contracting

Monday the 3rd of April:

After waking and having some breakfast I rang Bridget. Bridget came around at about 9am on the monday morning and did some more assessing. Sicily’s contractions still weren’t consistent and according to Bridget’s notes “Cx is posterior, 75% effaced, 2-3 cms dilated. Contractions currently 1-2:10x60+hrs, intensifying.”

Bridget left and said she would be back later that morning. Things continued how they had been going. I set up the lounge so it was dimly lit and womblike to help ensure the labour didn’t stall. Bridget came back at 12:15pm. Sunita had suggested we give Sicily some I.V. fluids for dehydration which we did and that helped. Sicily realised she hadn’t eaten anything for two days and what she had eaten she had thrown up. We got a couple of protein shakes down her and then I set up the birthing pool.

I had most of the pool set up but it was quite hard going so I decided to have a bit of a rest and read over the instructions. I saw that I had it pretty well under control but then noticed a very strange imperative in the instructions. It told how to set up the frame and the main pool bit then said, “This should take less than five minutes.”
“Why would they state that?” I thought to myself. “Are they trying to undermine my competency?” I asked Bridget.
“I’m so glad you didn’t say manhood then” She replied, and added “It always takes me longer than five minutes.”
I went back and finished off setting up the pool by which time my mother had arrived and she took over boiling the big pots to fill it up.

By this stage Sicily’s contractions were getting more intense so we started breathing together. I really can’t emphasis enough how important a good breathing routine is. It’s worth doing some research on and also well worth practising a good breath.

At about 3pm Sicily had a big vomit and then came back into the lounge and said she had had enough. She was dealing with the contractions fine but was nearly exhausted. She hadn’t slept for two nights and, as a normal side effect of labouring, had vomited any food she ate. We all decided to try the pool and hooked the hose up to fill it the rest of the way with hot water tank hot water. At 4:15pm the pool was 36 degrees, Sicily’s body temperature. Sicily was by now having a very hard time of it, she was managing the contractions extremely well but she was completely exhausted. I was never worried about Sicily’s ability to deal with the pain but was aware that if the labour was long stamina could become an issue, which I stated to Bridget.

Sicily was in the pool for 15 minutes when she requested a transfer to the hospital for an epidermal so she could rest. We had a big discussion about this and in the end decided a internal should be done to check how dilated she was to make sure she wasn’t in the final stages of labour. She wasn’t. She was still only 5 cms dilated. At 4:45pm we began preparing to go to hospital. As I packed a bag for Sicily Bridget asked me if I was disappointed.
“No.” I said, “We had always stated we would start at home and see what happened. Besides, “I added. “I was the one who defined a “normal” birth as one where no one dies.”
Still, I was pretty nervous. I knew epidurals can be used as a respite but I also knew that a large percentage of woman who had epidurals went on to have, if not a C section, at least a forceps delivery, simply because of a snowball, the facts-must-fit-the- theory approach to childbirth, an approach that midwifery as practised by Bridget doesn’t subscribe to. It was this, let’s change-the-facts-to-fit-the-the approach that had given us a due date earlier than the one all the midwives had given us.

At five pm on Monday the 3rd of April we left for Hutt Hospital.