(Please note I’m doing this as a back post since I’m so far behind due to being busy with a new baby)

At the time Jasper was measured he was 4395 grams, which we were told was 9 lb 1 oz. When finally writing this (3 months after Jasper’s birth) I decided to just double check the conversion. I know that the grams is correct as we have the photos of him on the scales. What a shock to find that in actual fact his birth weight was 9 lb 11 (eleven) oz, not 9 lb 1 oz as first told. I don’t know who read it wrong, but the entire time we had been telling people the wrong birth weight. The birth announcement was wrong (I only just updated this with the correct info for the blog when I made the post, however the initial post to facebook was incorrect), photobooks we have printed are now wrong. Pretty much everything we have done up until this moment has been with the incorrect weight.

Now of course this was a real shock. I thought 9 lb 1 oz was big enough, then all of a sudden I find out the truth… he was close to 10 lb! As a matter of fact he was bigger than his Daddy’s birth weight (who we always talk about as being a big baby!). All I can say is wow! I’ve gone from Addison who was 8 lb 3 oz, Preston at 8 lb 5 oz to now a massive 9 lb 11 oz!!! Golly gosh Jasper, you are one big boy!

Last Saturday October 5, 2014 I had contractions… what at the time I thought to be the beginning of labour. After having a few regular contractions we thought we better make the relevant phone calls to organise for the children to be looked after. Nanny and Poppy, Gran and Grandad were all called and they all started making their way to us. I also called the hospital as you do when contractions start to let them know that I might be coming in either that night or the next morning. At this point contractions were consistent and every 10 minutes… lasting a minute or so. They weren’t extremely uncomfortable, but they were there, that’s for sure. This went on for 4 hours (pretty much started while I was cooking dinner and then continued until midnight – about the time when everyone showed up and got settled in for the night). Thinking yep we would be having a baby in the morning, definitely be leaving for the hospital at about 4 or 5 am was my guess, I stayed out on the couch with Charles for the night giving up our beds to our guests and baby sitters.

Then this very annoying thing happened… they stopped! I had no idea what was going on, or why they had stopped but I had this sick feeling we weren’t going to be having this baby tonight. I felt terrible. I had called everyone expecting that we were going to meeting our new little man and now this… nothing! I felt like a big, fat, pregnant inconvenience to everyone. There was an odd contraction here and there during the early hours of Sunday morning, but then once more they stopped. I was so disappointed. I thought I would be having my baby and now I wasn’t. Jasper was still snug in my tummy.

I had an OB appointment during the week (not with MY OB though, mine was *cough* conveniently on holidays, so we saw his colleague). After an internal examination he discovered that Jasper wasn’t as far down as he would have thought (after my experience on the weekend with the “false labour”). If he would have been further down and engaged more then it would have been a simple matter of breaking my waters to get labour progressing… but nope, too soon for that. Already feeling like I had put everyone out by making them come when there was no baby I made the hard decision to be booked for labour to be induced on Saturday morning if nothing had happened before that time. This was something that I did with much hesitation. I had hated the experience of being induced for the birth of Preston. I felt like I missed out on so much going through that process. It wasn’t a spontaneous labour like I had experienced with Addison and loved. I knew the date my baby would arrive and the intensity of the labour I could expect, it all made me feel very disappointed with the outcome. After talking it over with both Mums (Nanny and Gran – our two appointed baby sitters while I would be in hospital) I made the decision to cancel the appointment with the hospital and just let nature take its course. I was by no means in any danger nor was the baby. I was only a couple of days over due and had plenty of time (if not patience) for this to progress naturally. I felt so much better once the appointment was cancelled and so thankful that everyone was being so understanding.

It was arranged that Gran would have to head back for the weekend to take care of some things at home and then come back for the following week. As timing would have it this meant she wasn’t around when Jasper finally decided to make his arrival. In the lead up to the weekend Charles and I, with the kids had been doing lots of walks (or waddles by this stage) hoping that it might move things along. Gran got herself all packed up to head back to Toowoomba. While she was helping to bath the kids on Friday night I mentioned to her about a little bit of liquid I’d had come out of me, saying that it might have been my “show”… but how there wasn’t any blood which was a little bit strange. She put the question to me, “it’s not your waters is it?” To this I replied “I don’t think so, there would have to be much more…wouldn’t there?” (we later discussed that she wasn’t of much use to me in this area after having never experience her waters breaking herself during labour…yet I had and still wasn’t sure!).

This bit of liquid continued to come out over the next few hours, so I thought it best to put a pad on. All night this kept up! After getting very suss about it all, I was laying in bed about ready to get up for the day when I got a feeling like there was going to be a lot more than just a little trickle. After a quick dash to the bathroom and saying to Charles, I think this is my waters breaking. A lot more had come but no where near as much as I remember when I had Addison (that was one big gush and boy did you know that it was happening – I was however already well into labour at that stage).

