Elaine's story, Scotland - infertility treatment for a beautiful boy

"5 Nov 07

THAT'LL BE THE MUCUS PLUG!!!

Well, (TMI warning) things are definitely moving along, when I had my 4.45am visit to the loo on Saturday morning, I wiped away some lovely salmony pink CM!!

It's now coming in dribs and drabs and is a little darker, so having to wear a pad at all times. Think that's my mucus plug officially gone, so getting closer to the finish line!!

Had another acupuncture appointment today - my back feels so much better, and she stuck a couple of needles in my shins again for energy! Made appointment for next Tuesday - but I'm hoping I won't need it!!!

9 Nov 07

PLEASE COME OUT TO MEET MUMMY & DADDY SOON!!!

We had clinic appointment on Wednesday and had a touch of protein in urine and slightly higher BP than usual, so two hours at the MDA in Wishaw that afternoon. BP was up and down and bloods showed a touch of pre-eclampsia, but they were happy enough for me to go home.

Made another clinic appointment for next Wednesday and MDA appointment with consultant for next Friday. Then at 2.30am Thursday had a proper "show" and cramps every 5-6 minutes lasting between 10 and 20 secs. DH wanted to phone Wishaw straight away, but I managed to put him off for a couple of hours as I knew there was a chance it could all calm down again. Anyway, when I did eventually call, the nurse said she wanted them longer lasting and closer together - needless to say, by the morning they were almost completely gone!!!! Same again last night/this morning with an added trip to the loo every hour on the half hour!! I'm exhausted!!

22 Nov 07

CHRISTOPHER JOHN IS HERE!!!!

As today is my due date, (started typing this on the 22 Nov!) I think it's only right that I update you while all the details are fresh in my head!

Saturday evening (10th Nov) sitting watching X Factor, I was really short of breath and had an uncomfortable tightness across the top of my bump. I had trouble eating my dinner (obvious sign something was wrong - it was a Chicago Town Pepperoni pizza!!) and just didn't feel 'right'.

DH pestered me to call the maternity ward, but I kept putting him off. Eventually I gave in and called, and they told me to come straight over. We left the house at 8.30pm. On arrival, we were moved to another ward as ours had no spare beds. We actually benefited from the move, as it was to the high dependency ward, and we were well taken care of.

Baby's heart rate, my contractions and blood pressure were continuously monitored through the night. I was hooked up all night to a fetal heart monitor, so got no sleep, while DH snored in the chair next to the bed. While I was melting, DH was freezing, so pinched the cover off the bed, LOL!! At 7am, I got DH to phone my parents to let them know what was happening, but also to ask if they could go and let the poor dog out – she’d been abandoned, poor pup!

The staff were concerned that the baby was showing some signs of distress with each contraction, so the consultant (who had done my amnio – I liked her so was quite please to see a familiar face) did a scan, which showed the amniotic fluid was a bit low and that baby was smaller than we would have expected at this point. She then did an internal examination which showed I was already 2-3cm dilated. She said, let’s get you delivered, and broke my waters, it was now 10am.

In the labour room, I was hooked up to the syntocinon drip and antibiotics for my GBS. I was bouncing away happily on the birthing ball for a couple of hours before I needed the gas and air. The syntocinon was continuously turned up to bring on the contractions stronger, so I was soon asking for the injection – can’t remember if it was pethidine or diamorphine!

Had a very interesting conversation with one of the midwives before needing any of the pain relief. She asked what my feelings on pain relief were, I told her I wasn’t brave and would take whatever was needed. She gave me some very good advice. Gas and air is pumped straight into the room so is on hand the minute you ask for it. Pethidine/diamorphine has to be signed off by two people and takes about 15-20 minutes to kick in, so you’re looking at half an hour before you get the relief. An epidural also needs two people to sign it off and an anaesthetist to be located. By the time the drug has taken effect you are looking at an hour all in. Something to think about!!!

Anyway I had my injection, but unfortunately some of the anti-sickness drug was lost, so there was poor DH running back and forward to get me water as the gas and air was making me so thirsty and drying up my lips like crazy, then fetching a sick bowl for me to throw it all back up again!

By 4pm I couldn’t handle it any longer. I could no longer track the contractions and time my gas and air intake. It felt like I was having one huge contraction! The midwife said an induced labour was a million times more painful than a natural labour, and she would eat her hat if I managed without an epidural!

