Quatre

Happy Birthday Monkey Girl

It's still weirdly cool for September, I'm wearing ugg boots in Brisbane in September, and that's even with all of the extra body heat that I'm generating these days. I'm so tired, but wired at the same time. On tenterhooks.

I had my 40 week OB appointment this morning. Am so over being pregnant. My OB laughed at me (in a nice way) and told me that I'm doing well. I rolled my eyes at him. The appointment was perfunctory. Everything is still going well. Blood pressure good and low, heartbeat strong. I ask for an internal to check that things are actually happening, because even the Braxton Hicks, the copious CM, the slowed movements cannot persuade me that I'm going to give birth any time soon.

The cervix is soft and 1-2cm dilated. But it's multiparous soft, not fully effaced. "Can I have a stretch and sweep"? I hate the way it sounds pleading and whiny to my ears, but my OB assents. I clench my teeth as the membranes are swept, trying not to jump off the table. But I'm still pessimistic as we book my induction date for October 5. That would make me 41 weeks and 6 days. I am resigned that nothing will happen before then, 2 weeks and three days to go. My heart sinks a little further but Sophie kicks me hard in my ribs. It makes me laugh - my little girl is trying to remind me that she's still there. I'm just so impatient to hold her.

I walk despondently down to the mall, trying to stay upbeat but my head in that whiny place. 2 more weeks, MORE than 2 weeks! I walk into David Jones, determined to buy something for Sophie. But the clothes hold no appeal, and I can't even manufacture enthusiasm about the toys so I head to the top floor to walk around the Christmas display - it's beautiful and sparkly in the spartan surroundings. I look at the ornaments, and a sparkling fairy on a swing appeals to me, should I buy two little fairies for my little fairies? I pick them up, but then worry that maybe Sophie isn't "Sophie" and put them back.

I head to Myer hoping that something in there will catch my eye, but nothing inspires and the Christmas display isn't open yet. So I trudge back through the mall, deciding to go home and get some useful sleep.

I stop at Sussan on the way back to the train station - they have a huge sale advertised in the window and I want more pyjamas for the hospital - they're the only possible thing that I can think of to pack in my bag that I haven't already. So I try some things on, all soft and snuggly. I love the new smell of the cotton. I buy a few things and feel less despondent. In fact, for some reason a little voice is telling me that it's going to happen today. Sometime soon anyway.

I catch the train back to my car and decide that a few more old wives tricks can't hurt and decide on Indian for lunch. Something hot and spicy, a tasty vindaloo seems to fit the bill. At home it is hot in the middle of the day. The air smells dry and still and hot and spiced with the curry. I'm feeling big and tired. I talk to DH and friends on MSN and am depressing and whiny.

It's cooler now than it was then, as I sit and wait for DH to finish reading stories to DD in the early evening. I snuggle in to DH when he comes to me and wait to be petted and reassured that I'm not just fat and am not going to be the eternal pregnant woman. In spite of my whininess I am completely in love with my husband at this point. We joke around and laugh for a while, before trying another well known induction method. It is wonderfully good, afterwards we're both blissed out and I even forget about the interminable pregnancy. But there is no "show", I'm not as completely oblivious as I'd hoped.

DH is tired, I've been getting up a lot at night and work is hard for him at the moment. We watch some crappy TV together and the now familiar Braxton Hicks start up again. I don't tell him because we've been down this path so many times in the last couple of nights. It's not painful either, just "contractions" - I can't think of any other word to describe them, just a sensation of a muscle tightening and squeezing in my pelvis. It's not painful at all and it doesn't feel "periody" like my labour with the Grot. Ergo, it is another false alarm. I refuse to look at the clock but it is about 10. At 10:30pm DH is exhausted and I tell him to go to sleep. "Any contractions" he asks, and I tell him that yes, every 10 minutes, but no pain so just another false alarm.

I don't want to go to bed so I tell him to sleep, I can always wake him if it;s the "real thing". I sit on my computer and read random topics on EB. Then a friend logs on and I chat to her on MSN for a few hours. The distraction is wonderful and stops me obsessively timing the contractions which are now about 5 minutes apart.

At one point she asks me if anything is happening and I sheepishly reply that contractions are every 5 minutes. But I refuse to get excited. It is now about midnight. I am wearing my new pyjamas and ugg boots in the strange September coolness. The sensation is becoming more uncomfortable as the time passes, but not painful yet. I am unconvinced that this is "it" but at the same time I don't want to lie down in case it makes them go away.

At 1am we're down to every 3 minutes and I am getting distracted when it happens. I know it is real now, but deathly afraid that it's going to stop and I'm going to go back into limbo. I decide to tempt fate. I say goodnight to Leesh and turn off all the lights, crawling into bed with DH. "I think this is it" I whisper to him, but lie down waiting with baited breath. They keep coming. They hurt now as well, not enough to cause me to yell or need anything, but I can't ignore them. The deep dragging sensation, the feel of my uterus contracting hard. I can feel them when I lay my hand on my belly.

I wake DH up fully, and he talks to me sleepily. Should we call SIL I ask? She is to pick up DD "when it's time". I am afraid to call her in case this is still a false alarm. But I'm also worried that if it goes as fast as it did last time that she will get here on time. Each contraction is only lasting 20-30 seconds though, even though they are only 2-3minutes apart. This is just prelabour my brain screams. BUt the night is only going to get later, so we decide to take the step and call SIL. It feels like we have truly set the ball rolling now and we can't stop it.

I rock with each contraction, backwards and forwards, swaying my hips feels good. I want to sit in my rocking chair which is in DDs room. The chair is noisy when I sit in it, and DD stirs, she sees me in the chair and sits up a little so I sit on her bed. and cuddle her to me. "Sophie is coming sweetheart" I whisper into her silky curls "she's goign to come out of Mummy's belly. Aunty U will pick you up soon and then tomorrow you can come and see Mummy and Sophie at the hospital". The Grot is dopey but wide awake at the same time. It must feel like a dream to her. I cuddle her to me as DH gets her bag ready so that she can get picked up. SIL arrives and picks her up.

As soon as the Grot leaves I am hit by a "real" contraction. It hurts and brings me to my knees. I rock backwards and forwards and beg DH to rub my back. It feels so good. 3 minutes later another contraction slams into me. I am ready for it and drop down, and DH rubs where I ask. 3 minutes later another contraction hits. I am confused, should I call the hospital? Should I hop in the shower? Should I lie down and conserve my strength? I am pretty sure that I am going to have this baby today, so I decide to let the hospital know that we will be coming in some time this morning. Gauging by the speed of my last delivery, it will probably be before day break as well.

When I call the hospital, the lady on the phone is concerned that as my first labour was only 6 hours and I'm already having contractions 3 minutes apart that I should come in soon. I am not convinced that much has happened, but I am worried about trying to get to the hospital in transition so we set out, packing the bags into the car. As DH closes the garage door Bittersweet Symphony starts playing on the radio. It suits my mood completely. Contractions are still coming every 3 minutes and hard, but I don't feel that labour is going to happen as fast as with the Grot.

DH and I are still joking with eachother when we arrive at the hospital. We wait for another woman to go through, so that we can start signing the forms. One form makes m laugh out loud - it gives the hospital permission to contact Sophie if she has any concerns about her hospital stay. Finally we are granted access to the birthing suites. An older midwife named Lynn is apparently "our" midwife. She gives me a tasteful yellow muumuu to wear and asks me to get changed so that she can check what's happening. Contractions are still every 3 minutes and painful, but in between I am myself, laughing and chatting with DH. I am feeling very restless and hate being confined to the bed.

This bed is hard, and lying on it the contractions are hurting my back and DH can't rub it for me. I am annoyed with the nurse, she is rummaging through paperwork and asking me questions all the while making me spend more time on my back. I suppose I could get up, but I just want this bit over and done with so I can jump in the shower. More annoying questions, and then the blue latex is snapped on so she can have a feel of how dilated I am. She waits until the latest contraction finishes and then feels my cervix. I can feel already that my cervix is posterior still, and my heart sinks.

"One centimetre" she announces. As if it might be a good thing. My heart is being eaten away by stomach acid. Seeing my face she adds "but soft, you are in labour". I am feeling unbelievably embarrassed. I have another contraction but it is mild, I can barely feel it from the outside, and I can see the expression on her face change. "Was that a little one" she asks. I nod, fearful that I'm going to cry. She calls up to the ward and then starts to explain what's going to happen to me. She wants me to take something so that I will sleep up on the ward and then I can come down later when I am truly in labour. I flatly refuse to take pethidine so she starts to talk abou tablets that can "help me sleep". I am firm that I will NOT take sedatives. She tries again to convince me that I should take something so I can get some rest but I am adamant that I will not take anything.I promise that I will lie down and rest when we go upstairs though. I don't remember if I cross my fingers at this point but I have absolutely no intention of lying down.

Contractions have all but vanished. It is 2:30 am as we make our way up to the overflow ward. They are full tonight, so I am in the crappy end room. It has a single bed and no bathroom and two straight chairs. I cannot lie down, and refuse to. I try and make DH lie down though so he can sleep. He is so tired, and now nothing is happening. I am so restless. I pace around the tiny room, staring out the windows. It's hot, I am annoyed at myself, and the room is terrible. No contractions. Labour has stopped. We have to reset the clock. Sophie is squirming inside of me and I chat to her, plead with her to come out. Little baby girl I love you so much already, I just want to hold you and to stroke your tiny head. I wander down to the shared bathrooms, and I have a bloody show finally. It's bright red, I don't remember that with the Grot. But no contractions.

..............................................................

The clock on the wall is irritating me. Every second that ticks by reminds me that I am not in labour. I'm distracted but I refuse to lie down. Sophie's head is already not in the optimum position to dilate my cervix, damned if I'm going to lie down and slow it down even more. Plus it WAS labour before. My pain threshold is huge so when I thought the contractions hurt then they HURT!

I get bored with the pacing around and pick up one of the magazines I brought with me to the hospital - Cleo looks suitably vacuous. I sit cross legged on the bed while DH slumps over and falls asleep. I am having very faint contractions again but at weird inconsistent intervals and they don't hurt at all. I flick through this seasons "fashions" and pretend to be interested in this year's bachelor of the year contestants. Contractions still in the background like fuzzy static on the TV - impossible to completely ignore but nothing more than nuisance white noise at the same time. More trips back down the hall to the bathroom. Still no real contractions. The clock on the wall insolently tick tick ticks. I can hear it ticking it is that quiet.

