My birth story - welcoming William

Love reading everyone else’s unique story, so felt inspired to share mine!

Our darling boy was nearing his due date (15 Jan) with no signs of coming, despite the fact that I had needed to stop work at 36weeks and 2 days due to regular braxton hicks and intense discomfort (was working as a medical doctor in A&E at the time). So I had been on maternity leave for over 3 weeks already, his bags had been packed and ready since 35 weeks, and in the extreme heat in January, I was starting to get a teeny bit impatient and uncomfortable. My obgyn suggested induction, stating that it had a very good success rate in her opinion, and that there was no need for me to wait to be overdue, as he was a good weight already and ready to come out. My husband and I felt the time was right to meet him.

So on Monday night the 13th at 10pm I was admitted for induction. The prandin gel was started at 2am on the 14th, and I needed a second dose at 8am as not much had happened yet apart from mild diarrhoea and light regular contractions. After the second dose I started experiencing very regular (every 2-3 min), and quite strong contractions. I managed not to require any analgesia yet. At my next PV at 3pm my os was STILL completely closed, and it seemed that my uterus was overstimulated. So essentially I was contracting quite strongly, and regularly but my cervix just refused to budge! Then we noticed that the baby became a bit irritated with this whole ordeal and his heart rate was above 160 - which might have been transmitted anxiety on from me, or mild dehydration (his heart rate improved after they gave me some IV fluids). Luckily he never became distressed, but because of the fact that my cervix wasn’t showing any signs of ripenening after 2 doses of prandin, I needed to have a C section. Apparently if 2 doses don’f do the trick, then a 3rd dose wouldn’t give any further benefit. When the doctor told me that I was quite emotional, and even blamed myself for sheduling the induction in the first place, but the doctor and nursing staff were very reassuring and I realise that I was also influenced by such exhaustion (hadn’t slept more than 90min since they had started the induction process 14hrs prior, and had been up early on Monday - so basically had hardly slept for the last 33hours. I had just truly hoped I could experience a vaginal delivery, and wanted to avoid an operation that I needed to recover from whilst caring for a newborn. My doctor also mentioned that my pelvic outlet was a bit narrow and even though she couldn’t say for sure, she did have some concerns that it would have been an issue for the baby during vaginal delivery.

In the end the C section went smoothly - barely felt the spinal go in, and had minimal blood loss. The whole procedure felt very peaceful actually. As soon as I saw his little face and full head of hair peek over the partition drapes, I shed pure tears of joy and relief - and all of a sudden it didn’t matter to me at all how he got here. He was here and he was healthy and all was right in the world!

So, Glow Baby community, meet my pride and joy, William Roy. Born via unplanned C section at 16:37 on 14 Jan 2020 weighing 3.52kg, 55cm long, and a full head of hair to explain all my heartburn!