Trial by fire: My birth story
By: Juliette Ryan
Tags: Mothers, Motherhood, Baby, Birth, Birthstory

Giving nature a kickstart

“Induction” can include a few different medical interventions, some of which first help to get the cervix into a state ready for labour, and then others which help the labour itself along.

Some women whose due dates have come and gone find they have a ripe and ready-to-rock-and-roll cervix at the point of induction, and they jump right to the labour intervention. This involves the injection of a synthetic form of oxytocin, the hormone that causes the uterus to contract and slowly push the baby out. But other women arrive at the hospital for their induction with a cervix still as green as a crunchy pineapple.

I was one of those latter women. I needed all of the interventions.

To get my body birth-ready, the doctors first needed to ripen, soften and bring forward my cervix (which at this point, was still high as a kite). To do this, they insert a strip of tape behind the cervix, which is designed to slowly release prostaglandins, the hormone responsible for turning my green pineapple of a cervix into a sunset of orange and yellow. (This is the hormone that is also found in semen, hence the “have a lot of sex” old wives’ tale, which I still maintain was propagated by blue-balled husbands to squeeze a last bit of nookie out of their pregnant wives!)

Induction technique (Image credit: Babygaga)

Unfortunately, upon examination, my cervix was still so high that not even the midwives could reach it! They had to call in the cavalry.

So in walked a serious looking doctor (white coat and all) who hoisted my legs up in stirrups and went digging with a speculum. Once the tape was tucked in nice and snug, I was taken to my bed in the maternity ward where I was to wait out the night and see what happened.

Nobody (medical professionals included) quite knows how a woman’s body will react to “the tape.” Some get over-stimulated and need to have the tape removed within a couple of hours, and others require another round of the tape after 24 hours and a still-green pineapple. I had done my reading and wondered where on the spectrum I would fall.

After bidding goodbye to my husband at 8pm (end of visiting hours), I lay back on the tough hospital mattress and tried to visualise my cervix opening like a blooming lily. (This is a very real recommendation you will find on The Internet, and some women swear by it. Of course, these women could have coincidentally used such a visualisation technique the night before they went into spontaneous labour and then made such an association, but I was a desperate and very pregnant woman who did not want to spend another 48 hours waiting for a baby that seemed determined to stay put. So bloom away, little cervix.)

Every couple of hours, a new midwife would come in and check on me, always asking the same question, “Any twinges yet?”

I would sadly reply with “No,” feeling more and more like a failure with each inflection.

And then, at about 3am, I was awoken by what felt like mild period cramps. Were these the twinges they were asking me about? I lay there waiting for the next “twinge” and noticed that each one was coming on stronger, and becoming more painful. They couldn’t be full-blown contractions, could they? I pulled out my phone and quickly downloaded a contraction-counter app and started timing them, while shooting my husband a brief message to say that something was happening, but I wasn’t sure what.

Using the app, I deduced that the “contractions” were coming every three minutes and lasting for about a minute. And they were getting so painful I could barely stay coherent enough to press the “contraction started” button when a new one arrived. When the app thrust the message “Time to go to the hospital!” in my face, I buzzed for the midwife.

Contraction counter (Image credit: AppGrooves)

She strolled in and I breathlessly apprised her of the situation in less than three minutes before the next cramp/twinge/contraction hit.

“They can’t be contractions. They’re just tightenings. This is normal,” she said. “I’ll come back and check on you in an hour. Hang in there.”

At this point, I was convinced that these words were all synonyms for the same thing which meant imminent pushing and baby delivery! Rather than leaving me alone in bed in the maternity ward, I thought they should be rushing me to the birth suites, toot suite.

Now, there is something you should know about me. I’m a people pleaser, and am polite often to the point of my own detriment. And so, I started to begrudgingly say to the midwife, “Ok, I’ll see you in an hour.”

