When booking my 40 week check up I was certain that we wouldn’t need it! But the days went by and there was absolutely zero movement at the station! The day before the due date we decided to book into a caravan park down by the beach to have a little holiday in our new van before the baby came. And what could bring on labour more than being somewhere completely inconvenient!

However, our due date passed and then the next day (Friday 3rd Nov) off we went to our 40 week check up. Baby was still completely not engaged and discussion started about being induced in a couple of days. Unfortunately my obstetrician was going away the following Wednesday (40+6) and the hospital I was giving birth doesn’t like to go over 41  weeks, so she wasn’t totally keen on letting me go until she got back on the Saturday. However, she definitely gave us the choice but said definite induction the following Saturday if bubs hadn’t moved out on his own!

We decided to just go in and get it done.. baby would only be bigger in a weeks time and at least we knew for sure that our ob would be delivering. So it was all booked and we were due to go in on Sunday night for gels. We stayed in the caravan park until Sunday morning! It was so nice to be there relaxing. If we’d have been at home no doubt we would have felt the need to do things around the place!

Sunday 5th November, 9pm we arrive to Flinders Private Hospital and I get admitted. We get shown to my room and start unpacking only to be told that someone else needs the room and I am to spend the night in the delivery room! This was good and bad as it meant I wouldn’t have to move the next day but bad because the labour bed was the most uncomfortable and guess who got zero sleep that night!

 

The gels were inserted.. it wasn’t too bad, felt slightly weird but they gave me gas so I was happy 🙂 Scott went home to get a good nights sleep before coming back at 8am ready for my waters to be broken at 8:30am! I was due for some more gels at 5:30am but I had started little early labour contractions through the night so they decided to not give them as it was unnecessary!

Ginette (my ob) arrived at 8:30am and got straight into it. Compared to the gentle hands of the midwife she was rough af! Luckily I had gas to help me concentrate on my breathing because I wanted to yell at her to calm TF down with her aggressive hands! Waters were broken and at all started immediately! My reasonably moderate early crampy contractions ramped right up.

I jumped into the shower for relief and after about 5 minutes was thoroughly confused about all I ever knew about what labour was supposed to feel like! I thought you were supposed to get a break in between contractions?! I was not getting one at all. I had about 40 seconds between each one and they were lasting roughly a minute.. however the whole time, including in between contractions I had this searing pain around where my pubic bone was! I said to my midwife, what is this! I thought you were supposed to get a break in between and she kind of just laughed at me (tbh she was a bit of a bitch). She was starting to get a little annoyed at me because she wanted to start me on the Syntocinon drip (which contains oxytocin, the labour/contraction hormone) but you need to be constantly monitored whilst on this which ideally they like you on the bed for! But I felt like I could hardly move and whenever I did, I just wanted to sit on the toilet!

 

By this stage it was about 11am, I was 4cm dilated and had had around 2 hours of continuous pain. I decided there was no way I was going to get through this drug free. My birth plan was no epidural as I’ve had a bad reaction to one in the past but that was all forgotten! I apologised to Scott (not that I needed to!) and said I couldn’t do this for much longer without an epidural. I thought I had a high pain tolerance after passing multiple kidney stones and breaking my neck! But after only 2 hours of still only early labour I felt like I must not because I was NOT coping! By midday the anaesthetist arrived and put me out of my misery! I was able to be started on the Syntocinon, be monitored and the midwife was a lot happier with me!

At roughly 1pm this midwife was relieved for lunch and we got another. He looked at the monitor and immediately rang Ginette. He asked her if she was looking at the monitor and apparently was just about to phone. Bub’s heart rate was dropping and not looking great. They thought it was either the Syntocinon drip or the epidural which was causing it as they were both started around the same time. The drip was stopped to see if it made a difference and thankfully his heart rate increased. Apparently sometimes the labour can stall when the Synto is stopped but luckily my body continued on with the job just fine.

