Odds & sods

After the initial telephone call of doom on Friday afternoon, the visit went well and I actually really like my Health Visitor! She gave me some really useful breastfeeding tips and advice. Looks like I'll be going along to her breastfeeding group across the road on Friday mornings. Turns out the Well Baby clinic is only over the road too so that makes things easy :-) She put things in perspective, in that at the moment all Little Man knows is sucking, crying, sleeping, weeing & pooing. He's doing well on all those fronts so I guess I must be doing something right. Apart from maybe the sleeping thing, but not all babies sleep as much as each other do they? He does OK at night; obviously we don't get as much sleep as we'd like, but I seem to have night feeds down so that helps.

She also talked to me about the birth. She was surprised that, as I'd had spontaneous membrane rupture & planned a home birth, that I'd ended up having a caesarean. I explained that the midwives who came at 4am asked me to go into hospital for a CTG & I'd ended up staying & she was of the opinion that, as I'd been taken out of my own surroundings into a strange unfamiliar environment, that my body had shut down & decided not to give birth then. Sounds about right to me! I'd thought this already, but didn't want to really believe it. I can't help wondering what would've happened if I'd gone home. There's absolutely no point doing this though as it's now in the past, Le Wiggler est ici & he's healthy etc. Anyhoo...food for thought.

Wheelie-shopper-of-greatness!

How are things going? They're going well. We've had a few nightmare days when I wanted to curl up & die, but who doesn't, right? The dummy/soother has died a death after only really being wanted by Isaac for about 1/2 a day. So now he sucks my finger instead. Although, last night I put a few drops of lavender oil on the muslin that goes under his head in his crib and he didn't need any kind of other soothing for the whole night! (for the times that he wasn't feeding etc). Lavender is good stuff I've decided - the knock out stuff of infants. We'll see how it goes tonight.

The sling continues to be daytime salvation. Isaac doesn't sleep during the day unless he's in the sling. I tried to have a nap the other day, which was hideous. I nearly got to sleep a few times in the course of an hour, but Isaac didn't sleep at all & I eventually gave up & felt like rhubarb for the rest of the day. Dad bought me a wheelie shopper to use in town when I'm wearing the sling & don't have the luxury of being able to carry lots of bags plus baby. It's amazing - thank you me Da!

I shall be glad when Simon has finished with enrolment at uni & he's home at a decent time in the evenings. I don't know what I would've done without Dad being here. He's been great - made me lunch every day & offered words of encouragement and understanding.  He's ace and will be missed when he goes home on Friday...alone at last :-( Bring on the visitors! :-D

Super Pa!

That is all I have to say for now, other than this...

(not Isaac!)

And she slings!

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh! The sling is operational!

I COOKED FOOD AND HE SLEPT THE WHOLE TIME!!

He slept for the longest period out of today AND yesterday; in fact, he's still asleep now. Isaac loves the sling!

I'm so very relieved. I was beginning to think there was no hope, but all seems well with the womb etc so I'm slinging it up from now on. Viva la Hug-a-bub :-D

Went to get him weighed again today & he's not back up to birth weight by 20 grams. A measly 20g I tell you. The midwife (crazy lady from Zimbabwe that I saw prenatally) says this is fine because breastfed babies gain weight more slowly than formula fed ones. So, all is well with family Turner. Now we listen to his birth chart reading :-)

Where to begin?

Booby baby & hemp burger at Eco Fest

So here we are at the end of Isaac's second week out of the womb and it still hasn't really sunk in that I'm someone's mother. Even typing it and reading it back sounds utterly ridiculous. I'm responsible for the well-being and development of a small person. Who let this happen?!

We've been out and about quite a bit considering the caesarean. We've been into town a few times and today went to Eco-Fest at Markeaton Park which was great. It was lovely to be out in the sunshine and surrounded by loads of other people. It's a bit surreal though; feels as though they're at a distance, not included in our little family bubble and therefore not relevant. I'm sure as I get more used to our new life that it will become less weird. I hope so anyway!

How's he doing then? He's doing fabulously and now has eyelashes! My staples came out on day 6 and the community midwife was pleased with how my scar was healing. She weighed Isaac, who had only lost 5% of his birth weight, which apparently is good.

At barely 8 days old he got conjunctivitis in his right eye. It was soon sorted after a visit to the doctor and some drops. It cleared up after about 2 days and shows no sign of returning. I would rather not have put anything in his eyes as I know conjunctivitis clears up on its own, but the poor little mite doesn't have the capacity with which to make his own healing tears yet :-(

We all went to the postnatal clinic for our 10 day check rather than waiting at home for the community midwife again as she didn't arrive until 7pm for our day 5 appointment! Poor woman should've finished at 4pm, but had several emergency appointments and decided to keep going rather than rearrange appointments. Anyhoo, we weren't discharged from midwife care because his cord hadn't then dropped off and, with 4oz to go, he wasn't back up to birth weight. The midwife was pleased with my scar and again commented on how good it looked (?) considering it was only 10 days after the operation. One forgets that a caesarean is actually major surgery.

