Hardest stage of baby
I was admitted on 15th Nov 2006, my husband, Amore, drove me down to GHKL with his sister’s car (our car was with the ‘doctors’) but it was just another false contraction. [b]Bad news![/b] I had to stay in since I was juz 2 cm open. Every morning, they kept saying, “It’s not open good enough, you got to wait”. Was there really any other choice? I was so bored – nothing much you can do with that big tummy, that weight, had no comprehensive entertainment tool except for magazines which I had read them all.
I had selected a single bedded room so I was pretty much alone & BORED!. On the 17th of Nov around 6.30pm, an Indian male doctor said ‘I will make sure you give birth today’, I was like thinking, ‘yeah you will’. Then he proceeded to check my dilation but instead he put his 2 fingers in and he start opening, opening and well, opening… The pain was excruciating and uncomfortable and he finally said, ” Bring her to the Labour room”.
Party Time
By 7pm, I was nervous, close to being naked (oversize pink top and sarong were all I had on to protect my modesty) and barefoot in an air-conditioned room. I was pushed in a wheelchair and then managed to slowly climb onto my bed with cold feet. I was on drips, had a fever, was given Panadols and the contractions kept coming. I didn’t opt for any painkillers. A sweet lady doctor broke my water bag. At the point I saw what looked like trainee doctors and nurses observing and studying my rather private area.
After a while the doctor said, “we’ll give you 8 hours to open up to 10cm or else it’s going to be a C-Section’. I was extremely disheartened as I wanted a normal delivery because I knew about the after birth pain from a C-Section I had endured after delivering my first born.
Time passed as I watched other mothers coming and going. I was so sleepy; I was crying quietly, the cramps were frequent, tougher, and even horrible. It was just so painful, as though my entire back and hip were breaking into pieces; All I wanted was to get my baby out so I could go back home. I was so tired & I missed my older daughter.
I felt like shouting, it was so painful then It was 3am and I noticed they were preparing me for C-Section. I was so sad and I kept praying. Around 3.30am, the doula said ‘Don’t worry, don’t cry, you have dilated 9 cm. We can start pushing at 4am’. How I wished she could do the pushing and deliver my baby!
Around 4am on 18th November 2006, I told the doula I could feel the baby head’s pushing. She said, “push now!” and asked me If I wanted my Amore to be with me. I couldn’t care. I was too exhausted. She went out, closed all the other rooms’ doors and came in with my dearest husband, Amore, who had stood outside since 7pm.
The general anaesthetic kept me in a daze. Amore actually had some second hand GA and nearly fainted. Though it was my first time delivering naturally, I had been given virtual lessons by my mother but when I pushed the baby didn’t come out.
The doula then said, “I am going to help” and I felt her snipping somewhere below. I heard the ‘snip snap’. Scared and nervous, I pushed as hard as I could and suddenly my baby slid out! In tears, my husband said, “ it’s a baby boy’. Baby Ignatius weighed 2.7kg. My husband had to leave for me to be stitched up and it 4.33 by then.
At Last
They start stitching me up around 4.40am; I was given a pain killer. They (around 3 ladies) stiched a very sensitive part and it was raw as I felt the needle going through my clitoris, 5 stitches. Each time the needle went through, my leg wriggled. But tiredness disallowed me any other reaction. After they finished, I was pushed to my room with my baby by my side and it was around 6am. When it was all over, I just wanted to sleep. When I saw my dearest Ignatius Alessandrio all pain vanished. He is almost 2 years old now and the mischief that he makes, never fails to put a smile on my face.