Episode 4 - The Reluctant Birth Story
The perfectionist in me really can’t help but approach these ramblings chronologically, which leads me once again, to a topic I don’t really enjoy talking about. I can’t discuss pregnancy in my last episode without detailing the ‘birth story’ next.
I used to revel in the retelling of the twins’ arrival. I would go into great detail about the awkward intricacies of each examination and each stage of labour. Now I can barely recall the name of the hospital without my scarlet cheeks swelling with the memories. On reflection, I can only assume my ongoing conversations with two unresponsive newborns wasn’t quite stimulating enough and so I bored the pants off anyone who would listen. Or, the zeal with which I threw myself into the retelling was some kind of survival strategy. Telling the tale somehow made sense of things. It validated that what happened, actually happened. I was naked, walking around a room moaning. I did tell the midwife that we should exchange numbers because we were best friends for life. Things happened that will only happen in that environment and circumstance; I had to confirm it did, in fact, happen to me. I digress, the point is it is not without a few toe curls that I share with you the details of Original Twin-babies’ arrival.
60% of twin births are carried out via cesarean section. There are a number of factors which make a section more likely; a low lying or shared placenta can cause problems during delivery. A quick delivery might be important due to one baby getting most of the nutrients and so the other baby’s growth is slowed or, twin-mums can request a section if they wish for it. The most common reason is that one of the babies is transverse (lying horizontal across bump) or breech (bum/legs pointing down). When twins are born, everything takes twice as long for baby#2 (this is what the professionals call the baby that's furthest away from the exit, I irrationally felt bad for our #2 as it really felt like she was being labelled second best from the start). So if there are any complications the situation can turn very dangerous very quickly.
Our opinions in all of our consultations was that we would just sheep-follow the advice of the hospital staff shepherds. Their years of experience definitely outweighed our total lack of knowledge on the subject. I’m pretty active, so I prefered to avoid the recovery of a section but as long as we had two healthy babies, we really didn’t care. In our last scan before their arrival, the twins were head down and in a good position. We planned therefore for a vaginal birth and that’s what we got.
Note the really ugly use of the word ‘vaginal’. There’s a reason for this. The alternative is to use the phrase ‘natural birth’. Many women believe this implies that a section is in someway unnatural - a belief I can totally understand. My experience (and there will be some that disagree) was that having babies torn out of my body didn’t feel very ‘natural’. I’m not sure a section would have been much different.
As it turned out, actually going in to labour was a bit of an anticlimax. Being so uncomfortable towards the end of my pregnancy; I was in early labour for a day or two without knowing it. I’d been very uncomfortable; the aches and pains had worsened. I scowled at anyone who could get out of a chair unaided. I just thought the haulage had taken its toll - my body preparing for the ordeal it was to undergo in 6 weeks time. In fact my waters had ‘ruptured’ (there’s something so gross about the pronoun use here. I feel like an ardent feminist declaring ownership of ‘my’ amniotic fluid - eugh). A quick call to Triage and a journey to Hospital told us that I’d stay the night on the ward for observation, scheduled to return home the following day. The aim was to keep Original Twin-twin babies in for another couple of weeks. So, I settled down to an evening of piling my swollen elephant-legs into compression socks and re-positioning my bed approximately every 30 seconds. At around 01.00, I heard a massive pop, had a gargantuan wee all over the floor and then experienced the most powerful, consuming, much-worse-than-I-had-ever-imagined contractions. Breathtaking, scary, overwhelming labour officially arrived. My trembling mass was escorted to the delivery ward, leaving a trail of leaking fluid behind me. The midwife started to ask “Have you thought about what type of pain relief”... “epidural” was my definitive response. I have never been so certain of anything in my life.
Although I successfully forgot some of the early trauma of labour, I will never ever forget the part played by my doting Husband, Original Twin-Dad. Let me set the scene. He had left me in the ward for home; he had work the next day and we both expected my hospital stay to be brief. No doubt he enjoyed some mindless television to ease his lonely evening away from the bloated, whinging thing which had recently replaced his wife. He went to bed early; it had been a long day.
Switch to original twin, waiting for epidural - unable to stop apologising and exclaiming “I’m one of those women!” “I can’t do it!”. There was also some mooing and swearing at this point. I tried to call my husband. Straight away in fact I was repeat dialling his number. I tried countless times with no reply.
He was asleep.
I was under siege and the Husband was AWOL. The hospital took over the responsibility of establishing contact. Facial expressions completely wild now, a midwife trying to dress me in my fancy ‘boyfriend shirt’ brought along so I looked good whilst labouring (pah!). We accepted defeat and I donned the backless gown. A severe lady entered with the drugs and ordered me on the bed. I hadn’t been able to bend down to put my shoes on for at least 3 weeks but this absolute chief of a woman got me sat with my head between my legs width ways on a narrow hospital bed. What a boss.
The epidural was delivered and chaos was replaced with calm, and yet there was still no break in the husband radio silence. I’d relaxed and felt like a human being again so I had the foresight to alert a good friend and neighbour of mine. She ended up knocking on my front door until original Twin-Dad chose to return from the land of nod. So an hour after things kicked off and 89 missed calls later, my husband entered the delivery suite ready to provide deeply emotional and spiritual support to the now sedated, sleepy, really pissed off wife.
Labour from then on was pretty boring. I could feel each contraction but I wasn’t in pain so I was drifting in and out of sleep for the whole time. I have two lasting images: my husband on his phone and the midwives making notes. Nobody seemed very interested in me really. Then it all kicked off. Stage two of labour began - this is where you push. Things were now very uncomfortable regardless of the pain relief. For an hour it went on until they decided I should push no longer and they would intervene. So off we all went to theatre for some forcep action.
Having twins in theatre is really hilarious. You’re shimmied through quite quickly, signing forms as you go through. Thank goodness Original Twin-Dad was there ( I had forgiven him his tardy arrival) I was emotional and confused and giving them permission to cut my body open. When you get there, you realise there are lots of other people in the room. All focused on your lady-cabbage. It’s absurd. Paediatricians, Midwives, Anaesthetists, Assistant Anaesthetists, Trainee Midwives and a gaggle of other trainees just in for the experience. At one point there was a loud beeping in the room which made us panic… turns out it was all of the pagers in the room going off simultaneously.
So quite quickly after arriving, baby #1 was freed. The baby that had grown inside me all of that time, was now a squidgy little snuglet in my arms, eyes open, tasting its first breaths of outside air. The feeling at that point, for both of us was astonishment to the point of shut down. If we were a drawing in a comic, there would simply be a massive exclamation mark over our heads.
Then we had to go again. Whilst #1 was being checked out, #2 was on its way. Hilariously, someone has to actually hold the baby in place from the outside, during the time between the two babies being born to stop it from changing position. I couldn’t help thinking there must be a more whizzy way of doing that. That lady would have been glad of a job though; the rest of us just looked at one another, smiling occasionally, for 13 minutes - like a very messy fag break. They asked me to let them know when there was a contraction and then #2 was ready to join her sister. Two little girls, all cherub-like and covered in yuck.
And that was that. Two beautiful girls successfully birthed into the world and we were entirely responsible for their happiness, safety and well being for the rest of our lives. Equal parts ecstasy and terror.
More importantly though, my reluctant birth story is now told and I never have to use the word ‘Vaginal’ again. Win.
