Sarah's motherhood story – The day you arrived

Dear Daughter,

Often you ask me to tell me about the day you were born, I tell you that one day you kicked so hard in my stomach and yelled “let me out, I want to meet my Mummy”! That’s not quite what happened though.

You were a stubborn little girl even before you were born and you didn’t seem to get the vacate notice on your due date. Each day that passed I became more and more impatient, you were a rather large baby and I was starting to get extremely uncomfortable carrying you around, I wanted you to hurry up and get out so that I could hold you in my arms.

I tried everything that I possibly could do to bring on labour. I Googled every possible old wives tale – from eating spicy food and pineapple, bouncing on a fit ball, walking up and down stairs, acupuncture and drinking raspberry leaf tea. I don’t know whether any of these actually worked, I don’t even really know when I went into labour.

I felt funny for a few days, thinking each day that this was the day, but it never was. I don’t know that I even slept in the last week and finally one morning after another sleepless night I decided that I was definitely in labour! I already had an appointment at the hospital for 9am to talk about being induced, so I went in for the appointment and they confirmed that yes I was in labour and I was 2cm dilated. They told me that I should go home and come back when the labour had progressed further.

So we rang Mummy’s friend Laura who was to be my support person at your birth and she met us at the hospital before we headed back home. I was excited to finally be in labour but also extremely nervous, I had no idea what I was in store for. It wasn’t an ironman race that I had trained for. All I knew was that no matter what, you'd make your way out!

To be honest I was far more scared about what happened after the birth than the birth itself, I mean after all, there is no manual for motherhood. Upon arriving home, I started to feel very sick and luckily Laura was there as your dad had decided this was the perfect time for him to cook himself a steak sandwich for lunch. After vomiting and feeling in a lot of pain we decided to go back to the hospital. Thankfully it was not far from home as by now the contractions were very painful.

Back at the hospital and there was no birthing suite for me, I was stuck in the assessment area, hooked up to a monitor that was showing that my contractions were tiny. I spent my time convincing the midwife that the contractions were indeed a lot more severe than what the monitor was showing. I was in a lot of pain and figured that if I still had hours more to go of this, that I was definitely going to ask for drugs. Who was I kidding? There is a reason they have the drugs so I wasn’t going to remain stubborn and refuse them. I had nothing to prove to anyone!

Finally a midwife came scurrying past telling another midwife to hurry up and get me a birthing suite. As I got whisked off to a room I asked for drugs, meanwhile the midwives start undressing me and examining me, announcing that I don’t need drugs as I am about to have a baby, I’m already 9cm dilated!

A few minutes later and my waters broke, the midwives were absolutely amazing and I was so lucky to have Laura there supporting me also. I remember telling the midwives over and over again that I couldn’t do it and they just kept telling me that I could and that I already was. They also told me that I was about to feel a pain like nothing I had ever felt and they weren’t bloody wrong about that!

Soon after, you were born, all 3.88kg of you and with a head of dark brown hair. You were a cheeky little bugger as you had your hand on your face as you came out, so whilst I had no tearing I did have some slight lacerations. I remember as you came out, the midwives saying that they weren’t quite expecting a baby that big to come out. I cried, you cried, I couldn’t believe you were finally here.

After you were born, I completely forgot that I still had to deliver the placenta, but I figured that would be the easy part after giving birth to you naturally. But I was wrong! Of course I had to have a stubborn placenta that was attached in 2 places and wasn’t making any kind of exit. There was talk about having to send me to theatre, which was the last thing I wanted after a drug free birth. So a doctor was called in and she said she could try to manually extract it, the pain of birth was nothing compared to having a doctor put their hand inside me to try to pull out the placenta, but she managed to extract it and saved me a trip to theatre.

I felt so lucky to have had such a positive birth experience, I told myself that my pregnancy was horrible so I deserved a good birth. I went into birth not knowing what to expect, thinking about worst case scenarios, I had a rough plan of how I hoped my labour would go but like an ironman, I was prepared for different conditions and to adapt my plan on the day.

In the end there was no time for any of my plan, I didn’t even have my bag with me! All of the things I had packed, the stress balls, carefully selected music on the iPod, the food, the Gatorade and the camera, never even made it to the birthing suite. But I truly could not have asked for a more positive experience, I hear so many woman sharing horror stories of their labours and births, so I feel blessed to have bought you into this world in such a beautiful way.

ABOUT SARAH

I'm a boring Accountant, former triathlete before becoming a Mumma. I love leading a fit and healthy lifestyle though do have a weakness for ice-cream. Last year I trained for and completed in my first body sculpting comp.

Hood: Bentleigh East

Children: 1

Motherhood in 5 words: Rewarding – Exhausting – Fun – Messy – Fulfilling.

Fav family friendly place: GESAC swimming pool

Coffee order: Almond milk latte

Blog: Bikes, Baking, Baby and Body Building

instagram.com/bikes_baking_baby_bodybuilding

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