Not knowing what on earth was going on I thought I better call the hospital for some advice. After saying that I thought it might be my waters breaking they wanted me to come in. They told me to have breakfast, get ready and get the kids settled and head on in. So this is what I did. Just as I was getting breakfast started I got a contraction. What a relief! I think (maybe) I was finally in labour! Charles was starting to get a little concerned at how casual I was. “Shouldn’t we be getting a bit of a move on” he asked. I got everything together, he put our bags back in the car (remember we had already gone through this once, most of it was still out in the car from the first time we thought we were having the baby), said goodbye to the little people and off we went. Contractions continued.

On our arrival we were settled into our room and I was hooked up to a monitor to see how we were both travelling. Everything was fine. We had to then wait for the OB to come and check on us. (Remember we were supposed to be induced today, before the appointment was cancelled so our “stand in” OB was actually rostered on today). Once again an internal showed that things were not progressing! What the heck was this baby pulling!!! And once more, things started to die down again! Contractions slowed off. With my waters being partially broken (yep as I thought it wasn’t all of it) we were told to hop up and walk around a bit to see if that would help move things along. I also had to be prepared for some antibiotics in case of infection (once your waters break you are at risk of infection in the following 48hrs).

We asked if we could leave the birthing suite and walk around this hospital. This was fine, so we went down to the coffee shop. This really wasn’t what I expected when we set off for the hospital…to be sitting drinking a hot chocolate in the hospital café. OH yay! Contractions again. We waddled (I waddled, Charles walked) back to the birthing suite. We decided that we should go pay for our room upgrade and get that sorted out, just as we were leaving it was time to be given the antibiotics so the midwife told us don’t go anywhere just yet. After this was done, lunch arrived (well Charles’ lunch, my snack! they didn’t want me eating as they don’t like mum’s to have too much when in labour) so we didn’t end up going anywhere. Good thing too, contractions got strong and fast…game on! After another internal I had gone from 3cms to 8cms within a very short period of time! We were having this baby, and soon. But guess what.. brilliant news (not), there was still a pocket of waters above the babies head! The OB kindly didn’t break it there and then without any warning “he didn’t think this would be very nice” – no kidding! Up I hoped out of bed again and began to do whatever I could to get it to break. Swaying side to side, breathing through the contractions doing my very best to talk myself through the incredible pain I was now experiencing (did I mentioned I haven’t had any pain relief. I was determined to get through this as I had done when Addi was born and after a pathetic experience with an epidural not working properly during Preston’s labour, I wasn’t wasting my time with that again). Success, the rest of my waters broke.

I urgently said “I think I better get back up on the bed” knowing full well that this baby was very close. I was in a world of hurt but just kept trying to talk myself through it. I uttered to the midwife and Charles “keep me focused”. I knew if I let the pain take over I would lose it. I couldn’t let thoughts of “Can’t” enter my mind. They are not useful, I knew that from Addison’s birth. I lost it then and I didn’t want to do that again. With every contraction I gave it my all. I knew we were nearly there by that absolute burning, oh that burning (those that have had natural labours will know what I’m talking about, it’s probably the worst feeling in the world))…yep, the head. 3:13pm Followed up closely by that very odd feeling of shoulders and body and limbs coming out of you. Then that feeling of absolute relief and overwhelming joy, followed by that love that you can’t put into words as words just aren’t enough. That proud feeling, a sense of accomplishment. This little person you now hold that was minutes ago inside your body. You now get to see the person, the tiny human you have been growing and carrying in your tummy for 9 months. All the trips to the bathroom, the back pain, the swelling, the exhaustion all just fades away into a distant memory as you look into the eyes of this little person you have made. There could be nothing more perfect in the world.

They put our boy up on my chest and we could promptly see that he was very blue in colour. When he was born he had the cord loosely around his neck, it wasn’t for long but still enough to cause him to not be the pinky colour you expect of a newborn. This of course had us very worried.

The midwife monitored him as he laid on my chest and after a little time had passed and his colour wasn’t getting any better she decided to take him and make sure everything was OK. He had flared nostrils as well which basically means that he was having to use increased effort to breath. They gave him oxygen and then decided to take him to special care to get him back to normal. Charles went with him as Dr Bopp stitched me up.

We were settled into our birthing suite quite promptly. Our midwife’s name was Melissa, so I think that it was meant to be. She hooked me up to the monitor to see how Squiggle was and to check how I was travelling while we waited for Dr Bopp to come by and get the process started. Charles and I actually recorded Squiggle’s heartbeat on his phone while I was on the monitor. I had read only days earlier about a woman that had done this and got the sound put into a Build a Bear which I thought was a fantastic idea! Once things settle down after the birth I will go into the shop and do the same as a wonderful keepsake from the labour.