LOL!!!

So over the next couple of hours, the consultant popped in a few times to check on us. She wasn’t too happy with the EFM, so attached a monitor to bubs head, which was a more accurate way of reading his heart rate. She also took a couple of blood samples from his head too.

By 9.30pm-ish, it was decided to get baby out by forceps. It all felt so surreal! You knew what was happening all day, but to actually know you were going to have your baby in your arms within a few minutes was crazy!!

After three pushes, Christopher John was born at 9.48pm weighing just 5lb 10.5oz. DH and I were literally speechless! The effects of no sleep, all the drugs and just the craziness of the day then took hold, and I could not stop shaking. DH had to hold the wee man for quite some time before I stopped! As soon as I was able to I popped him inside my nightshirt for some skin to skin which was the best feeling ever!

CJ slept by my bed in an incubator that first night and we were then moved to the ward the next morning, where the staff from the high dependency managed to get us a single room. I’m so gad they did, as CJ ended up being taken away to Neonatal for almost 48 hrs, which, if I’d been in a ward would have been really tough!

My milk didn’t come through, and I really wanted to breast feed – it actually didn’t come through for a week. I was managing to hand express a small amount of colostrum into a syringe, but it wasn’t enough. CJ’s blood sugar was all over the place, so I told the midwives I was happy to bottle feed him. Unfortunately this may have been left a bit late as with his jaundice making him sleepy and the fact that he wasn’t feeding, at 2am on the Tuesday morning, he was taken away! I can’t tell you how much I sobbed!! When DH and I went along the next morning to see him, I sobbed again. I knew he was in the best place, but you feel unbelievably helpless! The staff were all fantastic, and I can’t praise them enough. I spent as much time as possible with CJ, but felt guilty about sitting cuddling him when the best place for him was in the incubator. The sooner he was better, the sooner we could get home.

We did eventually get home late Thursday night, and I don’t know where the last couple of weeks have gone!

DH and I are eternally grateful to Dr Willocks, Dr McLellan and all the staff in wards 23, 24 and the neonatal unit of Wishaw General, and of course all the staff at Glasgow Royal Assisted Conception Services, without whom we wouldn’t be the family we longed to be."

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Lucy's story, Midlands - quick labour, no pain relief and slow placenta

"Riley Jackson joined us in the world in a hurry on 23rd November at 6:51pm weighing 7lbs.

I’d been having contractions since late morning, but they were irregular anything from 15-25 minutes apart and not overly painful. So I just ignored them while carrying on with my day, throwing my son around and such. Trying not to get my hopes up because with Joshua I had contractions like this that then went away for 24 hours. By 4 – 4:30pm my contractions were every ten minutes apart and a lot more painful, I would have to stop what I was doing, bend over and grip something while breathing through them. Once the contraction was over I was able to carry on with what I was doing so part of me doubted that this could be the real thing. 

We sat down and ate dinner and by 5:15pm when Ant was deciding he had to go to work I was saying, "look you can’t, this is happening". He called work while I rang the hospital about 5:30pm and my contractions were five minutes apart. They advised me to come in so they could check me over. Ant called my parents to come and watch Joshua and twenty minutes later we were on our way to the hospital. The car journey was bloody agony, with my contractions coming every 2 -3 minutes. By the time I waddled across the car park, up a lift and along the worlds bloody longest corridor to the labour ward the contractions were coming thick and fast. I wasn’t having time to recover from them before the next arrived. No one was answering the bell on reception as stupidly they had no one manning the desk, people had been there longer than me waiting and I was getting a bit panicky. 

Ant followed someone through the doors when they opened and told the midwife my contractions were coming fast and would someone come. She dismissed him and sent him back out. Finally after what seemed like a life time but in reality was probably no more then 5-10 minutes someone appeared. Right as my water broke and I yelled ‘I need to push.’

The midwife told me to follow her and I honestly didn’t think I could walk, she got me in a wheel chair and rushed me to a delivery suite and told me to take my trousers off and get on the bed. I swear she wants to bloody try climbing onto a bed while your body is screaming at you to push. Somehow I managed it and by the time I had the head was half the way out, the midwife then preceded to make me stop pushing, I have no idea why but I told her after that was she mean. The head was then out, and again I had to stop pushing. The cord was wrapped around the baby’s neck – she didn’t tell me this till afterwards thankfully or I would have panicked. Before I had pushed his body out he was crying which is the MOST amazing sound. She scooped him up and plonked him onto my tummy and I was so relieved. 