Tick

Tick

Tick

I am restless but not tired at all. I am still frustrated. Why has this labour been so different to the Grot's? Am I dilating at the moment? Who knows? The contractions are not palpable at all. Pace pace pace.

It's 4am, I'm looking at the clock and wondering if maybe I should have taken the Midazolam or the Pethidine, or something. Just too wired to sleep. The sky is still dark but there is a purplish haze forming on the horizon - dawn is coming and Sophie is still inside of me.

WHAM

A contraction hits from nowhere, no lead up, nothing. I drop on all fours and rock and breathe. My breathing is not automatic, I am forcing myself to breathe. Deep breath in, hold it, controlled breath out. Oh Lord that hurt. I've woken DH even though I was quiet, he rubs my back as the contraction subsides and it feels good. Then 10 long minutes pass before another one sneaks up on me and king hits me. I feel like my legs have been knocked out from under me. Another 10 minutes and it surges again. I am a little boat in a big ocean being lifted up by huge waves and then slammed down minutes later. They are exactly 10 minutes apart, DH jokes that he could set his watch to them.

It's just before 5am and the light is beginning to creep over the horizon into the misty foggy morning. I stand at the window waiting for the next contraction as it builds and builds and punches me deep in my pelvis. My knees go weak again. Down to 5 minutes now, the contractions are huge. I cannot speak through them, and I cannot stay still. I rock on all fours with DH rubbing my spine. I am eerily quiet except the monosyllabic instructions to DH, higher, harder, closer, up down.

It's 5am on the mocking clock, contractions are every 4 minutes now. Hard, long, painful. But I can still hold onto myself through them. The breathing and the rocking and the rubbing are giving me a routine. As each one starts to build we cope, my mind reminding me that it will soon be over. This is real labour now. I have none of the unsurety that I had with the previous night's debacle. This is real and powerful. I feel connected to the Earth.

I grasp the top of the wardrobe to see if that helps, rocking my pelvis while DH rubs. It feels stronger than on all fours, but my legs are so weak. I will myself to stand up to the contractions. Feeling the spray of the surge on my face as they hit and somehow being reenergised by the incredible power. In the short periods between contractions I feel Sophie fluttering inside me. Soon I think.

As they build in strength and intensity I give myself a timeline. It took 6 hours with the Grot so I have until 10am to birth this baby. And look, it's already quarter to 6, 4 hours left. I can do that. I can do that.

Contractions are changing, they are harder and longer than ever before and the doubt starts to creep in, can I do this? My back has been pummelled by DH and is sure to be bruised later and I know that it's goign to get worse. At 6am I feel sure enough that this is labour to call the nurse. We press the green button and watch the sun rise in the sky outside. The light gleams off the copper of the PAH sparkles in the early morning.

Twenty minutes later DH looks for a nurse as contractions are coming one after the other with barely 20 seconds break in between. The nurse is lovely but harried, they have had more arrivals during the night and she is working a double shift to care for all the about to be and new mothers that have arrived. We start to walk down the hallway and I contract, falling to the floor.

As it abates we manage to get to the nurses desk before I again fall down. This walk is long and tortuous. We finally get to the lifts and DH and the nurse wait again for me to get up and be able to walk. Down to the birthing suites and I'm again down, holding onto an oxygen tank that happened to be there when I went down.

There is some confusion when we get to the birthing suites, they're nearly full and there are more people coming in. I snaffle the last suite, the same one that the Grot was born in. This knowledge buoys me.

..............................................................

There is a wait before a nurse is allocated to me, as it is also handover time. I kneel in front of the large chair in the room hoping to use it as a support, while DH rubs my back. My breathing sounds so foreign, I can't believe that I'm having to tell myself to breathe! But the focussed breathing is helping. I control it so strongly that it distracts from the power the pressure and the pain.

My muumuu is annoying me and I want to take it off and get in the shower with its hot water. The nurse finally comes in to assess me, and I joke that if I'm only 2cm dilated that I want an epidural right NOW. I'm 6cm though and in transition. I smile at this news, but it's a weary smile. I'm a complete sucker for the encouraging words from the nurse though.

I finally get into the shower. How blissful does it feel to be naked instead of ensconced in the hot sticky material of the hospital gown? I bounce and roll on the fitball in the shower while blasting my body with hot water. When the contractions hit I aim the nozzle squarely at my pubic bone and with DH rubbing my sacrum the pain is less than what it was in the overflow ward.

The nurse comes in to check Sophie's heartbeat with the Doppler. I can feel her moving occasionally and know instinctively that she's fine, and I'm irritated by the insistence of the nurse. She has trouble finding the heartbeat, it's not on either side and she can only find it low down in my belly, right above my pubic bone. Which means I can't use the shower while she checks. Contraction overlapping contraction I have to stand still so she can find the heartbeat. Surprisingly I am not worried even for a second. I know intellectually that I should be worried that they can't find her heartbeat but I know she is fine. Finally she finds the heartbeat but it's a little slow. The nurse turns down the hot water - "you're cooking your baby" she says and forbids me from using the water at the scalding hot temperature I am currently using. I think I pout at that stage but acquiesce.

It's about 7am now and my OB is doing his rounds in the hospital. Cheerfully he pokes his head in and asks how we're going. DH answers and I say nothing, just riding the waves and incapable of doing much more than that. OB is concerned by this and checks again if I'm OK. I break out of my meditation and turn my head slowly "all OK" I manage to get out with some effort, and then go back to concentrating on the shower nozzle in front of me. The lady across the hall from me is also my OBs patient, and she's having trouble, OB explains that he will leave me be as I'm coping and go check on her. Whatever, I wave him off. I can't concentrate on much beyond what's happening right this second in my body. I certainly don'pt need OB hovering, I want the sanctity of the warm humid room with just DH and I back.

There is no break between contractions now, just an upstroke and a downstroke. My breathing is what is getting me through, but I'm proud of myself because I'm coping. "This is as bad as it gets" I remind myself! And tehre are less than 3 hours to go on my self imposed timetable.

It's nearly 7:30 when the contractions change again, they start to get further apart again but the sensation is different. In the short minute to 90 second breaks between them I feel completely normal and pain free. After hours of pain, it is a surreal sensation. I realise after a few of these contractions that I'm bearing down, involuntarily pushing against my pelvic floor with each one. I press the big round nurse call button in front of me wearily - I don't want to get out of the shower but know they will "make" me. The nurse bustles in and asks what she can do to help. Her voice is accented - Irish maybe? I find it odd that it is her accent that I am focussing on at this point. "I'm pushing" I say simply.

.............................................................

It is 7:30 when I make my way into the sun splashed room. Early morning, a beautiful spring day outside the window, still tinged with dew. I am still naked and wet from the shower. The nurse asks if I want another gown, or a blanket so that I don't get cold, but wearing clothes just seems so foreign. The idea of covering myself now seems ridiculous. I need to feel free at the moment, and I can't with artificial coverings. I probably look and sound completely feral but I am adamant that I don't need any clothes.

The nurse checks to see how dilated I am - 8cm and waters still intact, bulging through. She doesn't want to break them as my OB is in theatre with the other lady and she suspects things will go quickly once they are broken. I am neither here nor there. I kneel on the bed, gripping the top and push with every contraction now. It feels wonderful. Like I have some sort of control. Although the effort of pushing is almost unbearable, it takes the pain sensation away and replaces it with one of sheer pressure.But after a while I realise that I am pushing against my membranes. I can feel them like a closed door, stopping things from progressing. I feel like I am pushing into a brick wall every time and it begins to frustrate me. I push and push and push involuntarily but nothing seems to be happening. It feels exactly the same way it did with the Grot and I ask the nurse to break my waters. She is not keen as I still have a cervical lip and also because OB is still in theatre. It is nearly 8am.

I spend most of my time on all fours in the middle of the bed, collapsing my head down after the effort of each contraction.The nurse comes back in to check on me and stifles a laugh, I am basically mooning anyone who comes into the room and I find it funny myself but I am not moving for anything. I have found a comfortable position and I'm sticking with it. The nurse asks if I would like a beanbag to lean into and I decide to give it a whirl. Nothing seems to be happening at the moment and I feel like I'm just waiting for someone to tell me what to do. The nurse and DH then take it in turns to check that I'm breathing as I spend my time, butt still in the air and face planted firmly into the beanbag. "I'm thirsty" I manage to croak, my head cold means that I can only breathe through my mouth, and with all the heavy breathing that I'm doing, I'm dry and parched as the Atacama.

Just after 8am my OB comes back into the room cheerily and congratulates me on my progress. I am like a puppy dog as I lap up the compliment, and when the nurse chimes in I feel very clever and extraordinary.

The amniotomy that I have been waiting impatiently for is uncomfortable and surreal - I feel the whole process, which ends in my thighs feeling warm and wet. There is not a large amount of liquor however, her head is pushed firmly against my cervix.I try pushing for a bit longer on my knees, both on all fours and up, with my head and arms draped over the end of the tilted up bed but it still feels uncoordinated and wrong. So when my OB suggests trying on my side I am happy to give it a try. I need the direction, for the first time my body seems a bit unsure as to what it shoudl be doing.

"Wait for the contraction and then push REALLY hard right into here" my OB coaches, pushing against a spot on my perineum. As the next contraction builds I push as hard as I can, then gulp in another breath and push again. I do this for about 4 or 5 contractions before I feel it, I feel Sophie's head moving down. I am excited by this, I never felt it with the Grot and I feel so strong. "I'm doing it!" I exclaim.

My cheer squad keeps up the encouragement with each contraction and I use their words to lift me, to push harder. "Her head is still OP" my OB tells me between contractions, "so this time I want you to give me all that you've got to turn her, she's turning, you're doing very well". I lap up the praise and set myself the goal of turning her with the next contraction. By the end of the next breath she has half turned, and is almost crowning, I can feel her hard head in my vagina, pushed against the barrier of my pelvic floor.

"Push push push push push push push" from the squad. I can feel her now, burning the muscles, but not painfully. She is crowning, if I were to reach down now I would feel her slimy head. I never felt this with the Grot. I am feeling every second of this. I am feeling her being born. I feel euphoric, Sophie is THERE, in a few more minutes I will push her out of me.

"Push push push push push push push"

Her head is there, I can feel it, it isn't out yet but it is hard and firm against my pelvic floor.

Slowly I feel the soft tissues of my body yielding, allowing her passage, birthing her. I am birthing my baby, my Sophie, she is coming and I am whole, intact and can feel her being born I feel exultant - I am doing this!

