Jordan's birth story
3.8.07
On the 17th July, as per normal I went to teach swimming for 2 hours & have a quick swim myself in the late afternoon. After that the husband and I met up to go home together, as the bus was very crowded at that time, we decided to take a slow romantic walk home. Before we met up I was already feeling some tightness of the tummy (braxton hicks), and they seemed to intensify and last for as long as we were walking. However they also seemed to go away as soon as I had a chance to sit down and relax so I didn't think too much about it after that. Everything went on as per normal, I even went all the way to the airport on the MRT to pick up a guest with my mum and came home to bed around 1-2am where I slept soundly till around 5+am when Zoe decided to jump up on me because she wanted to be let out of the room. That got me awake and I felt that my shorts were very wet, so I went to the toilet to check and while passing urine there was a small gush of liquid that was NOT urine and I thought, crap isn't the water bag rupturing supposed to happen to only about 12% of pregnant women. I went back to bed, woke the husband up & after about an hour he finally persuaded me to page for Dr Lai, all this while I only had mild contractions. Dr Lai and I had previously spoken about his policy on the water bag breaking and he said as long as I was not infected or in severe discomfort he was fine with waiting and letting things progress naturally. This was what he said once again when we spoke after he was paged, he didn't even arrange for me to go down to the clinic for a check.
I already wrote about what happened on the 18th July in this entry so now I will continue with what happened after I went to the hospital around 6+am on Thursday 19th July. Upon arrival at Mt Alvernia in a taxi, we made our way to the delivery suites on the 3rd floor via the ER entrance and was assigned to room 9. There they did a CTG and vaginal examination on me, the CTG was fine but I was still only 2cm dilated as at Dr Lai's the day before. We were then left alone in the room and I was allowed to remain ambulatory so I was the only expectant mother in the delivery suites who was walking around for the 6 hours before I wasinduced my labor was augmented with intravenous oxytocin around noon. I even accompanied the husband down to the cafeteria for his breakfast and we also had lunch together there later. Just as we were coming back from lunch, the nurse who was to administer the drip couldn't find me in the room and had the hospital page for me. It was really funny to hear them calling me Mdm Lee over the intercom system.
However once they started the drip, I was not allowed to move anymore and had to be strapped down to continuous CTG monitoring. I couldn't even go to the toilet to pass urine but had to use a bed pan. This is the part where I progressed from still being 2cm dilated to 10 and wanting to poo the biggest motion of my life in 6 hours! The first 2-3 hours on the oxytocin (active labour) were still bearable but the next 2-3 hours (transition) before I pushed were the worst hours of my life! There was even a point towards the end where the nurse had to tell me to breath instead of gasping. Sometime during the end of active labour, I asked for the pethidine injection to be administered as the entonox gas was not enough anymore. During transition, I was moaning in pain and the husband said I sounded like a ghost, there wasn't anytime to rest at all. When I was 8-9cm dilated the nurse told me not to push so that I wouldn't swell and at 10 cm I couldn't push because Dr Lai had not arrived!!!! He was supposed to arrive at 5pm but he didn't arrive till 5.15pm and the nurse was getting ready to deliver baby herself!
Finally, after all the past 5+ hours came the painless part of pushing, it was very strenuous and tiring but a relief compared to the intense pain of transition. Jordan arrived at 5.53pm after actively pushing for 38 minutes, weighing 2.6kg and measuring 47cm long. They had to administer narcan on Jordan to reverse the effects of the pethidine injection I was given earlier. As he was very cold after delivery, they did not give him to me immediately but took him away to be warmed up in the incubator. I am very lucky not to have any problems with latching on even though we didn't get to establish breastfeeding right from the start but only several hours later when they brought him in to my room after 8.30pm.
Jordan has always been an excellent nurser and even now that I've had to stop breastfeeding him for the past few days since Tuesday afternoon because the pedac wants to confirm breast milk jaundice and rule out liver function issues but I nursed him for awhile yesterday afternoon, he had no problems latching on. So that's more or less my birth story and it certainly is a memorable one for us. Next time, I wonder if I can do without the pethidine!
I already wrote about what happened on the 18th July in this entry so now I will continue with what happened after I went to the hospital around 6+am on Thursday 19th July. Upon arrival at Mt Alvernia in a taxi, we made our way to the delivery suites on the 3rd floor via the ER entrance and was assigned to room 9. There they did a CTG and vaginal examination on me, the CTG was fine but I was still only 2cm dilated as at Dr Lai's the day before. We were then left alone in the room and I was allowed to remain ambulatory so I was the only expectant mother in the delivery suites who was walking around for the 6 hours before I was
However once they started the drip, I was not allowed to move anymore and had to be strapped down to continuous CTG monitoring. I couldn't even go to the toilet to pass urine but had to use a bed pan. This is the part where I progressed from still being 2cm dilated to 10 and wanting to poo the biggest motion of my life in 6 hours! The first 2-3 hours on the oxytocin (active labour) were still bearable but the next 2-3 hours (transition) before I pushed were the worst hours of my life! There was even a point towards the end where the nurse had to tell me to breath instead of gasping. Sometime during the end of active labour, I asked for the pethidine injection to be administered as the entonox gas was not enough anymore. During transition, I was moaning in pain and the husband said I sounded like a ghost, there wasn't anytime to rest at all. When I was 8-9cm dilated the nurse told me not to push so that I wouldn't swell and at 10 cm I couldn't push because Dr Lai had not arrived!!!! He was supposed to arrive at 5pm but he didn't arrive till 5.15pm and the nurse was getting ready to deliver baby herself!
Finally, after all the past 5+ hours came the painless part of pushing, it was very strenuous and tiring but a relief compared to the intense pain of transition. Jordan arrived at 5.53pm after actively pushing for 38 minutes, weighing 2.6kg and measuring 47cm long. They had to administer narcan on Jordan to reverse the effects of the pethidine injection I was given earlier. As he was very cold after delivery, they did not give him to me immediately but took him away to be warmed up in the incubator. I am very lucky not to have any problems with latching on even though we didn't get to establish breastfeeding right from the start but only several hours later when they brought him in to my room after 8.30pm.
Jordan has always been an excellent nurser and even now that I've had to stop breastfeeding him for the past few days since Tuesday afternoon because the pedac wants to confirm breast milk jaundice and rule out liver function issues but I nursed him for awhile yesterday afternoon, he had no problems latching on. So that's more or less my birth story and it certainly is a memorable one for us. Next time, I wonder if I can do without the pethidine!
posted by Sandra at 4:27 PM, | 
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wow you are one brave woman; wanting to do without even the pethidine! I'm going to ask for an epidural the minute I am allowed to take it!!
Dot, I was surprised I was actually able to go without the epi. I had prepared myself mentally in pregnancy by reading up on natural birthing and psyching myself during the early stages of labour. I think regular exercise & a sensible diet during my pregnancy helped too! :)
just read your birth story, and man...you are one strong woman to be able to go thru natural birth without epidural :) congrats and well done!! ready for your no. 2?? hehe :p
Thanks Jin =] hehe I'm ready for #2, but definitely not so soon, would like to enjoy Jordan first and let my body recuperate properly.
your story is really vivid - i can actually visualize what you were going through, though i don't think i can really feel the labour pains, not sure if i could ever go through what you did. hats off to you!!! keep this for little jordan to read so when he grows up and tries to be rebellious, remind him about the pain he put you through =D
Thanks Zyen. Hahah, if my son takes after me he'll prolly just tell me off for not using an epidural and suffering thru the pain needlessly. (So hope he takes after his more docile father)