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There's something so moving about that photo of Ollie and I that Matt took when we were back in ER, despite the incredible amount of pain I was in he handed me Ollie and I felt all that pain was beyond worth it for this little miracle boy. Oh and there's me in labour in all my glory with my BFF the gas and my amazing mother in law and angelic midwife
PART II -gory-ious, glorious labour, birth & postpartum meltdowns
PART II - gory-ious glorious labour, birth & postpartum meltdowns No sooner had Ollie been evicted from the comforts of nice warm squishy womb we too were being packed up to move to the ward. 3 hours after his birth and I was walking! I wouldn't go as far as calling it walking more like shuffling clutching onto his crib catheter bag onboard and jacked up on pain relief and loved up to my eyeballs over this little bundle all wrapped up. The first night there was minimal sleep. 9 long months I'd waited for this moment and here he was right beside me. Hormones were surging excitement, love, anxious, exhausted, confused. You name it I was feeling it. The toilet was calling me in the morning to change my padded up surfboard action below. Low and behold guess who forgot they still had a catheter in them? Meeeeee! I froze once I felt that initial tug and just stood in this awkward pose as I lurched forward for the buzzer and waited for the nurse. The bag was full and the midwife said due to my excess blood loss they had to keep it in overnight, she was happy with my vitals and said once I was ready for a shower she would remove it. Oh goody! Because it felt like a padded up party down there & I was super keen for some relief. She removed the catheter and I gave her this blank look as she pulled away. "Is that it? Isn't there more? Like padding?" I honestly believed someone had shoved a gauze down there and ever so sympathetically she replied. "No love that's just all the swelling you can feel now". SHOOT ME NOW. It wasn't my birth that traumatised me as in many cases you hear of women having traumatic births. No mine was from my early postpartum days & the shit storm that it entailed. Being a first timer to all this I had absolutely no idea what pains were normal and what weren't. Having had an episiotomy I expected both front and back to hurt. But nothing prepared me for the pain that followed. Ice packs galore they were my new BFF now the epidural & gas were long gone. But I had no idea the pain that radiated was in fact grade 4 haemorrhoids. to top it off I was being given no treatment other than midwives telling me to keep up the ice packs and voltaren. I also didn't know just how bad they really were. The pain got worse and finally a midwife said she was concerned about them & would get the doctor to come have a look. GRUESOME PART TO FOLLOW. Ok so I fore warned you. In waltzes Dr "I'm too busy for this shit" gets me to lay down and wiggle off my knickers and suited up hoo ha. She asks about the pain I've been feeling with the haemorrhoids she then has a poke around to which tears well up as it is the most sensitive of catastrophic messes down there. Then she says I'm just going to check if there's any further in and shoves her finger up my already damaged bottom, followed by her then trying to push the haemorrhoids back inside. By this point I'm screaming out in pain. With Matt by my side holding me he said I didn't even make that much noise during labour. That's how bad this was. The Doctor then all displeased with my crying out in pain says. "I'm going to get you some cream and you can put on some gloves and go in the bathroom and push the haemorrhoids back inside yourself because I'm just not going to do it for you ok?". SHE SAID DO WHAT?! So I got given this cream and off I hobbled. I tried I couldn't, I wanted to vomit and pass out. Buzzed back the midwife who took another look and was horrified when I explained what had happened. "Absolutely not you can't push those back in you shouldn't even be touching them". You don't say? Things now felt 100000 times more painful. She then proceeded to bring paperwork for us to lodge a complaint against the doctor who had done this as it should've never have been handled like this. My stay was now extended due to the severity of the haemorrhoids and the sheer pain I was in. However we checked out by the afternoon of the extension as sometimes shared ward etiquette isn't carried by all the patients and let's just say I wasn't ok with a room full of strangers coming & going to be able to take part in hearing me go to the toilet. New babies are wonderful & exciting however I think given how raw, sensitive & overwhelming those first days are with a new baby are its important to think of your fellow mamabears that you're sharing a ward with & perhaps limit your visitors until home time yeah? Our first night at home we were so lucky Matts Mum brought us over dinner or else we would've been hangry as well as exhausted. The first night was awful, we'd bought this baby hammock for Ollie