So here it is – our beautiful baby girls birth story. After such a carefree pregnancy which I was so grateful for, I had it in my head that her birth would be pretty unremarkable as well. I didn’t have a birth plan – I had made the decision early on that no plan is a good plan. Child birth is something that can change at any moment and I didn’t wan to get my head set on something that would more than likely not happen. I made sure I did everything possible leading up to her birth to ensure my body was ready but at the end of the day – as you’ll hear – the baby is in charge.
So I’ll start from the week before when I lost my mucas plug. I lost it at 37+6 days (a Wednesday). I had heard and read that once it goes you could literally go in to labour either that day – or you could still have weeks left. So the excitement set in. Up until that point my obstetrician was sure I was going to go either on time or slightly late. There was nothing during the pregnancy that suggested I would go early – and my mum had both me and my sister late so I just had it in my head that I had at least 2 weeks to go.
Monday 27th August – 38+4 days we had our obstetrician appointment and I mentioned my plug. She had been growing slightly small the whole pregnancy and wasn’t growing a huge amount at the end. After having a feel around, and a scan he said – “I think she’ll come this week”. OMG the excited look on Chris’s face and my excitement suddenly tripled. We would meet our baby girl soon. Chris still hadn’t packed his bag so promised he’d do it that night. I had been having Braxton hicks contractions constantly over the last few weeks – however now they were more intense and more frequent. I just had a feeling she was on her way.
Tuesday 28th August – 38+5 days. Chris still hadn’t packed his bag. He kept saying – once you start to feel contractions I’ll have time. I wasn’t so sure haha. I was still feeling great so headed off for a gym session.
I was still doing 30-40 min work outs, mainly upper body and banded leg and butt exercises, and always a good stretch at the end. I picked up Chris and we went for a gorgeous late lunch. As we walked in the door I had what I thought was a Braxton hicks, but it was different, it was also in my back. I didn’t think much of it – until 2 more came each about 30 minutes apart. I said to Chris – I think I may be going in to labour this was at 5pm. Then – he decided to pack his bag. It suddenly hit him – “babe – is this happening”. Yes Chris – it is.
From there the contractions started getting closer together – around 20 minutes apart. I called the hospital and explained and they said to rest up and call and come in when they either get to 5 minutes apart or too painful. We went to bed and around 9pm they started getting closer together – every 10 minutes and more intense. I was tracking them using my Pregnancy Plus App and dosed in and out between contractions. In the morning they were still 10 minutes apart and I was so tired.
Wednesday 29th August – 38+6 days. The contractions were all over the place all day. They started at 10 minutes apart – then went to 7 minutes – then I wouldn’t have one for 20-30 minutes. I popped on the Lion King and tried to just not think too much. We then decided to go for a walk – as that’s supposed to help get things going – and I still hadn’t had a cinnamon scroll which I’d been saying I wanted the whole pregnancy. So we walked down to my favourite bakery. 
Along the way I kept having contractions – again very sporadic. Once we got home I managed a 30 minute nap and it seemed the contractions were fading away. I had heard of false labour as well so started thinking maybe it wasn’t happening. We headed out for a late lunch close by – towel under my bum in the car – in case my waters broke. By the time we got home however – the contractions started getting not only closer to together but more intense. Around 8:30pm we called the hospital and they gave us a choice – we could stay at home until they got closer together, or we could come in and get monitored. At that stage I’d been having contractions for 27 hours and was getting so tired so we decided to go in. If they sent us home -then that was fine – but I wanted to know what was going on with our little munchkin.
We arrived around 10pm and they hooked me up to a machine to monitor her heart beat as well as the contractions. The contractions were regular however she was being so wriggly that her heart rate was constantly too high to see how she was responding to each contraction so they said I needed to stay in. Chris went and got the bags and we settled in to our birth suite at Epworth Freemasons. Chris had a lovely fold out bed, and I settled in and tried to nap between contractions which didn’t happen. They were so painful in my back – which I was told was because my baby was probably posterior, so her head was facing up and the back of her head was pressing against my spine. I was trying so hard to not make a noise each contraction so Chris could get some sleep – such a thoughtful fiancé.
Thursday 30th August – 39 weeks. At 3:30am I got up as I needed to go to the toilet. While on the loo – a tonne more of my mucas plug came out so I called out to Chris as I went to get a change of underwear. On my way back to the bathroom – while Chris was occupying the loo (GREAT) I stood in the bathroom and my waters broke. It was now game on, and thank goodness we hadn’t been sent home – cleaning that up in our bedroom would not have been fun. We buzzed the midwife, who gave me some super glamorous maternity pads – like surfboards as she said from here I will now continually leak fluid. I also had to be hooked up to an antibiotic drip as I was strep B positive. The contractions started to get far more intense at this stage, I was enjoying walking around and standing on my tip toes during each contraction for some reason but I was slowly getting exhausted. 