Soon they bought in food for Charles and a yogurt, jelly and apple juice for me (the only things I was allowed to have just in case I had to go into theatre). Of course Charles thought this was a hoot and decided to take a photo of our meals to compare them. He also thought it was so funny that when Melissa was trying to put my ID tag on my ankle that it would only fit on my left leg as my right was so swollen, this apparently also warranted having a photo taken! I had a baby brain moment when I was trying to sign my paperwork…I couldn’t remember how to do my signature!!! Goodness knows what name I actually signed but it was not my signature.

Dr Bopp came in to see us sometime after 7 am and looked to see how our stats were. He asked me if I had been feeling anything this morning as the monitor was showing that I had been having some very mild contractions. He said that if we didn’t do the induction today that he thought I would most likely have gone into labour very soon regardless. After last night I thought exactly the same thing!

It was time to start! Dr Bopp did all his checks and then put the gel on to hopefully get labour started. He did warn us that it doesn’t always work first time and some people take more than one application to get things kicked off. Apparently this wasn’t me! Charles and I went over onto the lounge in the birthing suite and sat watching some tv. It wasn’t long and I started to feel contractions. They came strong, hard and fast! What a shock to the system. This was totally different to going into labour naturally. A natural labour slowly progresses and contractions gradually build up getting stronger and closer together. This induced labour for me was very fast, with barely a break between some of the contractions making it very exhausting. I was however managing the pain quite well and my breathing was very good, pushing through the pain of each contraction really well.

I’m not sure of the time frame now, as it all seemed a blur. Eventually Dr Bopp came back in to check on us and see how I was going. Things were moving very fast and Melissa had said “I think we’ll have a baby by lunch time!!” So it was when Dr Bopp checked my cervix (an extremely painful experience that required gas for me to relax enough for him to do it) that I was disappointed to hear I was only 3-4 cms dilated.

It was at this point that I said I think I’m going to need some pain relief knowing that I could be here a little while with these intense contractions. Charles suggested the gas, but after that little taste of it there was no way I was doing that, it made me so funny in the head (this also made me realise that I had not used it properly when I was in labour with Addison the couple of times that I tried). I talked to him and said I think I’m going to have to have the epidural. It was never something I wanted to do but at the time I knew I really needed a break if I was going to be able to push this baby out. This really worried Charles and he kept asking me to make sure I was 100% certain as he knew I was doing really well with my breathing. It wasn’t so much the pain as it was that I knew I would be 100% had it when it came to the pushing stage of labour if I didn’t have a bit of a rest from it all. I also thought about something my friend had said to me along the lines of just do what you have to to get through the pain and if this means pain relief then don’t feel bad for having it.

I promptly requested the epidural (as I knew that it could take some time to get the pain relief). I was in luck, I asked only minutes before another labouring woman in the suite next to me. The anesthetist came in and explained all the finer details of what I had to do and things went perfectly. I was hooked up to everything now and stuck in bed for the rest of my labour. Not long after having the epidural I felt some liquid coming from my body. The midwife checked but said there was nothing to worry about. More came and a little later when Melissa said that she would check my cervix to see how far dilated I was she said that she would also break my waters. When she checked she realised that my waters had broken naturally (the wet feeling I had felt earlier). Once again, a totally different feeling to last time because of the epidural. I was so relieved as I was terrified of them having to break my waters with the needle!!

The epidural had worked quite well but after a little bit I started to feel some pain again. Just as they were considering a top up I let my OB and midwife know that I felt like I was needing to push. (Unfortunately I have no idea on the timing of things, I was not aware of what time it was at all during labour – I actually had to ask what the time was when he was finally born). Things got very intense and very painful once again. In hindsight I really don’t know if the epidural was worth it but I suppose it served it’s purpose. I got the break I needed to have the energy to push out our baby boy.

We got up and at em at 5.30 am and gathered all of our things into the car. I didn’t have breakfast as I thought they might want me to have not eaten (which was correct, just in case I needed an emergency c section). I called the hospital’s maternity ward (which was suggested by Dr Bopp) just to make sure there was a birthing suite for us when we arrived. You just never know when 5 pregnant women are going to show up at the hospital at the same time! Once I finally got through they said to come on in and they would check me in.

It was quite funny, when we were about to leave and say goodbye to Addi he was getting all upset thinking he was coming with us and he didn’t want to. He wanted to stay and play with Nanny!!! So we dragged a hug and kiss out of him and headed off.