to sleep in it seemed perfect for a newborn after all the reading up id done on it I thought he'd be sold on it! Wrong so bloody wrong! Matt had to get Ollie and bring him to me and help position him to latch on for feeds and change his nappies and dress him and I struggled with the pain to be able to stand for more than a few minutes and positioning myself in bed or on the couch was a performance on its own! Those first days I look back and just see pain. The new baby part I reckon would've been more bearable if I wasn't so immobilised from the pain and anxiety around that pain. My haemorrhoids were worse than originally thought, upon the home visit of the maternal child health nurse who did not only all Ollies checks but had to look at my stitches and pad etc. she was horrified by what she saw and said it was that bad that she couldn't see my episiotomy stitches. I was advised to go see my GP and see if I could get a referral to present back to ER. This meant getting in the car. Sitting in the car. On my hard seat car. Going over bumps. Fuck. My. Life. Upon getting to the doctors I was hardly doing what you call walking and the receptionists saw my struggle and asked if I wanted a wheelchair, I just cried and Matt explained that I couldn't sit. The wonderful nurse ushered us to a closer examining room and said they would get my doctor to come over to us and just to lay down or stand whatever felt the comfiest. Shout out to my doctor! She's seen and heard everything in the past 11 months and probably thinks I'm a complete fruit bat but is friggin amazing! Off to ER at the hospital I had Ollie we were to go. I couldn't bare the thought of sitting for the 25min drive and the awesome nurse who helped me walk out to the car told me to get on my knees and face the backseat of the car as she clipped me in. So now my butt was facing the dashboard and god forbid we crash my butt would also now take the full impact however I was comfy! And I couldn't have cared less how bizzare it looked at this point. Hospital declared the haemorrhoids as being a grade 4 out of 5. They also advised I'd been using essentially a useless cream for them and I would need to be having salt baths 3 times a day. We were all exhausted, emotional & at a loss as to how to make things more manageable. They were happy to re admit me to the maternity ward and went about doing so, only to be told it was full and we would need to just go home and manage best we could. Matt would need to have the mentally scarring job of checking down there to make sure things didn't get worse. I remember nurses & doctors reactions when they'd see the haemorrhoids for the first time & when Matt saw them & cried with me I knew they were bad. Everything comes to a breaking point when everyone's so exhausted, stressed & not coping. Our first melt down was in the car park outside the chemist at 8pm at night after coming back from ER. Matt was getting supplies & food, Ollie began crying, I could barely move but clambered into the back to try settle him. Matt came back to me hysterical saying we needed to get home and that I was in so much pain. Matt broke down. My rock who'd been carrying the 3 of us since labour was not ok. And THATS OK. I was so glad he could express this and even more so when he accepted that we needed help & to see if his Mum could come round the following day to help us. I truly believe we forget the massive role in which Dads play, they don't physically have the 9 months of growing and birthing the baby so a lot of birthing & beyond can be a really rude shock to them. I cry all the time, hormones, sore engorged boobs, tired as all hell. But it's also ok for Dads to cry too because this journey is just as raw & real & incredibly life changing for them as it is us. However I do still believe women should get this big fluffy crown of anazingness for all our child bearing/birthing/5weeks of surfboard wearing & beyond but hey. I'll give credit to the blokes because they're amazing too. Our first week of parenthood we were surrounded by the people we needed the most. My mother in law was unbelievably amazing! From bringing us meals to helping with cleaning the house as we wrangled our way through sleep deprivation and being responsible for this tiny human. Team NZ arrived when Ollie was just 5 days old (my MamaJo and Dad). I loved that time we spent together. We camped out in our living room most days, Dad reminiscing over when I was a baby and all my amazingness (total lie). To Mum answering all the odd queries and questions I had about my postpartum bodily functions. We needed that, we were so fortunate to have that and our little boy I hope one day you read this and see that from this how loved you are and have been long before your arrival earthside. Family is everything and in those early postpartum days family is the air that fills your lungs and warms your heart & keeps that spirit in you dancing and alive when you're emotional, overwhelmed & exhausted. Births intense but post birth that's when the real party begins!