After an hour, the pain started to return in my pubic bone and suddenly in my back. I was given a top up of the epidural however some of the pain lingered. I begun to get an ache in my thighs. The new midwife (shifts had changed and we got a lovely one!) said this may mean I had transitioned to the next phase and should be around 8cm dilated! She did a check and yep, 8cms! After another hour and another top up, the pain was barely easing at all. I was hardly feeling contractions.. all I had was this incredibly intense pain in my back and on my pubic bone! Another internal at 4pm and I was fully dilated. 10cm, ready to push! But, baby had turned posterior (hence the back pain) and his head was bumping against my pubic bone (hence the pain there!)! Turns out he must have turned and begun hitting my pubic bone from the very start! No wonder the pain!

I started pushing which actually felt relieving. I found that if I didn’t push through the entire contraction, my pubic bone and back pain would be literally unbearable and I would be beside myself with pain until the next time to push. But if I managed to effectively push through the whole thing, I would get a nice little break where the pain wasn’t as bad. It was literally the worst pain in my entire life. I wouldn’t wish a posterior baby stuck on your pubic bone to my absolute worst enemy. There are actual no words to describe the pain.

Earlier I had wanted to try pushing on my knees leaning against the back of the bed but wasn’t allowed to because of the epidural. This had worn off enough by now for me to try. Turns out this position only made things worse as leaning forward just put all of the baby’s weight against my pubic bone and when I thought it actually couldn’t hurt worse, it did!

My obstetrician arrived and I begged her to stop this! I wanted out! I didn’t want to do it anymore! She had come already dressed in scrubs and I found out later that she’d already alerted the theatres that I’d probably be coming up. I was grateful that she gave me the chance to try deliver him naturally even though she realistically knew he’d have to come out via cesarean. She asked if I wanted a section and put the consent form in front of me and I grabbed that pen fast as lightening and signed! I knew I couldn’t keep going, I was exhausted.

While theatre was getting prepared I continued to push. My midwife thought I had managed to get him past my pubic bone as she could see the head coming closer down! She asked Scott if he wanted to see the top of his baby’s head, so he went down and had a look! After almost 3 hours of pushing, I was given stronger drugs through my epidural port ready for surgery. While I was being wheeled up, the pain finally stopped and I felt a lot more relaxed.

Once inside, I was examined to see if forceps or a vacuum could pull him out but it turns out that his head was still palpable above my pelvis and he still was not even engaged! After we would find out that he really was in a shit of a position right up around the back and with his neck flexed totally the wrong way the little bugger! There was literally no way he was coming out without a csection. I felt really good about it all after that. I had tried my very best and there was absolutely no other option but the surgery.

I actually got quite nervous once on the operating table. I am a scrub nurse and see surgeries every day so I knew what to expect and I think that was the problem! I knew too much! I started talking heaps to distract myself from what was happening and even though I couldn’t feel any pain, you can still feel like tugging and pulling etc. So when I felt a thin line across my abdomen, I knew that was the scalpel.. I could hear buzzing and knew that was the diathermy etc. It really wigged me out and I was surprised by that! He was pretty stuck in there and they struggled to pull him out. But got there eventually!

They lowered the drapes and there was our beautiful screaming boy! With a massive ball sack and a massive cone head! All that pushing had elongated his head and that’s why the midwife could see it coming down even though he wasn’t really in my pelvis!

 

They gave him to me and then took him for check ups and a clean and then wrapped him up and gave him back. Then Scott got a hold while I was transferred back onto my ward bed. Watching him hold his baby son for the first time made me love him even more!

Once back in recovery, the midwife helped baby Bear and I to breastfeed for the first time. I honestly didn’t know what I’d think of breast feeding but I immediately loved it. It’s a very special thing and I was glad to experience it so soon after he was born.

I am so grateful that I was able to have a healthy baby. Even though I was induced, had an epidural and a c-section, all of which I was hoping to avoid and the fact that he was posterior and stuck.. I honestly can’t fault the whole experience. It was amazing and I want to immediately do it again!