Bronte and Bibi

Bibi was born within 5-6 hours

 "...pleasantly surprised it didn't take as long or hurt anywhere near as much as I had feared."

The day Bibi was born was her estimated due date and she was born in less than six hours. I had been to the obstetrician that morning and she'd declared I was only slightly dilated and unlikely to give birth that day. However I had decided that I didn't want to wait any more and would try some of the old wives tales to get things moving. So I bought a bottle of castor oil and made a milkshake with Sara Lee icecream, I also poked some evening primrose oil capsules inside near the cervix. That was around lunchtime, then I waited.

Around 5pm I started to feel a bit crampy, like period pains, and thought maybe something was beginning to happen. These weren't really painful and never appeared to be rhythmic like they tell you.

At 7pm I had a teleconference and laid on the bed to talk and listen to it. The contractions came and went throughout and by 8pm I thought we had better start looking at going. Martin came in to see how I was doing and rubbed my back for a bit as we discussed what to do now. I got up off the bed to call the hospital and my waters broke. The nurse asked me how far apart the contractions were and I couldn't really say as they just seemed to be dull and constant. They had told us we should go to the hospital when they were 5 minutes apart but I was waiting for them to get stronger and have a definite start stop to them. The nurse told us to come in anyway as my waters had already broken.

We got in the car and I decided to time the contractions on the way there and they were around two minutes apart. I'd forgotten to fill the car up with fuel so we had to do a quick petrol station stop on the way to the hospital. We arrived at the hospital at around 9pm where Martin grabbed a wheelchair and wheeled me off to the maternity ward.

The midwives took us straight into one of the birthing suites and kept monitoring things. At some stage they asked if I would like the gas and I said yes please. So with Martin there with me we progressed through the rest fairly well. I remember sucking really hard on the gas during the contractions to try and get as much of it as I could.

Just after 10.30pm I transitioned into second stage labour, this is the pushing bit. I felt like I needed to go to the toilet but couldn't, then told the midwife I felt like I should push. She said if you feel like it then do it. For some reason I had expected her to say "No don't push yet". Well I began pushing and within ten to fifteen minutes little Bibi was born. This bit did hurt and I roared a bit which I think helped handle the pain.

Then the obsetrician arrived! She said she lived a stones throw away from the hospital and it was the first first birth she had missed in a very long time. I had a tear in the birth canal so she stitched me up, checked Bibi over and declared all was well then went home.

I was very happy with the way my labour went and pleasantly surprised it didn't take as long or hurt anywhere near as much as I had feared.