CURLY AND CANDID

Taylor is now 5 months old, happy, healthy and adored by all, not least Kieran, his doting big brother. I haven’t realy done his birth story though, I was too busy with the “Look at my new baby” work I just had to do!

When I had Kieran, I had a straightforward –ish pregnancy, ok there were the piles, the varicose veins, the all-encompassing heartburn, but I was lucky! Kieran came a week early and it was a very positive labour. The whole labour was just under 2.5hrs, in fact and I didn’t have any pain relief (the barstewards took the G&A off me – read more about the whole experience here!). I now realise how lucky I was.

Taylor’s journey was somewhat different. I’ve touched on the fact that I have fertility problems a few times but have never really gone into it, and won’t today. Other than to say we had given up hope of another baby when we found out I was pregnant. We were thrilled. And I was terrified. Despite all the trying and a miscarriage before we got pregnant with Kieran, it was a fairly laid back time. From day one with Taylor. I just couldn’t relax. I was convinced we’d have another loss, though there was no reason why I should, I fell twice, had almost crippling pain in my legs due to really bad varicose veins, pelvic pain, had a tiny bleed which turned out to be something or nothing and at 30weeks was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. This was picked up when they did a routine check and as I’d been feeling fine, I was shocked! What did this mean?

What happened next was a flurry of appointments and scan, medicines, then insulin injections as my levels were sky high. I don’t drive and my local hospital is nine miles away. From 31wks I was going to the hospital twice a week for scans, consult appointments, to adjust my insulin at the diabetic clinic. A pain in the arse when you consider that I was doing the school run, getting a bus to hospital, appointments, waiting for the bus again, journey home, school pick up… I was shattered.

Due to the GD I was told I couldn’t go over 38 weeks so would be induced. I was told induction may take several tries, may not be successful straight away, baby may get distressed, due to the possible large size of the baby, forceps may be needed, baby might need to go into SCBU (the floor BELOW the maternity ward) as it was possible my high levels would have affected his insulin production… It just went on and on. Due to all of this and other things that were going on with the pregnancy we eventually decided on an elective csection (bear in mind we’d planned a home waterbirth so this wasn’t an easy decision!).

By the time d-day came I was ready. I was tired. I wanted to have my new baby here, I needed to see he was ok. I needed to be a proper Mummy to Kieran again.

The CSection itself was very straight forward. I had to be admitted for 8am, to go on a drip to sort the insulin etc. It was late afternoon before I walked down to the theatre. The spinal block was the weirdest experience ever. The worst bit was the anesthetist pressing against my spine before putting the needle in (which I didn’t feel). Before I knew it I was laid down, Roy beside me, waiting for the off. A head popped over the partition to tell me they’d made the first incision. Had they? Wow! Didn’t feel a thing yet could feel people brushing past my skin?! Then he was here. 7lb 10oz of perfect baby boy, not a large baby, no problems with his blood sugars, it was over.

THANK GAWD

Or not. Back on the ward my face started to itch. I was told this was a common side-effect of the spinal. The itch moved down and as the epidural wore off it became an all encompassing itch which was not an itch, it was painful, so painful! I’d had a severe reaction to the diamorphine in the spinal – I hadn’t had surgery or real treatment before so had no idea. It was awful. For the first 24hrs I could barely hold Taylor or feed him as I was literally jerking about. I really can’t explain it how bad it was. After a cocktail of drugs to help I’d get 30-45  mins respite before it restarted, then would have to wait 4hrs+ for the next dose. It was a full 36hrs before it really started to abate. The staff were great, I had Taylor with me attached to the side of the bed and they were so helpful while keeping me as involved as possible. I can’t thank them enough for that.

At last I could get myself cleaned up, start to be Mum, go home and be a family. A very long pregnancy and not the birth I had planned but worth it for what I have now. A perfect family of four. I can’t see us having more children now, partly because of the horrific pregnancy and GD, partly because I just don’t think I can go down that long road of struggling to get pregnant again, but also because I think I’m done. I think two is enough. We are content.

Not my usually light hearted post, but one I wanted to write. Thanks for reading x

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