Isaac's cord came away on day 11 and he now has a nice little pink belly button which is healing well. It's very cute :-) We've got another appointment at the postnatal clinic on Tuesday so we'll see if he's back up to birth weight by then. I can't imagine that he won't be judging by the amount he eats!! I'm really noticing the need to drink massive quantities of water; if I don't I get awful dehydration headaches.

Mother's Milk

Breastfeeding is going well. It doesn't hurt per se, but sometimes feels a little uncomfortable. He sometimes feeds for hours at a time, but I realise now that it's not all feeding, but comfort sucking. With this in mind we did the dreaded and tried him with a dummy. We really, really didn't want to, but he's so much happier with it. I don't like how it squashes against his nose, but maybe that's just how he was lying in the car seat? Plus there's a limit as to how much of the day I can sit with my boobs out!! If he's hungry he spits it out and cries, so I feed him. If he isn't hungry, he's happy to suck on the little plastic and rubber marvel. I expressed some milk for the first time yesterday. 2oz in about 3 minutes! Apparently that's good. I'm not an experienced expresser, so wouldn't know. It was very satisfying though! It'll mean that Simon can help with feeding too. This is good because it'll A) give me a break and B) include him more in Isaac based activities.

Simon goes back to work on Monday. Neither of us want him to go and if Isaac could talk I think he'd say the same. He's been an enormous help with things like making sure I'm fed and watered and doing the laundry. Mum's coming up for the day tomorrow to keep me company and then Dad's coming  up tomorrow evening to stay for a few days to help me while I get used to Simon being at work.It's rubbish that Dads only get 2 weeks paternity leave. Apparently the rules are changing and Dads will be allowed to take 6 months leave soon, but it has to be deducted from the Mother's allowance. How is that fair/does that work? Hmm.

The hospital discharged me with 7 days worth of diclofenac (anti-inflammatory).  I took those and paracetamol 3 times a day for the 7 days and haven't taken anything other than arnica since. I'm feeling much stronger now, although I'm not supposed to lift anything heavier than a baby or drive for 6 weeks, which sucks. The doctor did say to go with how I feel though and I do feel a lot better. I think I may be back on the road before the 6 weeks is up. As long as I can lift the pram in and out of the car that is! Having the caesarean has totally thrown me. I wasn't expecting to have to sit on my arse and recover. I'd much rather be out and about doing stuff and making new mum friends. Ho hum, I guess that's the way it's going to have to be for a few more weeks at least. I can't even wear my sling at the moment because it puts uncomfortable pressure on my scar. So, I really do have to sit on my arse and recover. Bring on the hands free days of sling!

For all the lack of sleep and feeding marathons, I wouldn't change a thing; I want him to stay tiny forever, if only for moments like this when he's asleep on my chest making little contented noises. I know it's not possible, so I cherish each moment as it happens.

I don't think the dog likes being further down the ranks though!

History Repeats.

It all begins at 2.26am the morning of 6th September 2009. My first contraction (that I was aware of) woke me up then and, about an hour after that, pockets of my waters started to trickle out. We phoned the emergency triage number after an hour or so to see what to do & they sent 2 midwives out. My contractions were every 2 minutes & lasted approximately 30 seconds. The first midwife arrived at 4am & the other about 45 minutes later as she had to travel from further away.

Typically, as soon as they arrived my contractions stopped. They were both totally flummoxed that I hadn't been induced and said they'd be much happier if I went to the hospital for a CTG (belt monitoring of baby & uterine activity) later that day as anything over term + 12 is outside of ordinary midwifery apparently - bear in mind at this point I was term + 13! We agreed to this & they left. As soon as they'd gone my contractions started again with much the same timing as before. I was pretty tired by about 6am so went back to bed & the contractions petered out until about 10am when I got up again & got ready to go to the hospital for the CTG which was scheduled for 11.30am. My contractions had started again with the same timing & strength as before & didn't let up this time.

Getting to the hospital was an experience - contracting in the back of a car isn't great. We got to the hospital & realised we'd left my maternity notes at home - D'OH!!! Simon nipped back to get them & I carried on eating my breakfast that we'd brought with us in the bowl (standing up outside - how oppressive is the waiting room on the labour ward??). Simon came back & we went into one of the consultant lead care rooms. I have to say that the midwife support worker that "checked us in" was bloody awful. No people skills at all. The midwife, however, was lovely & couldn't really understand why the other midwives had wanted me to come in!! Anyhoo...1/2 hour on the monitor & everything was fine.

By now I was pretty tired & still having contractions which were getting stronger now. The midwife examined me and found that I was 3 centimetres dilated which was kinda disappointing as I'd been up so long! I thought about what Rebecca (our NCT teacher) told us about labour -  it's like a trip to London on the M1; some days you get there in record time, other times you stop & start all the way & you can even give up, turn around & come back.