"Push push push push push push push"

Her head is out, I can feel her body being squeezed by my muscles, I feel each shoulder being born and then there she is - arms outstretched, covered in vernix, thick like lard over her whole body. Sophie! That's my Sophie! I put my arms out and draw her tiny slippery warm body into my chest so that I can smell her. So primal, so primitive and so euphoric. My baby is in my arms. SOPHIE is in my arms. I want to cry but I want to laugh at the same time. DH cuts the cord, severing her last physical link to me and giving her life as her separate self. But I am entranced with my precious bundle and barely notice.

My OB is beaming at me, "she turned back" he says "you birthed her OP". I try to smile but my body has started trembling as if it has just finally realised the enormity of what has happened. All I can focus on is holding my tiny squalling little girl. She is still yelling, but as she snuffles closer, the squeals dies down and it is quiet in the sun drenched room. I am so proud of her, and so proud of myself and my body. The previous night and the shame of the holding cell (overflow ward) is forgotten. It is just me, DH and our baby girl.

The placenta is birthed and I couldn't care less, I'm not interested in it. OB wants to check that there are no lacerations but I know that there are none. I feel whole and intact and incredibly powerful. My whole body is trembling now though. I think I am hypoglycaemic but refuse to concentrate on myself. After some photos are taken I bring Sophie to the breast. She nuzzles for a little while before latching on. Her attachment even this very first time is perfect and she makes sighing noises in the back of her throat as she sucks for half and hour.

It is complete. Our family is complete. As the colostrum flows into my tiny baby girl and the world around bustles back into its normal routine unaware of the miracle in my arms, I am feeling complete.

Happy Birthday Sophia; My powerful, triumphant baby girl.

Hazy Shades of Winter: Gold

I am still shaking. It's intensified now and is very obvious beneath the blankets they've thrown over us. I can't lift the Possum, I am shaking too much. I try to talk to Bingley and my voice trembles a lot. I'm not shivery, but I am cold. Shock, they would have called it once upon a time.

Bingley fetches me the chocolate that he bought this afternoon specifically because of this. I suck on it because chewing is too hard. The new nurse fetches me a cup of tea, tries to forcefeed me sweet biscuits. After about half an hour of chocolate and sweet milky tea I am shaking less. But the high need for sugar will persist for days.

I stand in the shower at about 11pm, watching Bingley cradle his son. Elated and tearful at the same time. It is such a beautiful sight watching the man I love meet the child he helped me create. It is one of my most important memories, the expression on his face as he begins to know them. He always looks older after birth. I know it has been hard for him too, the helplessness of watching someone you love in pain. The combination of pride, worry, fear, pain, love all entwined majestically in his expression. But there is something new this time too, a maturity and less tentativeness. No awkward arms for this confident Dad who's held a newborn head many times now.

My body feels so deflated in the shower, all soft and shapeless, a blob where that shining beautiful belly had been a few hours earlier. As I lap up the unlimited hot water I'm a little embarrassed by how sad it makes me. But I still wish I had my beautiful belly. This silent one feels very inept.

I get dressed in my new pyjamas and cuddle the Possum until I'm ushered to my wheelchair and he is placed in his perspex trolley. Bingley pushes the Possum and I strain to watch him through the plastic as I am wheeled. Originally I planned to walk but my legs were too shaky, so for once I gave in. And we are back in our room, the one with the sweeping views and the single bed. Yet another midwife greets us, congratulates us, and murmurs affirmations about the beauty of the Possum. I am given the new baby items (nappies, wipes, Family Assistance pack) with a ceremony that seems a little odd for nearly midnight. And then, finally, we are alone. The Possum, Bingley and I. Bingley has to go and then it is just the two of us, the two that were once just hours before. It blows my mind how time can warp like that, how so much can happen, when some people have barely watched a movie.

I feed him again. A long, beautiful feed. I feel the love well up inside me and trickle out down my cheeks as I watch him. Then something else wells up, and causes tears as well, but this time it is pain. Excrutiating pain. At first I leave it be, but when a nurse checks on me I take the paracetamol without hesitation. And later, when it doesn't go away I take the oxycodone. And even then it doesn't really touch it. Afterpains sound so innocuous but these are as bad as labour pains and there's nothing to work for, and for some stupid reason I ration the pain relief.

It's after midnight now, technically not even the Possum's birthday any more and he is asleep at the breast. Cosleeping is not allowed in the hospital so I wrap him up and put him in his bassinet, and change the bed height so that we are face to face. And I try to sleep but cannot. Can do nothing but watch his little face. The hours stop ticking by and no matter what I do I can't sleep. I know I should, but part of me is afraid to and part of me is yet too full of endorphins and adrenaline to even lie still.

For hours I lie in bed, reliving the birth, reliving the trauma but also the awesomeness as I watch him. Even now the pain has faded. I know how much pain I was in, but I can't remember it, I can't manufacture the fear, the need to scream, the certainty of being on the brink of something between life and beyond. And he sleeps on.

Dawn eventually breaks outside. The first time sunlight has ever kissed the Possum's cheeks. He has slept for 6 hours now, snuffling occasionally in his slumber, mumbling a little as if in dream, and his face in the new light is even more beautiful than the night before. I can't wait for him to meet his sisters and I wish they were with me now, wishing I was waking in my own bed with the cheerful shouts of joy as my little goddesses worship our new addition. Instead he sleeps on peacefully and I take photos, because I want to remember how in love I felt right then, so punch drunk on it that I felt that my body was filled with The Gleam.



It is then, at about 6am that I finally can succumb to sleep. I get maybe an hour before breakfast and then the girls arrive. If there is such thing as perfection it was sitting in bed, watching my family meet each other. The joy on their faces. The way the Elfling confidently held her arms out to hold him. The way the Monkey tentatively held him and kissed his fingers.

The day is filled with those who have come to worship at the altar of newborn life and it is after 10pm when the last visitor leaves. I want to be home then, but revel in this, these last few hours where it is just the Possum and I, cuddled together.

Hazy Shades of Winter: Blue

It's after 10pm, I can't do this any more and I'm lying on my side crying without tears. It hurts too much, I can't cope, that last contraction was so incredibly vicious it felt like I was being sliced from inside, being slashed by internal knives. The violence and pain and intensity were just so much. In retrospect, my previous labours had been painful, but relatively gentle. The fact that my waters had not broken had meant that the pressure on my cervix had been cushioned slightly by fluid. A shock absorber of sorts so that I didn't get the whole sensation.

I am whingy, I am sooking to Bingley, and I cried through the last contraction, the writing is on the fluorescent walls. Obviously I am not strong enough for this. I realise after a while though that there has been a break since the last contraction. At this point there had been upstroke/downstroke but not really a break between. And now that I'm having time to think in my head I realise that the lack of contraction is prolonged and this, to me, equals that labour has stopped.

My mind keeps racing, I can't work out how I could be so strong, so powerful, so exhilirated with the Monkey and what is so different now. I can't work out what I'm doing wrong or how to fix it. All I feel is failure. Failure towards myself, to labour, to my Possum. I want him, I want him in my arms, I want to do this, but I don't know how. And I'm only 4cm, maybe 5cm. There are hours and hours and hours left to get through. More tears.

Even though there is no contraction I am crushing Bingley's fingers. He is sitting with his head on mine, mumbling affirmations to me, kissing my forehead, allowing me to squeeze him, trying not to let me see his worry. I feel a contraction begin to start. The painless squeeze at the top of my uterus signalling that the pain is going to come, and I whimper out loud. Then the pain steps up and I cry out, no longer just a pitiful whimper but a wail. And then, it is more than that, it is beyond that and I scream, scream and push involuntarily.

The midwife rushes over and asks if there is pressure. "No" I manage to scream out, "No, I'm pushing". And she puts her hand inside me to check and the pain is even worse and all I can do is scream. She is confused, she doesn't think I'm any more than 6cm and she rushes out to get my obstetrician. The contraction keeps going and I keep pushing because I can't help it. I am still pushing when he comes back in and gently asks me if he can check what's happening. I'm still screaming and it's even louder when he checks.

"Jenn, you have a 3cm cervical lip but he's coming and he's coming now. I will help by pushing it out of the way. Just keep pushing". I am crying now, hoarse from the screaming and in so much pain I want to die. 2 minutes ago I was 6cm and had hours to go and now I'm supposed to push him out?? My cervix is burning, that familiar ring of fire and I am just lost to the pain. The contraction has stopped, but the pain is still there, the pain of his head pushing my cervix open.

Suddenly I feel the next contraction building and the scream bursts from me again. It is so loud and so foreign that it scares me. I am holding both of Bingley's hands as if they are my only tenuous grip on life. If I let go I know I will be lost. The contraction builds and builds and as it does I push involuntarily. I feel myself stretch, feel his head there, feel everything sting with unbearable pain. I stop pushing and take a breath in. "Push when you get the next contraction" My obstetrician coaches, "I'm still having a contraction" I whimper and I push. I push deep into my chest, down through my strong abdominal muscles and down into my pelvic floor and then I feel him birth. Feel his head come out, feel every part of his head be born. I breathe in again and scream again as his body starts to move, feel his shoulders start to come out and then feel the contraction wane.

He is there, half out, half in, and the contraction is barely there so all that is left is the stinging, stretching pain. I can't do anything but scream and I can't wait for another contraction, the pain is just too much so I push anyway. And feel him lifted from me. My scream stops mid note but there is no silence, there is more screaming, but this time it's not mine, it's Harry's, and he is lying beside me, his head on my belly. I look at him, tears coursing down my cheeks, no longer in pain, looking at my perfect son.

His fuzzy ears, the downy fluff over his head, his wide open dark eyes, his tiny blue hands. I stroke his clean shiny skin, no vernix anywhere, looking just like a catalogue baby, all blushed skin, dimples and fuzz. Neither of us are screaming now. We're just lying together, no one else in the room. He is nuzzling my skin, knowing my scent.

Bingley cuts the cord, and I can lift him higher. I bring him to my breast and he latches on perfectly. I am checked for tearing, we assume with the ferocity that I will have been damaged, but there is none. I am just lying there, eyes closed, my firstborn son in my arms, still holding onto Bingley and blissfully out of pain. I am shaking though, my whole body trembling uncontrollably. My obstetrician is stroking my hair, congratulating me, admiring my son, praising how wonderfully I birth.