The midwife and Chris were being amazing, I had a heat pack for my back and during each contraction just told me to go floppy – staying tense was the worst thing I could do. The drip was in my arm by 5:30am – and I wasn’t able to walk around through the contractions as much. There was no way I was going to sleep now. My obstetrician – Pregs (yup that’s his name) was called and came to see me at 7:30am. I was shocked when he examined me that I was only 1cm dilated. All of those contractions and only 1cm. He said – because she is posterior she’s not moving down into the birth canal. He said he needed to ramp up the contractions and with her sitting where she was he would most probably be using a vacuum or forceps to get her out. He said he would be giving me an epidural as there was no way I’d cope with how tired I was and he wouldn’t use a vacuum or forceps without one. Even though I was hoping not to have one – I was so exhausted and if the doctor said I needed one then I was going to listen to him. I was to be hooked up to another drip which would give me oxytocin which increased the contractions. Here I was hoping to not be hooked up to anything, and I was now hooked up to everything possible.
Once the epidural was in I was able to nod off for half an hour intervals as well and get some rest. Over the next few hours the midwives were saying to me that the baby wasn’t responding to the oxytocin – instead of her heart rate increasing with each contraction it was dropping and she was in distress, so they turned it down. Pregs came back around 11am (the times are all over the place in my head) and I was still only 3cm dilated – still not nearly enough with the amount of contractions the oxytocin was giving me. He ordered the midwives to ramp up the oxytocin and just see how the baby responded and how my body responded. It was then he said to me that if nothing happened then I was probably going to have to have a c-section. My heart dropped – although I didn’t have a plan – a c-section was something I really wasn’t keen on. I’d worked so hard in the lead up to giving birth, using the Epino, and doing loads of pelvic floor exercises – but at that stage I just thought – get her out safely – if that’s out the sunroof then so be it. At around 1pm the midwife examined me and I was still only 3cm – so called Pregs back. At the same time Chris decided to go and grab some lunch. If I was only 3cm there was no way I was giving birth naturally in the next 20 mins, and if I was going to have c-section then they would need to prep for surgery so didn’t see it a problem that he popped out.
At around 1:30pm Pregs arrived – examined me and exclaimed – she’s 9cm – let’s see if this baby will come down. I couldn’t believe it – from 3cm to 9cm in such a short amount of time. Luckily I’d had the epidural as the contractions would’ve been 1-2 mins apart and hugely intense. I still had a gap where the epidural hadn’t worked on my left side so I could still feel some of the pain and was glad it wasn’t all over. Pregs said he wanted to see if she would come down more so with a midwife each side – and my baby’s head in his hand – he made me do 3 big pushes. I pushed as hard as I could – I was using everything in my power to make sure I had a vaginal birth. I finished pushing and Pregs said – yup she’ll come out – Where’s Chris? OMG – this was happening and it was happening now. I picked up the phone – told him to get his ass back to the hospital now. When he’d left to get lunch I had been snoozing away – when he arrived back – my legs were in stirrups, the doctor was coated up and it was all go. 
Things had escalated very quickly in 20 minutes. While I was getting all prepped – Chris said – Danni I have to brush my teeth – omg seriously haha . With a midwife on either side giving me instructions, Pregs inserted the vacuum onto her head and the pushing started. It took me 5 big pushes to get her out, after the 3rd one the midwives were yelling at me to look down Danni, look down. I could see her crowning, then after the 4th push again I looked down and saw her head out in the wide world. It was incredible to be able to see. Although I couldn’t feel pain I could feel sensation and knew how much I needed to push to get her head out and then her little body. Chris was so fantastic the whole time encouraging me and being my cheerleader. I was so overwhelmed as she came out and was put on my chest. She was here. I looked up at Chris with tears in his eyes. 
She took a minute or so to cry but it was the best sound in the world. Our little girl was here and she had all 10 fingers and all 10 toes.
While just staring at her beautiful features – I knew the doctor would be waiting for my placenta to come out. I looked up briefly and saw him give one of the midwives a look – I asked what was wrong. He said that my placenta was stuck, and the cord had broken, and that he would have to manually removed my placenta. It was then he asked for an elbow length glove. Oh god – he meant getting it out with his hand. It was the weirdest sensation as I could feel him rummaging around inside of me looking for the placenta. He had to go up twice to get it all out, and as he’d already stitched me up once – had to restitch me again. I was impressed however that I only needed 2 stitches. The EpiNo definitely helped prepare my perinium – otherwise I would’ve had a huge tear.
The midwives then gave us time to just enjoy our newborn baby girl. They had to wait until my epidural wore off anyway so it was nice to just be the 3 of us soaking up our beautiful daughter.
It wasn’t the birth I envisioned, and I’m so glad I went in to with an open mind with no plan. It meant I was open to whatever the midwives and my doctor needed to make sure the baby came out safely and that I was ok. It’s true what they say though – I would do it a million times over for her, she is worth every second, every contraction, every sleepless pregnant night, every after birth pain.
The overwhelming love I have for her is insane – and it’s true – there is no love like the love for your child.
Love and Life
the Figure x
