I feel like I need to clarify something… Every mum’s situation with pregnancy and giving birth is different. This blog is by no means an attempt for sympathy or to say that my experience was worse than any others, because it certainly wasn’t. Looking around the NICU I realised just how lucky our situation actually was. Jumping ahead, I remember looking at one baby in particular. He was born the same day as our son and was exactly the same age, but was literally half his size. I knew we had a journey ahead of us, but that mother had a longer one. Heartbreaking…
Back to the start… labour was something that definitely did not agree with me. I wanted to be one of those women who took it in their stride and looked vibrant and healthy. I was so jealous of these women! This wasn’t the case for me and if I am to provide advice on this is to learn to accept that pregnancy is hard, despite some mum’s making it look easy (lucky ducks!). At around half way, it became apparent that it was a very high possibility this baby would come early. And as previously mentioned, walking in to see my Obstetrician, she took one look at me and said “our aim is to make 33 weeks”.
Me at 25 weeks.
Already big! Swollen face.
I ticked all the boxes for pre-eclampsia (not a rare condition, but none the less a scary one). High heart rate = check. Swollen and excess fluid = check. Protein in the urine = check (something that is a side effect of my kidney condition anyway). For anyone who has had preeclampsia during their pregnancy know that it can be life threatening for both the mother and the baby. This was something to take seriously.
Looking back, I still think I was pretty naive about the whole thing. The “we’ll be fine” and “I’m invincible” thought processes took over and I started to play it down. I was told I needed to cut back at work and start to rest more. Simple orders for some, but I thrive on being busy so this was not an easy feat. I particularly remember one instance at work where I was jokingly complaining to a colleague about my swollen feet and ankles. Her face when she saw them is something I will never forget. She was shocked and definitely did not think it was funny. I distinctly remember it felt like walking on a waterbed. Ok, probably going home and putting my feet up isn’t such a bad thing.
Thirty weeks came around. Yes, I had made it this far! Every week this baby stayed in my belly was essentially important. We had a wedding of our close friends in the City where my husband was a groomsman. I squeezed into a maternity dress (good opportunity to add that it is so hard finding stylish, affordable maternity clothes. ASOS and Jeanswest were my favourites), put on my kitten heels that I had purchased the week before (in a size bigger than my usual) and got my hair done in an attempt to make myself feel as least self-conscious as possible. The wedding was fun and despite being absolutely exhausted, I wanted to feel a part of it all so tried to be involved as much as possible.
My husband was definitely in the swing of the night and wanted to continue the party, where I needed sleep so returned to the hotel. The husband stumbles in at around 1am and as I awake I feel a dull pain in my lower back. I think nothing of it and decide to go back to sleep. Waking up in the morning the pain was undeniably worse and had now stretched from my lower back to also my lower abdomen. Not good. I wake my husband who was not in the best condition to deal with early labour but we thought it be best to hop in the car and make the drive home.
The drive home of course was my responsibility as my husband had enough alcohol on his breath to set off a breatheliser 100 metres away. Driving home along the freeway with labour pains, that were getting progressively worse, was not the best situation to say the least…
PremmieMum 