And it's that praise, combined with my perfect blue bundle and the relief and absolute pride radiating from Bingley that brings me peace. The knowledge that I did this, that I can do this, that I didn't fail anyone. I can't stop the tears and they trickle down my cheeks. After all my screaming and whining and lamenting I haven't made a single noise since he was given to me, and all I can do is cry, and marvel and tremble at the perfection of Harry William, born at 2222 01/06/09 weighing 3648g (8lb), 53cm

Hazy Shades of Winter: White

I'm not deliberately stringing it out, but the title hazy is right. Just processing all of it takes some time, and meanwhile life is chugging along regardless. I am currently dealing with a MASSIVE over supply. Those unfortunate enough to be long term readers know that I'm not exactly deficient in the bosom dept, but it's Dolly Parton territory now. Hard as a rock and exquisitely painful. The poor possum is doing his best, but after a decent layback on one side it's still half full and he's slurring and protesting he can't posshibly do more. Bingley thinks its great, or did until I threatened to knee him in the groin hard enough to not need a vasectomy if he so much as raised a lewd eyebrow.

But, Monday.

At 6pm we flicked over to the Simpsons. Pretty much as the opening credits rolled I had a contraction. A proper one. I remember sitting there, breathing through it, and trying to will myself to get up the gumption to go into labour properly. I was pretty sure that if I lay down and went to sleep that I could delay it for a while, but if I wanted it to happen soon I would have to get up, and walk.

So I paced around the room, rocking my hips when I got the inevitable contractions. Bingley decided to time them on the stopwatch on his phone and they were sort of irregular but averaging about 5 minutes apart. As the Simpsons wore on they got to about 3 and a half minutes apart lasting about a minute each. I could still talk through them, but they hurt and they were pretty strong. If I sat down though they spaced out further and weren't so intense. It was really really hard to convince myself that I should keep standing up. While having a contraction Bingley laughed that he had never ever seen my belly look more perfectly round and took a photo...



At about 7 o'clock it seemed that the contractions weren't going away and that this was it. Spacing still irregular and still prone to slowing down when I sat down I knew it was probably early but the 7 hours of waiting around like a caged zoo animal were doing my head in and I wanted to get going. A midwife came to check on me, and adamant that they wouldn't be letting me labour up on the ward they called down to birth suite and asked them to get my room ready for me.

After a lot of pfaffing about I was finally taken down at about 7:30ish. Even though "labour" had only been going for about 90 minutes and I knew that it hadn't reached anything like proper intensity yet I was getting very over it. It was a bad head space to be in and was exacerbated over the coming hours.

The birth suite I was ushered into was huge. Huge and white and gleaming and... hideous. I hated it. It felt like a theatre room and was just cold. Cold in atmosphere and in temperature. It felt like it had been designed by someone who liked glaciers and had never before given birth. It was stark and open plan and the lights were incandescently bright. The whole room was so white and glaring it hurt my eyes. I was then assigned my fourth midwife for the day. A woman whose name I couldn't recall 30 seconds later and whose face I can't even remember, but who I still have such feelings of animosity towards 5 days later.

She checked my dilatation, and happily informed me I was 4cm but not fully effaced. This was good enough for me and I told her I was getting in the shower. After a day of sitting in my own amniotic fluid and anxiety, the shower was bliss. It had 2 heads and I stood there with one blasting the front of me and one the back. I tried to make sure that the water wasn't so hot that they'd worry and went to the business of having contractions and dealing with them. My obstetrician, who had come straight to the hospital after his rooms that day specifically because he assumed I would labour quickly, popped his head in and asked how I was going. Correctly gauging that I was happy in my little closed off, darkened sauna he left me alone with a cheery wave.

My midwife however was not keen to just leave me to be. It seemed that she had recently taken a course in how to completely misread the signs of a labouring woman and to irritate them as much as possible by interrupting their coping mechanisms. Every time I got into a groove she would be there, asking questions mid contraction or wanting to check the foetal heart rate (in completely the wrong position, thus leading to much fucking around and me standing still out of the shower until she could find it).

After about an hour in the shower, my contractions weren't really intensifying but just in a holding pattern that I was dealing with OK. I didnt' feel any pressure (as I was being asked every 5 minutes) and felt that things were progressing relatively slowly. This didn't actually bother me, but it seemed to bother Hated Midwife. Sometime after 8:30pm but after 9, she decided that The Possum's heart rate as she was timing it was in the 180s indicating that he was in distress from my hot shower and that I needed to get out and be put on the monitor.

That messed up headspace I mentioned before? This is where it started to kick in. Instead of asking her to check it properly and/or measuring the heart rate myself I agreed to turn off the shower and slowly make my way out of my dark damp birthing cave and into the stark hideousness again. Getting on the bed and into a foul hospital gown was horrible (I just didn't feel safe being naked in that room) and I obediently let the monitor be put on. Which pinged a heart rate of 155. EXACTLY the same as it had been downstairs in the assessment unit that afternoon. The midwife mumbled something about it being quite high, especially for a boy, and I had had enough. She'd got me out of my safe place and into the horrid place and for nothing.

She asked if she could do an internal (it was about 9pm) and I agreed. Too completely out of my zone as to just go along with whatever. Where she told me I was 4cm still, although now fully effaced. Lying there on my back completely vulnerable and completely anxious and incoherent this did not help me. Nearly 2 hours had passed and not even a single fucking centimetre? I wanted to cry, but a contraction was building and I had to cope with that instead, lying on my back and trying not to cry as despised midwife CONTINUED the internal and announced 5cm seconds before I yelled at her to REMOVE YOUR BLOODY HAND. I was so angry then, and upset and feelings of failure were swamping me.

When she left I started crying. "I don't want to do this" I sobbed to Bingley, "I want to go home". All I could think about was the fact that I knew that she was outside organising for me to be hooked up to a drip (because I wasn't dilating adequately according to their protocols) and how I already couldn't cope and that I was going to end up with an epidural.

We put on Good News Week and somehow I grew some cojones with midwife out of the room and I completely ignored her when she came back in. It seems that my obstetrician had said to just leave me be, and that we'd reassess. I even managed to laugh occasionally at GNW and just focused on me, the Possum and Bingley. He soothed, massaged, rubbed, allowed me to crush his fingers and encouraged me to ignore the midwife.

After GNW finsihed at 9:45pm the contractions were reaching the consistency where there's not much time in between, I wanted to vomit and felt the need to void my bowels. Because my confidence was so incredibly shaky I was not dealing with the contractions like I did with the Monkey. I just couldn't get on top of them and even when I tried to do my powerful breathing I would break halfway through and end up whacking the bed instead with my fist. The hardest thing was going through this and not knowing if I was actually dilating at all, and in my irrational state I thought I wasn't, hot helped by the midwife remarking something similar.

To make it even harder, almost every contraction, at the height of the contraction, while I was struggling with the ferocity and trying to practice my strong breathing, inevitably there would be the midwife. "Jennifer, what can I do... what can we do about this pain". "Jennifer, how can I help you". It was distracting and frankly pissed me off. I had already told her I did NOT want gas, I'm allergic to pethidine and I didn't want a fucking needle in my back. After about 20 minutes of being asked this I eventually bit out mid contraction "You can have the fucking baby for me if you want" which shut her up. I hated her then. Before it had been irritation, but now all of my self doubt and the pain and the confusion were all directed at her. I didn't want to workshop my pain, I just wanted to be left the hell alone.

It was now about 10pm and the contractions were at their peak. Their ferocity is something I've never experienced before. It felt like I was being clawed. While I described the Monkey's labour as powerful and intense, this was violent. I felt like I was in a boxing ring being battered and wondered just how much I had left in me to continue. Everything hurt, nothing helped, I couldn't escape.

At abotu 10 past 10 I was sitting on a big yoga ball with my elbows on the bed dealing with a contraction and ignoring the midwife with Bingley rubbing my back. Halfway through the contraction however the pain was the worst I have ever experienced, I couldn't take it any more, I had to get away, and through the contraction I crawled up onto the bed, trying to escape the clawing and the beating. Finally getting up on all fours I collapsed onto my left side and sobbed. I was done. I could not do any more. I would not fight it any more. I cried to the Possum and told him I was sorry but I could not do any more.

Hazy Shades of Winter: Grey

Good grief you lot are impatient! Unfortunately for you a very persistent velvet cord clad marsupial spends most of my waking hours trying to dig his way into my clothes to latch onto my boobs, before promptly falling asleep in a self satisfied milk drunk stupor. While this is great from his perspective it makes it hard to type.


Anyhow, story picks up again at the hospital. I found my way to the appropriate place and was shown to my cubicle and left with a couple of out of date Womens Weeklies. Settling in with Nicole Kidman's miracle baby news I was attended later by a nice but very by the book midwife. After checking my story (and my underpants) she agreed that my waters had broken and started explaining the procedure. Which is basically to put me on a monitor and make sure I don't have a rip roaring fever etc. All well and good but she was explaining in painfully simplistic language at a snail's pace and it started to get really irritating.

She hooked up the CTG monitor and then launched into what it was and how it worked. When I got to the point I couldn't take it any more I interjected something simple that usually clearly gets the message that I know what they're doing and please stop treating me like a 4 year old. However she didn't blink and continued to explain that what the monitor was measuring in such laborious but unfulfilling detail that I stared off into space.

As expected, the Possum's heart rate was good and steady, doing nothing in particular and I was having very irregular very very mild contractions about every 10 minutes or so that barely registered on the machine. After about half an hour of this, there was a shift change and I was assigned a new midwife. This one had a brief chat to me and immediately labelled me as the cheekiest patient in the unit and told me that I could take off the monitor as it was clearly pretty pointless. She then phoned up my much loved obstetrician to see what he wanted to do. "To see what *I* want to do" I corrected and she laughed.

It was now around 2ish in the afternoon and in the stretches with no one else with me I felt incredibly antsy. I wanted Bingley and I was afraid of getting up and moving without him here and missing the whole event. I felt odd and swirly and like I was consciously deciding not to go into labour which was so strange. I would feel the Possum kick and swish and it felt totally surreal to know he would be out so soon. One stretch I was left alone for 20 minutes or so and I felt so panicky I smsed Bingley at least 10 times and felt really tearful.

After a while, my new improved midwife came back and told me that my obstetrician had ordered them to find me a bed because he didn't want me giving birth on the South East Freeway trying to get back in time once labour kicked in. He also told them not to let me argue and to enjoy the free sandwiches that they kept offering me. I get the impression that it may have been conveyed that I can be quite stubborn as much of this was presented to me as a fait accompli. Not really having any other options at that point though, resistance was futile so agreed to be ushered up to my room.

If it had felt surreal before it was just bizarre now. I was in a room with sweeping views over the city focused on a white church in the mid distance. My room was as neat and well appointed as a hotel room (even scoring hotel numbering on the door) with his and hers oxygen and suction accessories instead of towelling white bathrobes. I was handed over to the ward midwives and sat on the edge of my bed, still in my dressed up dress, with my handbag on the floor, oversized Audrey Hepburn sunglasses on the side table just... waiting.

