Liesbeth shares the story of Jake’s birth
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I got to the hospital at 7 am on Thursday when they were going to give me a gel to hopefully stimulate the contractions. However, the baby’s heartbeat became very low when I got a Braxton Hicks contraction, so they decided not to use the gel – once the gel is in there, you can’t go back and if the baby gets distressed it could all get very messy. So they changed the plan and said they were going to break my waters instead.
They broke my waters at about 8 am and waited for my contractions to start. They did, but were too mild, so I got intravenous drugs to stimulate them. They started coming hard & fast after a while and it was so exhausting! They were really painful and I squeezed the life out of R’s arm! I felt like I was running the marathon, with R mopping my brow after every contraction and trying desperately to get my strength back before the next one. Finally, at the end of the afternoon, I started getting the urge to push, but I wasn’t dilated far enough. Most frustrating.
At last, around 6 pm, they told me I could start to push, which was a massive relief. I pushed and pushed and pushed, but Jake just wasn’t coming far enough from under my pelvic bone. After a good hour, they said I would start to lose my strength, so they gave me an episiotomy and put a suction cup on his head. Two women were hanging on it, trying to pull him out and then the suction cup came off! So the poor little mite had to have the cup put back on his head and finally they pulled him out with quite some force.
They put him on my belly and he cried for a bit, pooed on me and then just wriggled around – wonderful feeling. After a good half an hour, they took him off to weigh him and it was then that I saw how huge he was! 4045 g, with massive hands & feet! When they measured him the next day, it turned out he is 54 cm, so a big fella all in all.
When they stitched me up, it turned out I had also torn quite a bit, so I have a lot of stitches and that is probably the worst bit for me.
Jake has worked out breastfeeding now and drinks like a trooper. He sleeps very well too and loves to be cuddled, as long as you avoid his sore head. That is already improving though and he should be fine in a few days. My swelling has gone down a bit and I’m slightly more mobile today than yesterday, but I shuffle around like an old lady when I’m up & about.
He has black hair, blue eyes and looks like neither of us!
~~ Welcome Jake~~