I have no clue of times, neither does the midwife really but there was no more than ten minutes between my waters breaking and Riley being placed in my arms. Little squid didn’t hang around that’s for sure. 

I lay there feeding him thinking, 'wow, that was fast and scary' and I realised I actually panicked and thought I was going to give birth in reception in front of a room full of people. 

Unfortunately the next stage wasn’t so simple, even with the injection to help speed up the delivery of my placenta, it didn’t want to make an appearance. Crazy that I managed to deliver a baby with no pain relief but needed gas and air for the placenta. To be honest I think part of the reason they gave it to me was to calm me down. My entire body was shaking, shock I think. An hour later and lots of poking around by the midwife, (child birth really isn’t glamorous) and my placenta still hadn’t arrived. So in comes a doctor to take a look, and they are talking about trying something to help. 

Injecting whatever is in the injection into the cord. I think all that talk scared my placenta and an hour and ten minutes later it made an appearance. 

Finally it’s time to focus on Riley again, who’s been wrapped in blankets and placed in his cot. They weigh him and get him dressed, but he’s really cold. He’s given a warming mattress once I’m taken to the ward and this is left on all night. Meaning even if it was possible to sleep on a ward with crying babies and a woman moaning she was in pain there was no way I was going to be able to anyway as I was so worried he’d not warm up enough, or he’d get too warm with the mattress that I had to keep checking he was okay.

Thankfully when they took his temperature again in the morning it was fine, so they turned off the mattress and checked again an hour later and he was fine. So we were discharged at lunch time. 

Things have been going brilliantly at home, breastfeeding is going well and doesn’t seem as hard this time around. The first few days were, but once my milk came in baby became more enthusiastic and is now feeding about every two hours. 

Midwife came out today to weigh him and he’s 6lb 15oz, so he’s barely lost anything... makes me a very happy Mummy."

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Beth's story, South Wales - quicker labour, missing waters

"After my first experience of childbirth, I was positive that I was more prepared this time around. I believed I knew what labour felt like, and I knew the signs and symptoms. I knew to pack dark pyjama bottoms, because the blood loss after birth would be tremendous. I knew that when I was ready to push, it would feel like I needed a poo. I also remembered that rush of love I felt for that little newborn in my arms, and was prepared for it.

My dream homebirth had been scrapped at 36 weeks after being rushed into hospital with severe high blood pressure, so I had resigned myself to having a second hospital birth. After two membrane sweeps at 39 weeks and being 2cm dilated both times, I was now 1 day past my due date and thoroughly miserable with extremely painful Pelvic Girdle Pain and desperate to get everything over with.

We hit the sack pretty late, but I was asleep in no time. 6am I woke up with a niggly bump, and realised that it wasn’t going to be long until I was going to meet my baby. I had a midwife appointment booked for 10am, so decided to try and get back to sleep until Little Man needed to get up for school. It was 7.45am when I woke up next, and the day absolutely had to start. It was a pretty normal morning, well for 15 minutes. I was eating my breakfast when I felt the first agonising pain shoot through my pelvis. “Oh my God, J, that hurt,” I said. “What?” he replied, still half asleep. “The pain in my pelvis.” It was only a couple of minutes later when I had another, so I started timing them.

By 8.30am I’d had 8 pains and I knew something was happening. We dropped Little Man off at school and continued about our plans taking J’s sister to her doctor’s appointment. While we were waiting for J’s sister, the pains started coming more frequently, every 3 minutes and starting to last longer, but they were still in my pelvis and nothing in my bump. I decided to call my midwife. “I’ll give you a home visit, Beth, if you’d prefer. Or if things are too difficult call the labour ward,” she advised. I decided to take the second course of action as I also hadn’t felt a kick that morning. “Come in and we’ll monitor the baby, but it does sound like it’s the groundwork being done,” the midwife on the phone advised.

We took J’s mum and sister home, picked Little Man back up from school, called my Mam and headed off to the hospital at 10am. Mam was meeting us there so her and my nan could have Little Man and the wait was excruciating.