At this point any time I got up and walked around I would have a contraction. A realish one. And being as I had no idea where Bingley was (he'd stopped answering my sms) I wasn't game to move. Buffet dinner was announced and I picked the least unappetising dish on offer and declined a glass of wine (red or white?) taking y tray back to my room before picking at the bread roll and watching terrible afternoon tv.

I read everything in the room. From the "tell us what you think" form to the "how to breastfeed" pamphlet. Even the "check your baby's paternity" pamphlet. I was so cagey by the time that someone knocked on the door I could feel my heart rate treble. When it finally opened to reveal Bingley calmly wheeling a small cabin bag holding a RedBull I was completely out of my comfort zone. Seeing him almost made me burst into tears, both with relief and also with an irrational anger that he hadn't been here all the time (even though I had known where he had necessarily been).

It was dark then, my picture window ablaze with twinkling lights along the freeway, shops and houses. Bingley kept asking me if anything was happening as we watched TV in uneasy silence, knowing that both of us were thinking about what was going to happen At Any Minute. It was at least 5 hours now since my waters had officially broken and the suspense of just sitting there, of knowign what the eventual outcome would be but not knowing how the story would be written (other than it would be different to anything else we'd ever done before) was tying us both up in knots.

Hazy Shades of Winter: Red

Monday morning blew into our house with all the hallmarks of winter. A touch of frost on the air, a crispness that burned the inside of your nose and chilled your ears. But by early morning, the warm unfiltered sunshine had banished all but the gentlest rebuke on the breeze.

I was "due" and at the height of prowliness. I had an obstetrician appointment at 12:30 and was fully expecting the day to go much as my previous labour days. An appointment with a stretch and sweep, an afternoon of uncoordinated contractions, a last night of debauchery followed by intensifying contractions and then later that night or maybe the next morning, a new baby.

It didn't happen like that.

At about 10am I felt damp. There's not really any other way to describe it, and nothing that will make it sound dignified. Not wet, no "oops, I dropped a jar of pickles", but damp. After the increasingly uncharming effects of late pregnancy including increased leukorrhoea I assumed this was more of the same. At the very least I was incredibly sure that I hadn't suddenly developed incontinence. I had a shower and asked a bemused Bingley what, hypothetically, we were supposed to do if it was something else. Something like my waters breaking (remembering that for the Elfling and Monkey I had my waters broken at full dilatation). We neither of us had any idea.

At about 12pm there was no gushing of waters and I had no idea if I'd imagined the "dampness", so we were all ready to go to my appointment. I was wearing one of my favourite red dresses, because we figured a trip to the city deserved some last minute shopping and dining et al. I grabbed my handbag and I stood up, and promptly worked out that either my bladder had exploded or my waters really had broken. It was sitcom cliched really, standing there, in the middle of the room, dressed up with my pretty dress and product in my hair and clear sticky fluid running down my legs with a completely nonplussed expression on my face. I honestly had no clue what you are supposed to do when this happens.

I called my obstetrician for guidance and was instructed to go to the hospital's assessment unit forthwith, the assumption being that with my stellar previous labours, that this one, with the turbo boost of already broken waters might be imminent. At this stage I'd had nary a braxton hicks, and didn't feel "labour-y" so was in no rush. I called the hospital to find out where I should actually go because I didn't think this was birth suite material, and ate some lunch before making sure the bag was in the car etc and tried to decide what to do about the girls. The Monkey was with us, the Elfling at school (finishing in just over 2 hours) and all of our "to call" people were at work.

By 1 o'clock we had sorted everything out. We picked up the Elfling from school and planned to drop me off at the hospital. Bingley would look after the girls at home with my sister on standby should labour kick in to look after them. I was dropped off out the front of maternity, and stood there, in my pretty red dress, with my glossy hair and my handbag and felt like a right royal fraud. Not in labour, not a single contraction, standing alone outside maternity, dress fluttering in the breeze.

I have been banned

From associating with, talking to, touching, observing, looking at or otherwise interacting with newborns. 'Tis Verboten. In angry German accent.

I was examining newborns again this morning (healthy newborns) and oh my dear Lord. My breasts ache, my uterus aches, I had to stop throwing myself on the first male that walked past me and beg "impregnate me now". I spontaneously ovulated as soon as the little pink rosebud mouth rooted against my palm as I touched her cheek. I walked into the library straight after and they have a GD MIDWIFERY display of mothers and babies and breastfeeding and OH MY GOD I WANT ANOTHER BABY.

I called LH who is right this second probably performing his own vasectomy with a staple remover. Which is probably not a bad idea because if he was in the vicinity then I would be using every unfair below the belt trick in the book right about now and he would not stand a chance.

This is crazy insane. Rationally we've been discussing this on occasion and while we haven't decided *definitely* no, it's pretty much been leaning that way. I've said I don't really want any more, LH has definitely been keen to put the crappy nappy stage behind us and move into the "take them snowboarding and then they can stay at Grandma's house" stage.

I could never have been childless, I don't know what it is within me, but the pull to have children is just so strong. All of it right now is appealing. The gleeful "trying", that first anxious POAS moment, feeling the stretch of skin and muscle, lying in bed and looking at the little lump protruding up from my abdomen, that first real scan at 13 weeks, the first flutters soon after, the real belly, the "big" scan, seeing feet and elbows outlined by my skin, falling asleep to stacatto dance steps with a huge grin on my face, preparing for birth, the incredible power and wonder and achievement of birth, that first miraculous fall in love meeting, that first breastfeed, the discovery of little arms and legs and the way that those tiny fingers wrap around your finger and melt you into a gooey puddle on the floor, night feeds by starlight, sitting in the park as they roll over, sitting up, crawling, cruising, toddling, walking, running, jumping into your arms, "nigh nigh Mummy", "I love you", strange large headed drawings with ears and no noses or mouths, bedtime cuddles, chasing fairies, blowing bubbles, birthday cake candles, santa photos, calling schools, buying school uniforms...

OK have to stop now because I'm crying but I want more babies. I don't know if we'll have them but I want them so much.

4 years

At this exact time 4 years ago I was sitting up in bed on a block of ice with my knees drawn up to my chest. LH was off having a sleep after his "big night" and I was waiting for him and my Mum and Dad to get there. Curled up next to me, swaddled inexpertly in the hospital blankets was the most perfect creature I had ever seen. She had a squashed face, a giant cephalohaematoma on the back of her head (LH called it her halo), ears that were still stuck to her head, no eyelashes and almost no hair aside from a single golden strand sprouting from her forehead. But to me I had never seen anything so beautiful. Her skin was luminous. I have never seen a baby with such beautiful skin, and her cheeks were flushed with rose. So many times in the next few hours I would pick up her teensy tiny little body and press my cheek to the satin of hers and drink in that new baby smell.

I still could not believe that I had a baby. It was an amazing shock when she was placed in my arms at 3:34am on 02/03/04, that after such excrutiating pain, pain that ripped me to my soul, that there was no pain. There was just awe that I had made this. LH and I had made this. A whole new person. A whole new perfect person. A whole new perfect girl. I was a mother. For 4 years now I have been a mother. An inexpert, bumbling, oft failing one, but a mother nonetheless. A mother who this morning woke to having her tall, skinny daughter jump on her far too early and exclaim after asked what day it was "It's my BIRTHDAY!!!" before singing "Happy Birthday to meeee, Happy Birthday to meeeeeeeee, Happy Birthday Dear Elfing... Happy Birthday to ME" followed by gargantuan cuddles and giggles.

4 years ago...

The heat of late February was scorching and as gravid as my belly. The power would often fail as the grid tried to keep up with the demand for airconditioners and fans and I would sit in a lukewarm bath feeling the sweat roll into the bath and patting my swollen front bit focusing intensely on what was to come. I can remember sweat stinging my eyes as it rolled down my forehead and the smell of the drying sandalwood soap that I was using in the last few weeks as a Pavlovian association so I could remember these last few days of being pregnant forever.

I completely went into myself in the last week. I think I knew instinctively that *it* was coming. The day, the night, the birth and then I would hold her in my arms. But as it drew closer I was consumed with the birth. Our birth. The day when one would become two.

That Monday morning as I walked down the hill in the humid rising heat towards the city I *knew*. I knew she was coming. I felt different somehow. I remember catching the bus home, clutching what I knew was my last purchase before she came sitting in the "pregnant mothers designated seating" that it was coming. I smiled the whole way - the owner of the most precious and incredible secret in the world. I got home and made up the cot with the new blanket and sheets that I had bought and remember just sitting in her room. The bright, warm sunny room, rocking gently in my chair, looking at the brand new furniture. Smelling the finish on the new wardrobe and gloating over the tiny clothes held within.

When DH came home that afternoon he knew something was different as well. He was restless and jittery in contrast to my serenity. When we were lying in bed in the early evening and my "show" had shown itself I remember grinning inanely. Yes it was coming. What *it* was I still wasn't sure, but it was.

I don't remember if we ate dinner that night. I'm sure we must have. But the evening progressed like most others had. Warm and humid, we lazed around watching TV. As I was watching I felt a dragging sensation deep in my pelvis. The exact same sensation as period pain. I ignored it. A while later I had the same sensation again. It continued for about an hour before I mentioned it to DH. While uncomfortable it didn't *hurt* and being as I had had much worse with endo pain and periods I figured this must just be what Braxton Hicks felt like. But I was resltess by this stage. I didn't want to watch crappy television and felt the need to go into my bedroom where it was cool and clean and comforting.

At some stage we decided to "time" these pains. It seemed like a good idea considering everyone does it on TV and we were kind of lost as to what we should do. The dragging pains were coming every 10 minutes or so. Sometimes less. The sensation was also becoming more uncomfortable. I could still talk through them comfortably though so I just assumed that this wasan't the real thing yet. Maybe it was the prelude, but it wasn't labour.

The time between was gradually shortening as well. I tried the bath but it annoyed me as it restricted my movement, so I got out. I remember feeling an overwhelming need to be on all fours and rocking backwards and forwards felt great. It got rid of most of the uncomfortableness that had started to actually feel painful. I felt compelled to go into the nursery. To feel the energy of that room. I remember kneeling on the floor with my head on my arms on the rocking ottoman and rocking gently through the contractions. It felt so good.

