, but the midwife reluctantly checked me, and was as surprised as we were to find that I’d actually dilated to 6cm. Epidural time, at last! However, at that point there were still no available labour rooms as the hospital was so busy, so we had to wait. By the time they moved someone out of a room – one of the longest hours of my life later – I was pretty convinced I was going to give birth then and there, on the induction ward, with three other women in the beds around me (sorry! to these women, I was you a few months earlier). As they finally pushed my bed down the corridor I started feeling the most intense physical pressure, and my body started automatically pushing. My waters broke in dramatic fashion as we got to the room, and I was pretty sure this didn’t bode well for any more pain relief. I was right; the doctor swiftly checked me again and it turned out I’d gone from 6cm to 10cm in an hour and would just have to get on with it. So push I did. I was so focused on getting the baby out that I don’t remember this part being anywhere near as painful as the lead-up (even though they took the gas and air off me, to my absolute horror). Pushing took either five minutes or five hours in my head; Alex says it was more like half an hour. Towards the end the midwife was concerned as the baby’s heartbeat kept dropping off the monitor and she calmly instructed me to “get this baby out NOW.” So just before 4am I gave the final push, and, with both hands by her face, out flew Eliza. It’s funny, I had planned and prepared so much in the weeks leading up to the birth; all the usual first time mum worry about random things like what to wear and what songs would go on my pushing playlist. However, when it came down […]

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Welcome to the world, Eliza Grace

Gillian — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 12:38:59 +0000

Baby C, aka Eliza Grace, was born in the early hours of last Thursday morning at King’s College Hospital in south London, weighing 6 lbs 10. Although she looks a lot like Alex, especially with her dark hair, she’s inherited my impatience gene; she took just under 10 hours to make an appearance from start to finish (I was induced, a process the doctors said could take anywhere from 1-4 days). I have to admit that her name wasn’t our first choice; we were so utterly convinced she was a he that we’d already picked a boys one out for her, so it was a bit of a happy surprise to be proven wrong at the 22 week scan. In terms of her actual name, Eliza is a family name from the 1800’s on Alex’s mum’s side, and one he suggested but we both really loved. We’d picked Grace as a middle name from the start because it fits really nicely and ‘Amazing Grace’ was one of the songs we had at our wedding. So far we’re getting on really well; Alex and I have spent a lot of time just staring at her, and we’re both in awe of this amazing person that we made.

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