When Mam arrived she took one look at me and knew it was not just 'groundwork being done’. “I’ll find somewhere to park the car, and I’ll be back for you,” Mam said as she left. With that me and J headed off to the labour ward.

As soon as we got there, I was given an internal examination. “Ah yes, 2-3cm, so you’re not in labour,” the examining midwife said. I was then hooked up to the monitor, and baby’s heartbeat came out loud and clear. I continued being monitored for a whole hour, and despite the pains in my pelvis every 3 minutes, nothing was coming through on the monitor. I was devastated, I really wasn’t in labour. Eventually, the monitor was taken off, and I was told to go for a scan and then go home. “How long will it be?” I asked. “Oh, it could be days yet,” was the reply I got. I couldn’t hold it in any longer and burst into tears, I really couldn’t cope with this pain for days. As we walked out, with me crying my eyes out, I heard, “Beth, what’s wrong?” I turned and saw my mother’s concerned face and could barely get the words out, so we just walked to the ultrasound department, stopping every couple of minutes because of the pain.

While in the waiting room, surrounded by women coming in for their first antenatal appointment, I started to panic. The pain was so intense I just couldn’t cope. “Oh, lovely, what’s wrong?” a midwife walked over to us, and took us into one of the rooms. We explained and she put her hand on my bump and calmed me down, “You’re scaring all these women off,” she laughed. Minutes later, my name was called and we went through for my scan at 12.16pm. I’ll always remember D, I’d seen her a few times throughout the pregnancy, and she was absolutely fantastic. She scanned me, and felt the contractions through my bump herself and suggested we didn’t go home, as it definitely wouldn’t be days. “Let’s go outside, and we can call M,” Mam said. (M is my Godmother who delivered Little Man when in remission from breast cancer, who was recently diagnosed with lung cancer.) The entire time Mam was on the phone to M, I felt the urge to push. I didn’t know what to do with myself, or how I was going to survive this.

As we weren’t going to leave the hospital, we went to the restaurant and I ate a cheese and tomato sandwich in between contractions which were lasting over 90 seconds and starting every 3 minutes. I couldn’t handle the pain so we went back to the labour ward and at 1.20pm I was examined and was 4cm, with membranes intact but I WAS IN LABOUR! I cried with relief then got excited as I knew it would be long.

Over in the delivery suite (which wasn’t as mad a rush as the first time), I was fitted with a canular, had oodles of blood taken and was put on an antibiotic drip as I had a high temperature. My ideas of a mobile labour had gone out of the window. I eventually gave in to gas and air around 2.30pm and immediately turned into a silly billy. “I didn’t have a shower this morning,” I moaned, making everyone in the room laugh. I had 2 fully qualified midwives, and a lovely student who made me feel completely at ease with their chatter and laughter in the background. My waters still hadn’t gone and that was a talking point with the midwives and they all stood out of the way, just in case.

By 2.45pm, I was pushing with no control over it and no breaks in between contractions, as quickly as one was finishing another was starting. It was agony. “I’m pooing, I’m gonna poooo.” That feeling had got me again. I was determind I knew what it felt like, but obviously not.

I’d had enough by 3.15pm. “Mam, I want it over. I want Pethidine. I want a section. I just want it over, Mam, please?” I’d turned into a baby, and looked at the midwives wondering why the hell they hadn’t moved to get me what I wanted. “I want a section… Now” I cried.

“F, I think you ought to check how far she is? She could be doing damage by pushing.” One of the qualified said to the student. F gloved up, and examined me. “I think I can still feel a bit of the cervix.” She said, “Could you double check for me?” The qualified turned around to glove up, and another contraction tore through my body, “Oh, there’s the head, stop pushing…. little pushes.” As I ‘little pushed’ I looked down, and saw my baby land in F’s hands. Baby was placed on my stomach, and my first reaction was, “how small is my baby?”

It took me a while to realise I didn’t actually know whether I’d given birth to a boy or a girl. J cut the cord and we looked down together. A girl, a beautiful baby girl. I cried, Mam cried, J cried. It was amazing.

Then something happened I wish I’d filmed, she started rooting for the breast and all by herself, she found it. It was an incredible sight. Her first thought was booby and that was all she was interested in. Her first feed was a good 20 minutes long and at least an hour of skin to skin was amazing. Afterwards, we realised that again my waters had not gone, and there was none when Dot arrived. It’s another mystery. And I’d almost cut my labour time in half, being in established labour for just 2 hours 12 minutes. I was in love once again with the little human I’d just given birth to and at that moment nothing else mattered.