By this stage we figured that I might be in labour and we hastily packed a bag by throwing in whatever looked likea good idea at the time. (I don't think we used more than one or two things out of it). By now things were starting to feel serious. The contractions were actually painful and although moving and rocking and my heat pack against my pelvic bone and alternately my sacrum took the edge off, I could not ignore them any more - and even if I had wanted to, they were coming every 2-3minutes. Being as antenatal classes had instructed to call when we reached 5 minutes apart, we thought we ought to call. The midwife on the end of the phone asked how long I'd been feeling *twinges* which at that stage had been about 2 hours and brushed me off breezily insisting that I had plenty of time to go.

So I paced and I rocked and I pushed the heat as deep into my pelvis as I could. But half an hour later the contractions were down to every 1-2 minutes. Although I didn't have a fear that I was going to give birth at home, I was feeling the need of the reassurance of a birth attendant. DH just looked bewildered and didn't know what to do. I needed to be with people who could tell me that I was doing well, and could tell me how we were progressing. So we called the midwife back to let her know we were coming in. By this stage contractions were coming with barely a nreak between them. And although I could cope with them silently I needed to go. I remember closing the garage door and thinking that this was the last time that it would be just the two of us driving away from the house. That when I returned through the front door there would always be someone else.

The trip to the hospital was quiet and mercifully short. As we drove along the highway, lit with lights the river sparkled as we coasted by. I could see the lights of the hospital as we approached. A beacon of safety as we drove in silence.

Once we got to the labour ward, my contractions were coming harder and stronger and longer. But the lady at the desk was not particularly hurried in processing our details. After several minutes of confiming our details, she left us for 10 minutes to find a midwife to take us to the birthing suites. At this stage I was still silent through contractions, even answering questions though they annoyed me, shifting my focus onto insignificant things.

I asked to be checked when we reached our room and was found to be 6-7cm which surprised my midwife. She then tried to put the CTG on me because it was routine even though my OB had assured me that I didn't have to do it. But as I hadn't felt Oofty move since the beginning I assented. But I couldn't stay still during contractions. By this stage there was no denying that they hurt. The belt would slip and lose the trace, and following protocols the midwife would tell me they needed to get me to have the trace done. In the end I refused. It was impossible for me to be still. And I wanted the shower.

The shower was blissful. I sat upright on a birthing ball with warm water directed at my belly, low in the pelvic region. The pain still wracked my body relentlessly but I felt so strong. And there was still a gap of about 30 seconds or so between each one where I could just calm myself. But that gap got shorter and shorter and the pain started to invade all of my thoughts. I turned off the cold water and let just straight hot water be directed at my belly while instructing DH to rub hard against my sacrum.

By this stage I couldn't talk properly and the intensity just blew me away. I remember thinking then that this was just the beginning, that it was goign to get worse and the flicker of doubt began to flame. I couldn't do this. I didn't want to do this. I wanted to go home. As the contractions started to pile on top of eachother I lurched forward and nothing helped. I'd had enough, I wanted out. The pain, oh God the pain. But not sharp pain with a sting, achy, dragging, pressurised pain that I couldn;t relieve or distract myself from.

I had known it was going to be painful but at that point I felt like I was dying. Or maybe I hoped that I was. It was interminal and unrelenting. It made my legs quiver and feel like jelly because I couldn't use any of my brain power to keep them working to support me. Every fibre of my being was consumed by the pain. Coping with the pain. I forgot I was having a baby, I forgot that the pain had a purpose. I was just lost in the sensation of my body taking over. I wanted someone to fix it, I wanted to forget it had ever happened as I reached out and hit the red button on the wall in front of me. The midwife came back admonishing me for pressing the "emergency" button. Even in my pain I felt embarrassed for hassling her. I asked for the gas. It was my only pain relief option that I would allow myself even then. But I think what I had wanted more was the support. The encouragement of someone to tell me how well I was doing. To acknowledge that it hurt but to remind me why.

The gas was wheeled into the bathroom and after a cursory lecture on how to use it I grasped it like a lifeline. And the midwife left us alone again. DH fearful and lost, and me grasping the mouthpiece like a lifeline. It did nothing. In fact I don't even know if it was turned on. But it gave me a focus. I had to rattle that bead with every breath. Nothing was helping though. I was trying to work out how I could run away and leave my body behind. I think I begged DH to make it stop. I felt so helpless as my body revved up several more gears.

Then the sensation changed. I felt myself involuntarily bear down. And in spite of the lecture of the time before I pressed the red button again. There was NO way that I was sending DH out to find her. I needed him to knead my back and direct the scorching hot water there.

The midwife bustled back in and hustled me out to the bed so that she could check that I was actually *there* (It had afterall been only 4 hours since the original twinges). Although I missed the shower, I loved that someone else was giving directions. I was in no state myself to direct the proceedings - Iwas afterall battling an internal dialogue that was insisting that I just runaway and forget about the whole thing.

The examination showed that I was 9cm and another midwife came in and told me that I should do whatever it felt like my body wanted me to do. If I wanted to push then that was fine. So I let myself push a little. Tentatively because I didn't know how I was supposed to be doing it. The new midwife encouraged me. She praised me and talked about how well I was doing. I was pitiful in my gratitude for her praise. I didn't really believe her but I clung to that admiring tone.

My OB was called as I got through the contractions as best I could. When he arrived the pain lessened almost immediately. It was still unbearable in a way that words and even memory cannot describe but my confidence, shattered by transition gave a tiny hurrah. Here was someone that knew me, was cheerful and upbeat and was reminding me I was going to have a baby. Imagine that! A BABY!

Pushing was strange. I never realised before that I would need coaching on how to do it. But I really had no idea. The fact that DD was malrotated probably had something to do with that, as did the fact that I was pushing with my waters intact. They asked to break my waters and I acquiesced. I didn't give a damn. If they'd told me that standing on my head would have helped I think I would have done that too.

Pushing was a relief in some ways. It was active. It was strong. And blessedly between each wave there was a break where I flaked out or even at one stage joked with my attendants (oh and the gas had been given away long ago). It was just me and the power of my body and my cheer squad. I had thought that the "push push push" of the movies would irritate me. But I needed it. I couldn't formulate a thought for myself and I needed the direction.

I remember focusing on the clock on the wall in front of me, and trying to work out where an hour had gone. Nothing felt different either after all that time. They brought out a mirror to try and show me that things were happening so that I didnt get discouraged. But it was abstract and strangely grotesque - not in an "ew I'm looking at genitals" point of view, but an oh my God, look how distended that all is. I was trying desperately to relax my pelvic floor as I pushed, but fear and pain combined with the fact that I had an extremely strong and toned pelvic floor meant that it was not easy to make it lax.

Another hour passed. This hour seemed to progress for me, and towards the end I felt her whole head in my vagina. Hard and unyielding, but she couldn't pass the final hurdle. I was still pushing hard but was so tired, pain was still wracking my body and rendering me mute in my "quiet" periods. In the brief breaks all I wanted was to sleep. I remember an explanation somewhere - her head was crowning at a weird angle, she was still facing the wrong way and her neck was extended rather than flexed. Her heartrate was also starting to change a little. Not enough to be concerned, but still different.

My OB told me that we were going to try the ventouse. I begged not to, and with the next few contractions pushed with as much vigour and strength as I could. Still powerful, still strong. But she wouldn't move. So the ventouse was assembled and inserted.

Until that moment I had not known true pain. My body split open at that time and I made my first real noise. I screamed. Not a horror film scream but louder, purer. A single note that shook even my experienced care providers. They apologised, they soothed, they promised that it would be all over but I was lost in the pain. There was nothing else but pain. Until the next contraction where as I pushed, the gentle traction of the ventouse extracted her head, her face flattened by my pubic bone, facing towards me. I was still unable to feel a single thing besides pain. I barely registered her tiny head as the next contraction slammed into my perineum. And she was out. So quickly. Her arms flailing out so that she suddenly seemed huge - all arms and legs and was placed over my heart.

There was no pain. The shock of that, and the desperate fear that I was goign to drop this lard covered *thing* on my chest left me bewildered. For a second I could not process what had happened. The room was silent, and in the centre of it all was DD nestled into my breast. I had a baby. There was no more labour I HAD A BABY. I had a baby girl. I think I wanted to cry at that point - I didn't know why I wasn't crying. But somehow I was beyond that. I had endured such pain, I had been so strong and I had made this. MY BABY.

I was elated. I felt like I could conquer the world. I had experienced that rite of passage. I was a woman who had birthed her child. My heart sang and felt as if it would burst. I felt so incredibly proud of what I had achieved. LOOK what I had achieved. Look at this bundle that grew within me. Look at how perfect she is.

But I was also in awe of myself. What I had done, what I had been through. What it had taken to bring her forth into the world. The power and intensity of it. The pure achievement of it. The fact that I suddenly felt connected to mothers before me. That they had been through this filled me with awe. How do we not talk about this - gloat about this? This was Everest with an even bigger reward! How could it be that so many women go through this every few minutes and it is commonplace? It was so incredible. So humbling. Even now, [4] years later the power and courage and the strength of it all still leave me breathless.

Happy Birthday my beautiful Elfling. Thank you for giving me the gift of being your mother.

Happy Birthday Monkey Girl

It's still weirdly cool for September, I'm wearing ugg boots in Brisbane in September, and that's even with all of the extra body heat that I'm generating these days. I'm so tired, but wired at the same time. On tenterhooks.

I had my 40 week OB appointment this morning. Am so over being pregnant. My OB laughed at me (in a nice way) and told me that I'm doing well. I rolled my eyes at him. The appointment was perfunctory. Everything is still going well. Blood pressure good and low, heartbeat strong. I ask for an internal to check that things are actually happening, because even the Braxton Hicks, the copious CM, the slowed movements cannot persuade me that I'm going to give birth any time soon.


The cervix is soft and 1-2cm dilated. But it's multiparous soft, not fully effaced. "Can I have a stretch and sweep"? I hate the way it sounds pleading and whiny to my ears, but my OB assents. I clench my teeth as the membranes are swept, trying not to jump off the table. But I'm still pessimistic as we book my induction date for October 5. That would make me 41 weeks and 6 days. I am resigned that nothing will happen before then, 2 weeks and three days to go. My heart sinks a little further but Sophie kicks me hard in my ribs. It makes me laugh - my little girl is trying to remind me that she's still there. I'm just so impatient to hold her.


I walk despondently down to the mall, trying to stay upbeat but my head in that whiny place. 2 more weeks, MORE than 2 weeks! I walk into David Jones, determined to buy something for Sophie. But the clothes hold no appeal, and I can't even manufacture enthusiasm about the toys so I head to the top floor to walk around the Christmas display - it's beautiful and sparkly in the spartan surroundings. I look at the ornaments, and a sparkling fairy on a swing appeals to me, should I buy two little fairies for my little fairies? I pick them up, but then worry that maybe Sophie isn't "Sophie" and put them back.