Gory-ious glorious birth & beyond
Gory-ious glorious labour, birth & postpartum melt downs PART ONE (because I just dribble on far too much) 5 weeks ago I gave birth to the most delightful, gorgeous little boy, all 8pound 1oz of him was perfect in my eyes and in that moment everything around me became a blur and I was just fixated on this tiny human and all his glory. However let's rewind because unlike the movies my waters didn't just suddenly break in the supermarket and I didn't start trying to push him out in the car and give birth walking into the hospital. I also didn't look sweaty but beautiful and glowing delighted mother to be. No I looked more like a puffed up pissed off land whale ready to evict this little freeloader from his comfy womb. " excuse me young sir but it appears your womb service whiners card has declined, we will be needing to ask you to leave". Labour consisted of a long drawn out 3 1/2 day long pre labour, in which I bounced on a fit ball, expressed colostrum till the cows came home, had enough baths to successfully use up all the hot water, Skyped my family in NZ for "contraction parties" ate tornado potatoes and briefly passed out loading up on panadeine forte and self pity. For someone who's so outspoken I was a bit of a mute when it came to labour. My focus shifted from anxious wreck about the inevitable of squeezing out this squishy baby to just focusing on my breathing through the contractions. I told myself over and over that the contractions were like waves crashing on the beach, they would roll in like the surge of pain with the contractions but no sooner would they come they would drift back out to sea and so would taper off the contraction. I also reminded myself like a mantra that "your contractions are not stronger than you they will not kill you because they are you". Your body essentially yes feels like it's dying from the worlds worst ever period pains charged up by 1000000 times their usual T. rex crampiness, but no matter the pain you actually won't die from your contractions, rest assured I have tested and tried this and I'm definitely still alive. #survivedmycontractions2016 Something I learnt from labour and hospitals is don't settle for one opinion, get a second opinion, ask for the supervisor or doctor on shift if you feel what you've been told isn't right. Thursday night after being in pre labour since Tuesday 2am my contractions had gotten down to 2 min apart and we presented to the birth suite. Once there they began to space out again to 5min apart. I was emotional, exhausted and felt defeated by my own body as they were saying I'd need to go home and rest. I'd been trying to rest I couldn't, panadol wasn't cutting it anymore and they were getting stronger as time went on. I asked for a stretch & sweep (where they glove up and up your hoo-ha they go in a bid to give your tiny free loader their marching orders). I was denied this, I was also denied a vaginal ob to see if after all this time I'd dilated at all. I was denied on the grounds that they were understaffed and had a heap of inductions booked in for the following day so they couldn't risk putting me into labour.....they also didn't think there was any pain relief they could give me to take home. CUE MELTDOWN! Well after a second opinion by the supervisor I was given my S&S I was only 1cm dilated which was deflating but with any luck this would get things moving! And I was sent home with a lovely script for some nice strong panadeine forte to try knock me out. Saturday morning the tiny gremlin was packing his bags and ready to ship out. Presenting to the birth suite this time was suddenly so different. It was happening staring ahead at the birth suite room I knew I wouldn't be leaving here this time without my baby earthside! I have to laugh at this but at the time it wasn't funny at all, upon arriving to a bunch of midwives and doctors standing at the entrance having a morning debrief I was asked to take a seat in the corridor. TAKE A SEAT! My contractions wanted a fit ball in the privacy of a room not a hard chair in a corridor. What felt like a lifetime but wasn't I got to go into the obs room to see how I was going. I got my fit ball this time. We must've been there awhile before they moved us to the Taj Mahal ok not really but the birth suite. I made it clear in the obs room as by now I was hurting bad and was almost certain no one was reading my birth plan. I wanted drugs! I wanted the gas as soon as we got to the Taj Mahal and an epidural ASAP after that. My fit ball party didn't last long at all once in the birth suite and my plans to labour in the shower quickly went out the window as i clambered onto the bed with my new BFF the gas nozzle. If you're new to birthing & beyond best advice I can give you with the gas is suck that bad boy until you hear it rattle in the tank, that's what you want.... they can turn the gas up... who knew?! I was so keen to get this epidural underway but they said I was doing so well and just kept me on the gas until I was 9cm, I wanted the epidural at 6cm I was exhausted and in so much pain. I went inside myself and there were no screams no swearing just breathing, moaning and waiting for the next wave. My anaesthetist could've rode in on a magical cloud of happiness for all I cared I was so unbelievably happy when my beautiful epidural arrived. All my fears of getting an epidural were diminished by this point and I was so happy that we had decided to go with drug assisted birth. Being at 9cm tiny human was ready to waltz out now. I kept being told don't push. I can only relay this feeling to those who haven't experienced such as though, having chronic gastro and needing to crap and someone yelling out "i need you to hold that poo in ok? No pushing" well classic Hannah didn't listen and pushed anyway. My reaction to the epidural that was a nightmare for Matt as I had to sit up and lean forward all of which I wasn't helping with and it was now up to Matt to wrangle this land whale into action. Once administered I said I felt like a floaty unicorn. Kid you not after days of pain it was pure nirvana! Every 15min when the epidural light would go green I was pushing away at it looking up at the bag of heavenly goodness like a greedy little kid in a candy store like "yes! Yesssss give me moreeeeee". Before I knew it my Xmas ham looking legs were up in stirrups and I was ready to push the watermelon out of the now expanded lemon #riptomyladyhood. It all happened so quick, his heartbeat was abnormal as both him & I were tiring out from this Labour Party by now so intervention was needed. In came this brilliant doctor suited up and holding these oversized salad tongs. 5:54pm on 01/10/16 Oliver came roaring into this world via forceps delivery. My prerequisite in my birth plan "baby to be wiped down before being handed to me" #germaphobe went flying out the window in the blink of an eye as I reached out for the most amazing gift from God to grace my life and embed in my heart my beautiful son. Tears of joy filled the room & love so much love it was crazy! With Matt & Nania Tania by my side the whole way I couldn't have asked for a better support team, my emotional skype to my Mum, Dad & sister just after being given the epidural made me feel like everyone I loved and needed there my village, were there. To be continued...