Dot

2nd December 2009

3.32pm

9lb 1oz"

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Helen's story, Wolverhampton - feeding trouble and painless contractions!

"Contractions carried on but the pain stopped!

We had tried for a baby for 3 years without luck. After 3 months of Clomid, I finally fell pregnant. I was delighted.

Then the midwife came to me for the booking in appointment, she was really miserable and snappy. Not what a happy first time mum wants. Anyway she apologised as she was pregnant too and feeling really poorly. I only mention this because it turned out we were in labour in adjoining rooms! The other reason for mentioning it was because she was so horrible at the beginning when she asked if I had a 28 day cycle and I said yes. I’ve never had a regular cycle!

Samuel’s due date was 31st August but that came and went. Everyone thought he was late but he could have been early due to my dodgy periods. The following Wednesday I went for doctor’s check-up and my BP was high. The doctor sent me home to rest and the midwife came to re-check me in the afternoon. It was still high so I was sent straight to hospital.

They checked my BP and got me straight to a bed. I really didn’t want to stay and got very upset. On the Thursday they decided to induce me but because the other 3 local hospitals were full and patients were being sent up, they couldn’t fit me in. 6am Friday morning some rotten nurse woke me to get me started. Apparently they were going to start me in the night but I was so deeply asleep they left me (good decision!!!).

I was taken to the labour ward and had some gel put in. I immediately got a very uncomfortable tightening around my middle. I was meant to be monitored for 15 minutes but after 10 I had to ask to be taken off because I was so uncomfortable. I went back to my bed and managed to get some sleep. At 8ish I had some breakfast and the contractions were mild but definitely there. At 9.30ish I decided to have a bath. Once I finished I got out and there was a gush of water – my waters had broken. All I was worried about was I hadn’t cleaned the bath out like it asked! I put on a panty pad – how naive is that! I slopped my way up the corridor and got a mega pad to sop up the water!

I put on my TENS machine but I should have really put it on earlier as it didn’t make any difference. By 11am I was in a lot of pain. I went to the labour ward and asked for pain relief. The lovely sympathetic midwife said “you can’t possibly need pain relief”. When she examined me I was 8cms dilated. I asked for an epidural. When he finally turned up to do it I was having such bad contractions I couldn’t bend forward enough to have it done. He managed to put some local anaesthetic in which took the edge off the pain for a short while.

They seem to leave me for ages in this transition stage. They said the longer the better because of my BP (which had been fine throughout labour). Finally I started to push. As soon as I got to that point my contractions stopped. Well they carried on because the trace was showing them but I couldn’t feel them. I just kept pushing!

At 3.43pm Samuel entered the world. Weighing in at 7lbs 15oz.

I had to have some stitches but nothing too serious.

I finally had my gorgeous boy.

My little man went straight to sleep. He stayed asleep until, at 3am, I woke him up for a feed. NEVER WAKE A SLEEPING BABY! If they are asleep, they aren’t hungry! I had terrible trouble getting him to latch on. It didn’t matter too much at first but it became a problem very quickly and there was little support on the ward.

I went home on the Sunday which, in hindsight, was too quick for me. When I got home I broke down crying. I didn’t know how I was going to keep this little one warm (we didn’t have central heating).

For the next week I lived in a very unhappy bubble. I struggled to feed Samuel and I began to dread him waking up. I had a different midwife every day, none who picked up how badly I was struggling.

One morning I ended up back in hospital at 4am because I couldn’t cope anymore. I had an older midwife who got him latched on like a dream but once I got home I still couldn’t do it.

The next night I was being left on my own with Samuel for the first time. When he woke and I couldn’t get him to latch, I rang my mum. She came up and made up a bottle of formula for Samuel. A friend of mine, the only one to say I was having a boy, had got me a bag of baby bits when I was pregnant. She had got me a tin of formula and a bottle. I couldn’t understand why she would buy me that – breastfeeding is easy isn’t it? Anyway, after taking the bottle, my lovely lad slept from 10pm – 2am. Mum had made me up another bottle for the night which he took at 2am and then slept until 7am.

I was such a happier mum at that point so it was formula all the way after that and I finally began enjoying my lovely son."

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