Surprise!

I had a blog post for today all planned out in my head. It was going to be called 'Fully Cooked!' and I was going to talk about how I'm 37 weeks' pregnant today and therefore technically full term. Then I was going to go on to say that despite being full term, if she decides to show her face before next Wednesday, we'll be having words, as it means she'll be an August birthday and one of the youngest in her school year, rather than a September birthday and one of the oldest in the year below. I was going to say that I had planned a loads of things to do this week so I wouldn't be as bored as I was last week, including going into town to pick up a wallpaper border, lamp shade and pictures for the nursery, waiting in for a delivery of nursery furniture on Friday, dinner with Ben & Jill tomorrow evening, even a trip to the theatre on Thursday afternoon to see Les Mis (I know I've seen it a gazillion times but I thought £20 was a fair price to pay for something to do for a whole afternoon).

Then my waters broke at 06:30 this morning.

I ran to the bathroom and while I was there I looked back at my alarm clock which was taunting me with today's date. 24 August 2010. I sat on the toilet thinking 'This isn't what we planned!' Not only because I never anticipated her coming early but also because, as I mentioned above, I don't have any nursery furniture yet.

Because it was first thing in the morning, I persuaded myself that maybe my waters hadn't broken and I just needed the loo after a night's sleep, as normal. I had a midwife appointment booked in for 09:30 this morning anyway, and nothing else was happening, so I followed my normal morning routine and got showered and dressed - I even had time to straighten my hair! I drove round to Rob's and told him what had happened, then we both went up to the midwife and told her. She checked and confirmed that my waters had broken, and that one way or another we would have a baby by this weekend. She told me that 86% of women go into labour naturally within 24 hours of their waters breaking, and a further 7% of women go into labour within 48 hours, so I should just keep an eye on things.

We came away from the midwife's and went back to Rob's house so he could pack a bag and come and stay at my house until we went to the hospital, whenever that might be. I started having mild period pain-type cramps at the midwife appointment and they carried on while we were at Rob's, but they weren't painful or frequent, which were the two criteria the midwife told me they had to be before ringing the hospital or the birth centre. On the way to my house we stopped at a pharmacy and bought a Tens machine, which I put on almost as soon as we got back.

Rob had planned to go to the gym and do a workout, and ask Ben to fit the car seat while he was there, then go to Sainsbury's on the way home to buy drinks and snacks for the labour. He left the house at 12:40 having already decided not to do a workout but still to get Ben to fit the car seat and stop at Sainsbury's. He didn't get to do either of those things; when he left I went upstairs to check my hospital bag (I'd been throwing things into it for about 10 days but was pretty sure I was missing stuff) and by 13:00 I was having painful contractions lasting about 50 seconds, about 3 minutes apart. I rang Rob and told him to come straight back, then he rang the birth centre when he got here. My midwife happened to be there at the time, and when she heard the noises I was making at the other end of the phone, she told us to come in straight away.

Rob ran upstairs and threw everything that was on my bed back into my hospital bag (I was still convinced there were things missing, and I was right) then we had a mad dash along the motorway to the birth centre. We got there just after 13:30 and went into one of the delivery rooms, stopping a couple of times on the way to have a contraction. I told them I wanted to get in the pool, if possible, so they started filling it while I went to the loo. I was examined at 13:45 and was already fully dilated, so as soon as the pool was full and the right temperature (which took what seemed like forever, but was actually only about 20 minutes), I took the Tens machine off and got in.

I had been using the gas & air while waiting for the pool to fill, but once I got in the pool the midwife (not my pre-natal midwife; a different one) told me not to use the gas & air but instead to concentrate on pushing. I pushed for an hour and a half but each time I had a contraction her head came half out but then went back in again as the contraction faded. A supervising midwife came in and said that she thought I should get out of the pool as much more of the same would cause the baby to get distressed. I think that was the impetus I needed, because there was no way I was getting out of the pool, so I begged her to let me have one more try. She said yes, and told me not to forget to use the gas & air. What?? I thought I wasn't allowed to! I'd been pushing hard for 90 minutes with no pain relief, and now she tells me I can use it??? So I did. A lot.

One huge push and a few seconds of the most excruciating pain later, her head was out, then it was no time at all before we were pulling her up out of the water and laying her on my chest. Daisy Rebecca, born at 15:36 on Tuesday 24 August 2010.


I know it sounds corny, but for the rest of the day, nothing else mattered.

I stayed in the pool with her for about 25 minutes, then Rob took her while I delivered the placenta (easily one of the most disgusting things I've ever seen). Then we had some skin to skin time and we tried feeding her. She didn't seem all that interested but she did then feed about an hour later.

Rob went into Southampton at 17:45 to buy a Moses basket (no furniture, remember?) while I was stitched up - I used more gas & air during that hour than I had during the labour. Rob came back at 19:00 with Ben & Ryan for a visit. It wasn't until then that we actually got round to weighing her - 5lb 13oz! I knew she looked tiny but I didn't know she was that small. Although she didn't seem that small when she was coming out of me ;).


Ben had bought today's paper for us to keep as a memento of the day Daisy was born. It was a shame that the paper he chose was the Sun, but he said he picked it because there was an article about Manchester City on the front :). Clare also visited, bringing with her a much appreciated bar of chocolate and a not-quite-so-well-appreciated trashy magazine (seriously, I got to page 72 and still hadn't read an 'article' that was either remotely newsworthy or that concerned any 'celebrity' worth caring about - but Clare knows me well enough to know that's what I would think), then they left when Ben & Jill arrived, armed with a beautiful swaddling blanket and a 'Learn the Alphabet' book in Italian :).

Rob left around 21:30 and for the first time, it was just me and Daisy. I knew I should sleep, but I stayed up till long after midnight just staring at her :).