Once again, I got to the end of my pregnancy thinking “This baby is never going to come out”! I guess I make a very good home for my babies! My Estimated Date of Birth was the 11th of February and I felt that once again I would indeed go over. From the 9th to the 13th I had acupuncture every day with Alex for birth preparation. Since I had such a good outcome with Lachlan being induced with acupuncture, I decided that I would see Alex throughout the pregnancy with Charlotte and hopefully have another wonderful birth experience!
I decided that if Charlotte hadn’t arrived after my session on the 13th that I would leave it a few days until closer to the big 42 weeks when Dr’s start pressuring you for intervention! I went back to Alex at 3:30pm on the 18th and had an induction session. Nice, strong pulses from the Tens Machine for a solid 90 minutes. I got off the table and still felt a little defeated but Alex and I thought that maybe in the next day or two, Bubbe would come.
I then picked Alan up from work and Lachlan from Day Care and went home. I still felt nothing during Lachlan’s dinner and bedtime routine so we packed him off to bed and asked Alan to go out and get me Indian food. I always want Indian for some reason when I am sad or sick for comfort food. Alan left at 7:25pm and I settled down into the couch to watch some TV. At 7:40pm, I heard these two massive pops and thought something fell off the armchair onto the floor. As I sat up to see what it was, I suddenly realised that it was me that ‘had popped’ and raced into the bathroom. Amniotic fluid gushed out of me. Since my water never broke with Lachlan, at first I had no comprehension of what was going on as I thought it would be much more of a trickle. I then woke up to the fact that I was indeed going to start labour! Hooray!!! No, hang on, no hooray! Where was my husband?
I cleaned myself up and managed to race into the kitchen, grab my phone and back to the bathroom before it started gushing again. Alan was only in the garage thankfully, but looked stressed when he got inside! I informed him we were going to have a baby within 48 hours regardless of having no contractions yet and that we should eat dinner and pack my bag. Alan rang his Mum straight away to tell her to jump in the car and come to Canberra. I thought we were being a little over the top but at least she would be here tomorrow when I was most likely going to have the baby! I rang our Midwife Natasha and our Doula Rachel and told them my water had broken and that I was feeling ok and that I would call if anything else started. Alan then rang Richard who is 30 minutes driver away and let him know that he was now on standby in case it was soon.
I still wasn’t having any contractions but I just felt ‘funny’ and told Alan that the baby would probably be here in more like 24 hours than 48 hours. It was at this stage that I lost my marbles. I told Alan to vacuum the carpet and mop the floors. I suddenly felt compelled to clean my wallet out. After Alan vacuumed he said, “Hope, is there something more important that I could be doing right now?” I told him that he may have to be doing a lot of running around the next day and that he should fill the car up with petrol. I think he was glad to get away from me as he was suddenly gone before I knew it. I went upstairs and put most of my gear into a bag and my back started to ache. I went back down to the kitchen to get a drink and was suddenly hit with a contraction that took my breath away. By the time Alan got home 15 minutes later, I had had 6 contractions. Alan looked as though he was going to faint!
I went back upstairs to finish packing my bag. By 9:30pm Alan convinced me that I was probably going to have a baby in a few hours time and that I should think about going to the Birth Center. My fear has always been that I’ll turn up and only be 2cm dilated and have to turn around and go home. I called Natasha and asked her to come over and check me. We spoke for a few minutes on the phone and during this time I’d already had 3 contractions. As politely as she could, she told me to ‘move it’ and get to the Birth Center as a baby was coming Fast and Soon. I got off the phone and told Alan who immediately freaked out about waiting 30 minutes for Richard and the fact that his Mum would only be half way to Canberra. He called Ben (one of Lachlan’s Godfather’s) and asked him to come over and wait until his Mum got there.
At 10:00pm, we were about to leave when I realised we hadn’t called Natasha or Rachel to tell them we were leaving. Alan called Natasha as I had a contraction and then barrelled me into the car. As we drove off, Alan called Rachel and told her we’d see her soon too. Once again, I couldn’t bear to sit down so I had to turn around, kneel and hug the headrest while Alan raced down the Parkway. Poor guy – he’s done it twice now and still not managed to get pulled over by the police and get an escort to the hospital!
We got to the Maternity entrance to the hospital and was holding onto the side of the car during a contraction when I could hear Alan buzzing the Delivery Suite to let buzz the door to let us into the Birth Center. Now I look back on it, it’s pretty funny that he could hardly get the words out and couldn’t remember the name of the Birth Center when he was speaking. It was such a welcome relief to see Natasha and Rachel who grabbed me under each arm and led me to the bath that was still filling up. Oh Yeah! Rachel had already lit candles and I stripped off and dove in as fast as I could. The contractions were intense. I remember with Lachlan that in between I would be able to hang my head over the edge of the bath and recover for a minute or two in preparation for the next one. This time around, I felt like I’d finish one only to begin another one seconds later. I asked Natasha could I push as I really wanted to but she said that I was only 8cm dilated and to try and breath through the next few contractions to try and avoid a tear. At 11:25pm I’d reached 10cm and was into second stage of labour and it was all systems go. At 11:35pm, Charlotte was in my arms and I couldn’t believe the relief!!! Hooray! 15 minutes later I had birthed the placenta and was in bed cuddling up to my little princess.
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