I head to Myer hoping that something in there will catch my eye, but nothing inspires and the Christmas display isn't open yet. So I trudge back through the mall, deciding to go home and get some useful sleep.


I stop at Sussan on the way back to the train station - they have a huge sale advertised in the window and I want more pyjamas for the hospital - they're the only possible thing that I can think of to pack in my bag that I haven't already. So I try some things on, all soft and snuggly. I love the new smell of the cotton. I buy a few things and feel less despondent. In fact, for some reason a little voice is telling me that it's going to happen today. Sometime soon anyway.


I catch the train back to my car and decide that a few more old wives tricks can't hurt and decide on Indian for lunch. Something hot and spicy, a tasty vindaloo seems to fit the bill. At home it is hot in the middle of the day. The air smells dry and still and hot and spiced with the curry. I'm feeling big and tired. I talk to DH and friends on MSN and am depressing and whiny.


It's cooler now than it was then, as I sit and wait for DH to finish reading stories to DD in the early evening. I snuggle in to DH when he comes to me and wait to be petted and reassured that I'm not just fat and am not going to be the eternal pregnant woman. In spite of my whininess I am completely in love with my husband at this point. We joke around and laugh for a while, before trying another well known induction method. It is wonderfully good, afterwards we're both blissed out and I even forget about the interminable pregnancy. But there is no "show", I'm not as completely oblivious as I'd hoped.


DH is tired, I've been getting up a lot at night and work is hard for him at the moment. We watch some crappy TV together and the now familiar Braxton Hicks start up again. I don't tell him because we've been down this path so many times in the last couple of nights. It's not painful either, just "contractions" - I can't think of any other word to describe them, just a sensation of a muscle tightening and squeezing in my pelvis. It's not painful at all and it doesn't feel "periody" like my labour with the Grot. Ergo, it is another false alarm. I refuse to look at the clock but it is about 10. At 10:30pm DH is exhausted and I tell him to go to sleep. "Any contractions" he asks, and I tell him that yes, every 10 minutes, but no pain so just another false alarm.


I don't want to go to bed so I tell him to sleep, I can always wake him if it;s the "real thing". I sit on my computer and read random topics on EB. Then a friend logs on and I chat to her on MSN for a few hours. The distraction is wonderful and stops me obsessively timing the contractions which are now about 5 minutes apart.


At one point she asks me if anything is happening and I sheepishly reply that contractions are every 5 minutes. But I refuse to get excited. It is now about midnight. I am wearing my new pyjamas and ugg boots in the strange September coolness. The sensation is becoming more uncomfortable as the time passes, but not painful yet. I am unconvinced that this is "it" but at the same time I don't want to lie down in case it makes them go away.


At 1am we're down to every 3 minutes and I am getting distracted when it happens. I know it is real now, but deathly afraid that it's going to stop and I'm going to go back into limbo. I decide to tempt fate. I say goodnight to Leesh and turn off all the lights, crawling into bed with DH. "I think this is it" I whisper to him, but lie down waiting with baited breath. They keep coming. They hurt now as well, not enough to cause me to yell or need anything, but I can't ignore them. The deep dragging sensation, the feel of my uterus contracting hard. I can feel them when I lay my hand on my belly.


I wake DH up fully, and he talks to me sleepily. Should we call SIL I ask? She is to pick up DD "when it's time". I am afraid to call her in case this is still a false alarm. But I'm also worried that if it goes as fast as it did last time that she will get here on time. Each contraction is only lasting 20-30 seconds though, even though they are only 2-3minutes apart. This is just prelabour my brain screams. BUt the night is only going to get later, so we decide to take the step and call SIL. It feels like we have truly set the ball rolling now and we can't stop it.


I rock with each contraction, backwards and forwards, swaying my hips feels good. I want to sit in my rocking chair which is in DDs room. The chair is noisy when I sit in it, and DD stirs, she sees me in the chair and sits up a little so I sit on her bed. and cuddle her to me. "Sophie is coming sweetheart" I whisper into her silky curls "she's goign to come out of Mummy's belly. Aunty U will pick you up soon and then tomorrow you can come and see Mummy and Sophie at the hospital". The Grot is dopey but wide awake at the same time. It must feel like a dream to her. I cuddle her to me as DH gets her bag ready so that she can get picked up. SIL arrives and picks her up.


As soon as the Grot leaves I am hit by a "real" contraction. It hurts and brings me to my knees. I rock backwards and forwards and beg DH to rub my back. It feels so good. 3 minutes later another contraction slams into me. I am ready for it and drop down, and DH rubs where I ask. 3 minutes later another contraction hits. I am confused, should I call the hospital? Should I hop in the shower? Should I lie down and conserve my strength? I am pretty sure that I am going to have this baby today, so I decide to let the hospital know that we will be coming in some time this morning. Gauging by the speed of my last delivery, it will probably be before day break as well.


When I call the hospital, the lady on the phone is concerned that as my first labour was only 6 hours and I'm already having contractions 3 minutes apart that I should come in soon. I am not convinced that much has happened, but I am worried about trying to get to the hospital in transition so we set out, packing the bags into the car. As DH closes the garage door Bittersweet Symphony starts playing on the radio. It suits my mood completely. Contractions are still coming every 3 minutes and hard, but I don't feel that labour is going to happen as fast as with the Grot.


DH and I are still joking with eachother when we arrive at the hospital. We wait for another woman to go through, so that we can start signing the forms. One form makes m laugh out loud - it gives the hospital permission to contact Sophie if she has any concerns about her hospital stay. Finally we are granted access to the birthing suites. An older midwife named Lynn is apparently "our" midwife. She gives me a tasteful yellow muumuu to wear and asks me to get changed so that she can check what's happening. Contractions are still every 3 minutes and painful, but in between I am myself, laughing and chatting with DH. I am feeling very restless and hate being confined to the bed.


This bed is hard, and lying on it the contractions are hurting my back and DH can't rub it for me. I am annoyed with the nurse, she is rummaging through paperwork and asking me questions all the while making me spend more time on my back. I suppose I could get up, but I just want this bit over and done with so I can jump in the shower. More annoying questions, and then the blue latex is snapped on so she can have a feel of how dilated I am. She waits until the latest contraction finishes and then feels my cervix. I can feel already that my cervix is posterior still, and my heart sinks.


"One centimetre" she announces. As if it might be a good thing. My heart is being eaten away by stomach acid. Seeing my face she adds "but soft, you are in labour". I am feeling unbelievably embarrassed. I have another contraction but it is mild, I can barely feel it from the outside, and I can see the expression on her face change. "Was that a little one" she asks. I nod, fearful that I'm going to cry. She calls up to the ward and then starts to explain what's going to happen to me. She wants me to take something so that I will sleep up on the ward and then I can come down later when I am truly in labour. I flatly refuse to take pethidine so she starts to talk abou tablets that can "help me sleep". I am firm that I will NOT take sedatives. She tries again to convince me that I should take something so I can get some rest but I am adamant that I will not take anything.I promise that I will lie down and rest when we go upstairs though. I don't remember if I cross my fingers at this point but I have absolutely no intention of lying down.


Contractions have all but vanished. It is 2:30 am as we make our way up to the overflow ward. They are full tonight, so I am in the crappy end room. It has a single bed and no bathroom and two straight chairs. I cannot lie down, and refuse to. I try and make DH lie down though so he can sleep. He is so tired, and now nothing is happening. I am so restless. I pace around the tiny room, staring out the windows.It's hot, I am annoyed at myself, and the room is terrible. No contractions. Labour has stopped. We have to reset the clock. Sophie is squirming inside of me and I chat to her, plead with her to come out. Little baby girl I love you so much already, I just want to hold you and to stroke your tiny head. I wander down to the shared bathrooms, and I have a bloody show finally. It's bright red, I don't remember that with the Grot. But no contractions.

...............................................................

The clock on the wall is irritating me. Every second that ticks by reminds me that I am not in labour. I'm distracted but I refuse to lie down. Sophie's head is already not in the optimum position to dilate my cervix, damned if I'm going to lie down and slow it down even more. Plus it WAS labour before. My pain threshold is huge so when I thought the contractions hurt then they HURT!

I get bored with the pacing around and pick up one of the magazines I brought with me to the hospital - Cleo looks suitably vacuous. I sit cross legged on the bed while DH slumps over and falls asleep. I am having very faint contractions again but at weird inconsistent intervals and they don't hurt at all. I flick through this seasons "fashions" and pretend to be interested in this year's bachelor of the year contestants. Contractions still in the background like fuzzy static on the TV - impossible to completely ignore but nothing more than nuisance white noise at the same time. More trips back down the hall to the bathroom. Still no real contractions. The clock on the wall insolently tick tick ticks. I can hear it ticking it is that quiet.

Tick

Tick

Tick

I am restless but not tired at all. I am still frustrated. Why has this labour been so different to the Grot's? Am I dilating at the moment? Who knows? The contractions are not palpable at all. Pace pace pace.

It's 4am, I'm looking at the clock and wondering if maybe I should have taken the Midazolam or the Pethidine, or something. Just too wired to sleep. The sky is still dark but there is a purplish haze forming on the horizon - dawn is coming and Sophie is still inside of me.

WHAM

A contraction hits from nowhere, no lead up, nothing. I drop on all fours and rock and breathe. My breathing is not automatic, I am forcing myself to breathe. Deep breath in, hold it, controlled breath out. Oh Lord that hurt. I've woken DH even though I was quiet, he rubs my back as the contraction subsides and it feels good. Then 10 long minutes pass before another one sneaks up on me and king hits me. I feel like my legs have been knocked out from under me. Another 10 minutes and it surges again. I am a little boat in a big ocean being lifted up by huge waves and then slammed down minutes later. They are exactly 10 minutes apart, DH jokes that he could set his watch to them.

It's just before 5am and the light is beginning to creep over the horizon into the misty foggy morning. I stand at the window waiting for the next contraction as it builds and builds and punches me deep in my pelvis. My knees go weak again. Down to 5 minutes now, the contractions are huge. I cannot speak through them, and I cannot stay still. I rock on all fours with DH rubbing my spine. I am eerily quiet except the monosyllabic instructions to DH, higher, harder, closer, up down.

It's 5am on the mocking clock, contractions are every 4 minutes now. Hard, long, painful. But I can still hold onto myself through them. The breathing and the rocking and the rubbing are giving me a routine. As each one starts to build we cope, my mind reminding me that it will soon be over. This is real labour now. I have none of the unsurety that I had with the previous night's debacle. This is real and powerful. I feel connected to the Earth.