But then, as a new wave began to build, I realised that then and there, in that very moment, the little acrobat in my belly had only one advocate, and it would do her no good if that advocate was a spineless pushover. What if there was something actually wrong, and I let politeness trump the safety of my baby?

So instead, I said, “Look lady, I have a high pain threshold. I am sure these are full-blown contractions. I need to go over to the birth suites, ok?” (I still can’t quite remember whether I added the “lady” in there, but I like to think that I did.)

I didn’t realise it at the time, but that was my first act as a mother — to go against my heavily ingrained nature for the sake of my daughter’s health and safety.

Fortunately, the midwife accepted my plea and five minutes later we were walking the obscenely lit corridors of the hospital together, headed directly for the birth suites. Every three minutes, I had to pause and grasp the handrail as a new wave of ever-heightening pain washed over my entire body. My legs would tremble and I would see spots. (“Tightenings,” my arse.)

When we arrived, the midwife deposited me in an examination room and bid me goodbye. It was 4am, I was all alone in the room, and there were 45 seconds until the next wave. I was terrified. Surely, my cervix had magically descended and bloomed like a spring lily. Surely, I was minutes away from giving birth. Surely!

When a new crone-faced midwife strolled in, I was in the middle of another contraction, vomiting into a bag I found next to the examination table. She instructed me to lay back and spread my legs while she examined me, instructions that barely registered in my consciousness through the pain. As the wave receded, she uttered five all-too-familiar words that completely and utterly shattered me.

“I can’t reach the cervix.”

The birthing process is a delicate balance of multiple natural systems working together in a perfectly choreographed dance. The cervix gracefully descends and blossoms as the uterus begins contracting in a building crescendo that culminates in a symphony of sounds that are the mother’s groans giving way to baby’s cries.

It seemed that my earlier medical intervention had thrown a giant grenade into this graceful dance, and things were in complete disorder. My uterus was attempting to push my baby out through an opening that was still well and truly shut!

With very little sensitivity, the midwife informed me that “luckily for me,” most birthing suite rooms were currently empty, which meant I could hole up in one of those rather than be sent back to the maternity ward. With 30 seconds until the next wave, being sent back to maternity seemed tantamount to a death sentence. My whole body had begun shaking even between contractions now, and I felt on the verge of passing out.

Now, I had been to the birthing classes. I knew the different levels of pain management that were on offer during labour, all of which try and disrupt or muffle the pain signals in some way before they reach the brain. At the mild end are shots of water and/or electrical impulses in the lower back followed closely by happy gas. As you move towards the other end of the spectrum, shots of water are replaced by infusions of morphine. And instead of water injections in the back, a single injection into the cervical column delivers local anaesthetic to the space around the spinal nerves, effectively paralysing you from the waist down. (What a way to disrupt the signal!) This is known as an epidural.

Epidural (Image credit: BabyCenter)

When we were informed of these pain management options during our birthing classes, to my everlasting shame, I had internally scoffed at all the women in the world who had opted to have an epidural. How bad could the pain be that they wanted to unnaturally deliver their babies in an (albeit temporarily) paraplegic state?

My naive pregnant self had gone to bed every night after 37 weeks, visualising a serene labour in a candle-lit room infused with the scent of lavender while classical music drifted softly around me. My husband would be there, rubbing my back while I calmly meditated through each contraction. Finally, I would “breathe” my baby out, like some zen goddess adorned with a crown of daisies.

My arrogant expectation of the birthing process was so different from the reality that I may as well have visualised my baby being delivered to me on the back of angel wings.

I say all this to put into perspective the magnitude of the next moment.

As the stern midwife bluntly instructed me to follow her to the next room, the pain reached a point where me and my 0cm dilated cervix gasped to her, “I need an epidural!”

I’ll never forget the look on her face. Her expression was one of incredulous disdain as she dryly asked, “Are you serious?”

I felt about the size of an ant. Not only had I fallen well below my own expectations, but the arguably experienced midwife in front of me also thought I was woefully weak. I felt like I had completely failed the test before it had even started.