We made the decision to stay at hospital as the pool room was free. The awful midwife support worker came to take us down to midwife lead care. She opened the door and said "ready then" as I was obviously in the middle of a contraction. Did I look fecking ready?? Off we went thinking everything would progress &  the Wiggler would be with us soon. How wrong can you be? Got into the midwife lead care room & contractions stopped. I got really, really REALLY upset & wanted to go home. About 3 hours later the midwife suggested a hot bath to see if we could speed things up which I did and was in it (which is called Diana, by the way) for about an hour. When I got out I was only 4 cm!! Crushing. By now I was exhausted and really tearful. Mum had gone home to let the dog out and it was just me & Simon. We talked with the midwife & the doctor who explained that it was what they call an obstructed labour. With great sadness we decided to move back to consultant lead care & go on a drip  of synthetic hormones to get things going.

Back in consultant lead care I'm crying pretty hysterically, or as hysterically as someone who has had 4 hours sleep & been awake  for about 17 hours can cry. We had the loveliest midwife called Steph. I'm eternally grateful to her for being so nice. She put me on a belt monitor. When asked what my thoughts on pain relief were I found the words "I'm not sure I can cope with the pain if I go on the drip so I'd like an epidural" coming out of my mouth. She said it's what they'd recommend as I was so tired. I ended up being on the monitor for a good 2 or 3 hours again when she came in asked if she could put a clip on the Wiggler's head as she was concerned about his heart rate dropping during contractions. Again, grateful for NCT class attendance as we knew what it was for and why it was a good idea. So she did that, all the time still waiting for someone to come & put a cannula in my hand before the epidural could be administered. She suggested that I start using some entonox as the contractions were getting quite strong now. I'd like to say that it's bloody marvellous stuff, although it does loosen your tongue and make you feel drunk :-D

Wiggler didn't like that at all. His heart rate dropped dramatically & Steph came rushing in, told me to get onto my side & then told Simon to pull the red cord behind the bed. The next thing I know is the room is full of people in scrubs all talking medi-speak deciding if I should be prepped for  caesarean. Wiggler's heart rate calmed down, or rather sped up so they backed off a bit, but decided to get a blood sample from his head. Joy. Off came the bottom of the bed & out came the stirrups. Steph tells me to keep sucking on the entonox like there's no tomorrow which I do,  thank goodness for that stuff. I still hadn't had the epidural, or got the cannula. The light wasn't working & I wasn't very dilated so the doctor couldn't get said sample :-(It was like having the mother of all smears, or a lifetime's worth of smears in one go.

It was then the decision was made to deliver him by emergency caesarean section. Finally the cannula went in to the side of my wrist (after some sort of conversation with the anaesthetist about the weedy veins on the back of my hand) & a blood sample taken for whatever reason. I'm still on my side breathing constant entonox. Not really sure what happened, but everybody left & I was told I'd have a spinal instead of the epidural. We waited about 10 minutes for them to take me to theatre. Steph came to get me & allowed me a few massive gulps on the entonox before we left. Once in the operating theatre it took what seemed like forever to get the spinal done & I was still contracting quite heavily. Simon says the noises I was making were awful. Sitting up for the spinal was grim, but mercifully it kicked in quickly. After that the screen went up & the top half of my body was shivering like a thing possessed! I felt OK though, tired, but OK. Simon came in in scrubs (I remember thinking he looked really good in them!) and sat next to my head. Then the pulling about started & the next thing I know I hear a cry. I thought "Oh, there's a baby in here" and then it dawned on me that it was our baby :-) Having waited the duration of my pregnancy for him to be born it was very strange to know that I was going to see him for the first time very soon. Steph took him to do whatever it is they do with newborn babies and then brought him over to Simon. We'd agreed about 1/2 an hour before it all kicked off that we liked Isaac as a boys name, which is good because we'd been undecided until that point.

I was stapled up and wheeled into recovery where Steph put him onto my chest for some skin to skin and to start breastfeeding. It was difficult to hold him so that he could feed properly because I had the cannula with a drip on the side of my wrist & something else on my forefinger measuring something else, plus I couldn't sit upright because of the operation, but we managed a little. We were in there for about an hour and then 2 porters came to wheel me up to the maternity ward.

Nothing had really sunk in and everything was surreal to say the least. Mum & Simon stayed until about 2 and then the midwives asked them to say their goodbyes. I was so wired that I hardly slept all night; I was too busy looking at my beautiful little boy. Plus I was  too awash with hormones and drugs to care!

And so that is how, at 11.42pm, weighing 8lbs exactly, Isaac Andrew came into the world; the same ugly route as his mother. It's not as I'd have liked, but he's alive and healthy - for what more could I ask?

He sleeps next to me in his pram as I type these words. It's taken about 3 days with 5 or 10 minutes snatched here and there between feeds and sleeps. I'm eternally grateful to the powers that be that he's here. I'm gutted that my body seemed to fail so hideously in its performance of such a natural and instinctive task, but it all seems an awfully long time ago now as Simon and I look to the future with our son.