This pregnancy and birth story is one that is VERY special to me. Let me introduce you to Anna, my best friend and soul sister. I've been trying to find the right words to describe her but I can't narrow it down. She's fierce, She's strong and she is an INCREDIBLE mama.
We've been through pregnancy TWICE together, we've learnt together and we love each other's children almost as much as we love our own.
So here it is... Anna's story, in her own beautiful words.
Tom and I fell pregnant in November 2020 just 9 months after I had our first-born Zephyr. We always knew we wanted our kids to be close together but never thought when we started trying again that we would be lucky enough to fall pregnant first go.
My pregnancy this time around was quite different to my first. I was much more tired, sore and uncomfortable. not to mention I was running around after a 1 year old. None the less we were over the moon and so, so excited to give Zephyr a little sibling.
As much as we wanted to, we decided once again not to find out the gender of this baby as the surprise at the end is far greater than any other surprise on Earth! (We were both admit the baby was a boy anyway).
At my 28-week Glucose Test (if you know you know), I found out I had developed gestational diabetes. Initially I was upset and shocked and very uneducated on the whole matt
er. I had multiple appointments within those next few days with dieticians -
1. To come up with an eating plan to keep my levels stable
2. To learn what my readings meant and to use my prick machine
3. To educate myself on what this meant for the rest of my pregnancy, birth and 6 weeks postpartum.
I walked out of these appointments feeling informed and confident for the remainder of my pregnancy.
Come my 38-week appointment my doctor began to talk to me about early induction due to my gestational diabetes (there are some risk factors with gestation diabetes where they do recommend early induction). By this point I was feeling exhausted, sore and pretty much worse than I did when I was at 41 weeks with Zephyr. We decided the following Friday I would be induced but, in the meantime, I would have a stretch and sweep every second day in hopes that would get things going naturally.
Thursday arrived and I had only dilated 1cm (I was super disappointed as the stretch and sweeps put me into labour last time with Zephyr). My doctor and midwife both agreed that staying overnight and having the tape inserted would be my best option to get me to start dilating so that they could break my waters.
That night I had slight discomfort but all in all I had a good night’s sleep ready for ‘game day’ as my Husband calls it.
Friday morning at 6am they walked me into my Birth Suit. The sun was just rising over the river with a big beautiful pink sky. My midwife checked me and I was dilated enough for the doctor to be able to break my waters and that’s where it all began!
My contractions started straight away and were pretty regular, which both doctor and midwife were happy with.
The next few hours were pretty chill, I had the curtains open and I bounced on a ball looking out over the river. I was getting in the zone and prepping myself for a massive day (Zephyr was a 33-hour labour so I was sure I was in for a long day and a half).
Come mid-day the contractions amped right up. I had hired a tens machine so that’s when that came out and my god it helped! It subsided the back pain I was having by quite a bit, but, it also kept my mind busy when adjusting the levels and settings etc.
Around 1.30pm I asked for the epidural, I knew if I waited any longer I wouldn’t be able to sit still for the anaesthetist. My midwife examined me and confirmed that I was now 5cm dilated and the anaesthetist was 30 minutes away.
I had a couple of big contractions while I was on the bed after being examined and all I wanted to do was get back on the ball and bounce while I waited for the epidural. After about 20 minutes, I rolled to the side of the bed to stand up and had a lot of pressure - to the point I said ‘I need to push’.
Both midwifes checked me and sure enough... the baby’s head was right there, and I was ready to push.
The next few minutes were VERY intense, the anaesthetist walked in early but I heard a midwife say ‘it’s too late, we don’t need you now, my heart dropped and I could not believe I was about to birth a baby completely drug free. After a few very big pushes our beautiful girl was born sunny side up straight into the arms of mine and my Husbands at 2.07pm.
The next few hours I was monitored in the birth suit because after the birth of my first born I had a massive PPH (post-partum haemorrhage). We had a full plan in place if this were to happen again, but luckily, I didn’t experience much bleeding at all this time around.
Tom and I were in complete ore and spent the next few hours wrapping our heads around that we had a baby girl (we were so, so sure she was a boy!).
The next morning, we were discharged and we headed home to introduce our beautiful Rosie to her big brother Zephyr and my god that will be one of my most treasured moments EVER.
What a story! Thank you so much for sharing with us Anna. I'm so proud of you. You took it all in your stride and absolutely nailed it. Here's to hoping we "plan" our third babes better so I can actually photograph one of your births haha!
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