I grasp the top of the wardrobe to see if that helps, rocking my pelvis while DH rubs. It feels stronger than on all fours, but my legs are so weak. I will myself to stand up to the contractions. Feeling the spray of the surge on my face as they hit and somehow being reenergised by the incredible power. In the short periods between contractions I feel Sophie fluttering inside me. Soon I think.

As they build in strength and intensity I give myself a timeline. It took 6 hours with the Grot so I have until 10am to birth this baby. And look, it's already quarter to 6, 4 hours left. I can do that. I can do that.

Contractions are changing, they are harder and longer than ever before and the doubt starts to creep in, can I do this? My back has been pummelled by DH and is sure to be bruised later and I know that it's goign to get worse. At 6am I feel sure enough that this is labour to call the nurse. We press the green button and watch the sun rise in the sky outside. The light gleams off the copper of the PAH sparkles in the early morning.

Twenty minutes later DH looks for a nurse as contractions are coming one after the other with barely 20 seconds break in between. The nurse is lovely but harried, they have had more arrivals during the night and she is working a double shift to care for all the about to be and new mothers that have arrived. We start to walk down the hallway and I contract, falling to the floor.

As it abates we manage to get to the nurses desk before I again fall down. This walk is long and tortuous. We finally get to the lifts and DH and the nurse wait again for me to get up and be able to walk. Down to the birthing suites and I'm again down, holding onto an oxygen tank that happened to be there when I went down.

There is some confusion when we get to the birthing suites, they're nearly full and there are more people coming in. I snaffle the last suite, the same one that the Grot was born in. This knowledge buoys me.

..............................................................

There is a wait before I a nurse is allocated to me, as it is also handover time. I kneel in front of the large chair in the room hoping to use it as a support, while DH rubs my back. My breathing sounds so foreign, I can't believe that I'm having to tell myself to breathe! But the focussed breathing is helping. I control it so strongly that it distracts from the power the pressure and the pain.

My muumuu is annoying me and I want to take it off and get in the shower with its hot water. The nurse finally comes in to assess me, and I joke that if I'm only 2cm dilated that I want an epidural right NOW. I'm 6cm though and in transition. I smile at this news, but it's a weary smile. I'm a complete sucker for the encouraging words from the nurse though.

I finally get into the shower. How blissful does it feel to be naked instead of ensconced in the hot sticky material of the hospital gown? I bounce and roll on the fitball in the shower while blasting my body with hot water. When the contractions hit I aim the nozzle squarely at my pubic bone and with DH rubbing my sacrum the pain is less than what it was in the overflow ward.

The nurse comes in to check Sophie's heartbeat with the Doppler. I can feel her moving occasionally and know instinctively that she's fine, and I'm irritated by the insistence of the nurse. She has trouble finding the heartbeat, it's not on either side and she can only find it low down in my belly, right above my pubic bone. Which means I can't use the shower while she checks. Contraction overlapping contraction I have to stand still so she can find the heartbeat. Surprisingly I am not worried even for a second. I know intellectually that I should be worried that they can't find her heartbeat but I know she is fine. Finally she finds the heartbeat but it's a little slow. The nurse turns down the hot water - "you're cooking your baby" she says and forbids me from using the water at the scalding hot temperature I am currently using. I think I pout at that stage but acquiesce.

It's about 7am now and my OB is doing his rounds in the hospital. Cheerfully he pokes his head in and asks how we're going. DH answers and I say nothing, just riding the waves and incapable of doing much more than that. OB is concerned by this and checks again if I'm OK. I break out of my meditation and turn my head slowly "all OK" I manage to get out with some effort, and then go back to concentrating on the shower nozzle in front of me. The lady across the hall from me is also my OBs patient, and she's having trouble, OB explains that he will leave me be as I'm coping and go check on her. Whatever, I wave him off. I can't concentrate on much beyond what's happening right this second in my body. I certainly don'pt need OB hovering, I want the sanctity of the warm humid room with just DH and I back.

There is no break between contractions now, just an upstroke and a downstroke. My breathing is what is getting me through, but I'm proud of myself because I'm coping. "This is as bad as it gets" I remind myself! And tehre are less than 3 hours to go on my self imposed timetable.

It's nearly 7:30 when the contractions change again, they start to get further apart again but the sensation is different. In the short minute to 90 second breaks between them I feel completely normal and pain free. After hours of pain, it is a surreal sensation. I realise after a few of these contractions that I'm bearing down, involuntarily pushing against my pelvic floor with each one. I press the big round nurse call button in front of me wearily - I don't want to get out of the shower but know they will "make" me. The nurse bustles in and asks what she can do to help. Her voice is accented - Irish maybe? I find it odd that it is her accent that I am focussing on at this point. "I'm pushing" I say simply.

.............................................................

It is 7:30 when I make my way into the sun splashed room. Early morning, a beautiful spring day outside the window, still tinged with dew. I am still naked and wet from the shower. The nurse asks if I want another gown, or a blanket so that I don't get cold, but wearing clothes just seems so foreign. The idea of covering myself now seems ridiculous. I need to feel free at the moment, and I can't with artificial coverings. I probably look and sound completely feral but I am adamant that I don't need any clothes.

The nurse checks to see how dilated I am - 8cm and waters still intact, bulging through. She doesn't want to break them as my OB is in theatre with the other lady and she suspects things will go quickly once they are broken. I am neither here nor there. I kneel on the bed, gripping the top and push with every contraction now. It feels wonderful. Like I have some sort of control. Although the effort of pushing is almost unbearable, it takes the pain sensation away and replaces it with one of sheer pressure.But after a while I realise that I am pushing against my membranes. I can feel them like a closed door, stopping things from progressing. I feel like I am pushing into a brick wall every time and it begins to frustrate me. I push and push and push involuntarily but nothing seems to be happening. It feels exactly the same way it did with the Grot and I ask the nurse to break my waters. She is not keen as I still have a cervical lip and also because OB is still in theatre. It is nearly 8am.

I spend most of my time on all fours in the middle of the bed, collapsing my head down after the effort of each contraction.The nurse comes back in to check on me and stifles a laugh, I am basically mooning anyone who comes into the room and I find it funny myself but I am not moving for anything. I have found a comfortable position and I'm sticking with it. The nurse asks if I would like a beanbag to lean into and I decide to give it a whirl. Nothing seems to be happening at the moment and I feel like I'm just waiting for someone to tell me what to do. The nurse and DH then take it in turns to check that I'm breathing as I spend my time, butt still in the air and face planted firmly into the beanbag. "I'm thirsty" I manage to croak, my head cold means that I can only breathe through my mouth, and with all the heavy breathing that I'm doing, I'm dry and parched as the Atacama.

Just after 8am my OB comes back into the room cheerily and congratulates me on my progress. I am like a puppy dog as I lap up the compliment, and when the nurse chimes in I feel very clever and extraordinary.

The amniotomy that I have been waiting impatiently for is uncomfortable and surreal - I feel the whole process, which ends in my thighs feeling warm and wet. There is not a large amount of liquor however, her head is pushed firmly against my cervix.I try pushing for a bit longer on my knees, both on all fours and up, with my head and arms draped over the end of the tilted up bed but it still feels uncoordinated and wrong. So when my OB suggests trying on my side I am happy to give it a try. I need the direction, for the first time my body seems a bit unsure as to what it shoudl be doing.

"Wait for the contraction and then push REALLY hard right into here" my OB coaches, pushing against a spot on my perineum. As the next contraction builds I push as hard as I can, then gulp in another breath and push again. I do this for about 4 or 5 contractions before I feel it, I feel Sophie's head moving down. I am excited by this, I never felt it with the Grot and I feel so strong. "I'm doing it!" I exclaim.

My cheer squad keeps up the encouragement with each contraction and I use their words to lift me, to push harder. "Her head is still OP" my OB tells me between contractions, "so this time I want you to give me all that you've got to turn her, she's turning, you're doing very well". I lap up the praise and set myself the goal of turning her with the next contraction. By the end of the next breath she has half turned, and is almost crowning, I can feel her hard head in my vagina, pushed against the barrier of my pelvic floor.

"Push push push push push push push" from the squad. I can feel her now, burning the muscles, but not painfully. She is crowning, if I were to reach down now I would feel her slimy head. I never felt this with the Grot. I am feeling every second of this. I am feeling her being born. I feel euphoric, Sophie is THERE, in a few more minutes I will push her out of me.

"Push push push push push push push"

Her head is there, I can feel it, it isn't out yet but it is hard and firm against my pelvic floor.

Slowly I feel the soft tissues of my body yielding, allowing her passage, birthing her. I am birthing my baby, my Sophie, she is coming and I am whole, intact and can feel her being born I feel exultant - I am doing this!

"Push push push push push push push"

Her head is out, I can feel her body being squeezed by my muscles, I feel each shoulder being born and then there she is - arms outstretched, covered in vernix, thick like lard over her whole body. Sophie! That's my Sophie! I put my arms out and draw her tiny slippery warm body into my chest so that I can smell her. So primal, so primitive and so euphoric. My baby is in my arms. SOPHIE is in my arms. I want to cry but I want to laugh at the same time. DH cuts the cord, severing her last physical link to me and giving her life as her separate self. But I am entranced with my precious bundle and barely notice.

My OB is beaming at me, "she turned back" he says "you birthed her OP". I try to smile but my body has started trembling as if it has just finally realised the enormity of what has happened. All I can focus on is holding my tiny squalling little girl. She is still yelling, but as she snuffles closer, the squeals dies down and it is quiet in the sun drenched room. I am so proud of her, and so proud of myself and my body. The previous night and the shame of the holding cell (overflow ward) is forgotten. It is just me, DH and our baby girl.

The placenta is birthed and I couldn't care less, I'm not interested in it. OB wants to check that there are no lacerations but I know that there are none. I feel whole and intact and incredibly powerful. My whole body is trembling now though. I think I am hypoglycaemic but refuse to concentrate on myself. After some photos are taken I bring Sophie to the breast. She nuzzles for a little while before latching on. Her attachment even this very first time is perfect and she makes sighing noises in the back of her throat as she sucks for half and hour.

It is complete. Our family is complete. As the colostrum flows into my tiny baby girl and the world around bustles back into its normal routine unaware of the miracle in my arms, I am feeling complete.

I woke this morning with a burning sensation behind my eyes and a lump in my throat. I cannot believe that it has been a year.

Happy Birthday Sophia.