18
Birth Story Caroline ledger
At 11pm I was feeling really uncomfortable and so got up off the bed, when all of a sudden my waters broke, there was lots of blood and I had the urge to push. Not the greatest experience of my life. The ward had 5 other expectant mothers, all trying to sleep and I was in total shock not knowing what to do. I called for the midwife who came running and text Graham to give him the heads up. I didn’t want to get back on the bed to be examined but she was insistent. She found I was fully dilated and all of a sudden about 4 other people descended. They grabbed my stuff, offered me a wheel chair (I wanted to walk to keep active, but made it about 4 steps before almost collapsing into the lift). One of the midwives said she’d grab the emergency delivery kit and another raced ahead to open the doors and call the lift. Within minutes I was on the delivery suite, in the first available room. Lights were turned on, packs of equipment were being opened and the special cot the baby goes into on arrival (Katie – no idea what it’s called so do replace if you know) was turned on. I once again refused to get on the bed so stood leaning on it, begging for gas and air. One of the midwives checked my husband had been called. Before they connected the gas and air, my baby girl arrived! She was scooped up onto the bed in front of me. I was very insistent that her cord wasn’t clamped (partly because of the health benefits but also because I wanted Graham to cut the cord if possible).
There was more commotion and Graham came running through the door (having been all over the place looking for me)! He made it in time to cut the cord and agree on Rebecca as her name. It was 11.50pm and my active labour had been recorded at 22 minutes.
After a few hours getting everything cleaned up (including another second degree tear which had to be sutured) we were taken back to the Joan Booker ward. It was so busy that I had a private room to myself. Graham had to go home as soon as we were settled in, and I had a lovely few hours getting to know Rebecca in peace. Several of the midwives who’d seen me earlier in the evening were amazed at how fast it had been.
Graham came back in the morning and we were discharged later that day. We went home and introduced Charlie to his younger sister, our family now complete.
Although the final labour was very fast, and the contractions much more painful than I remember them being with Charlie, being induced was nowhere near as bad as I’d feared it would be.