When lani met blair
A mama who trusted her gut, leading her to a positive induction experience and the safe arrival of her daughter.
Lani tells her birth story in her own words…
It all kicked off in the 18th of January at about 6pm.
Contractions had started and were about 9 minutes apart, they were not intense at all. I could breathe through them quite easily so I was a little bit unsure if it was the real deal or not but because they were about 9 minutes apart I believed it was.
By about 10pm they were still 9 minutes apart but seemed to be getting stronger. I jumped in the shower to try and help the back pain and I had a feeling something was wrong. It was a gut feeling that came out of nowhere, I decided after about half and hour to give my midwife a call as I had reduced movement and she had advised me to come in and get observed.
We jumped in the car with our bags with such an uncertainty on what was going to happen. I was so worried about the reduced movement as she was such an active little princess.
Once we got to the hospital we looked for a heartbeat and we found it with ease which was very reassuring that she was okay. It was a little bit elevated but we claimed it as I was dehydrated.
We checked if my waters had broken and the test came back negative so we were sent on our way.
As we were about to leave the midwife came in and decided to do a bedside ultrasound to check her position and fluid levels etc.
That’s when we were told she had low fluid around her which was causing the reduced movement. We were also told that her tummy was measuring a bit smaller than the rest of her body.
So we made a plan with the doctor to get induced the next morning. It wasn’t urgent and didn’t need to happen then and there so we made a plan to go home and get some rest. By then my contractions had slowed down so I was luckily able to go home and get a good night sleep!
Part Two
On the 19th of January we got a phone call and we’re told it had to be moved to the 20th as they were quite understaffed. They reassured me it was okay to wait another day and If I had any more reduced movement to go back up to the hospital.
On the morning of the 20th we got a call saying they had a bed for me and to come up at 9am. So off we went, bags packed in the car again!
We were taken straight to the birthing suite where I was changed into my nightie and then it all happened.
Because I was already 2cm dilated they decided to break my waters. My waters were broken at 9:40am and we then decided to put me on the hormone drip which caused instant contractions. The midwives told me to expect a 12 hour average labour so that’s what we were expecting.
The contractions were about 3 minutes apart as soon as the drip went in, they were so intense and so frequent that I wasn’t coping too well.
After about an hour Blair’s heart rate had dropped a little bit and we weren’t too sure if it was just the monitor or if she wasn’t coping so we decided to attach a heart rate monitor to her head which showed a much more reliable heart rate that the midwives were happy with. I had the plan to jump in the bath but due to the monitor I was unable to do that so I jumped in the shower.
By 12pm I was not coping, the shower was quite comforting but because the contractions were so close together I couldn’t catch a breath. I decided to try the gas and absolutely hated it, I couldn’t stand it and because I was spewing from about half an hour after the hormone drip was administered the gas just really wasn’t for me.
I had the idea in my head that I was going to be in labour a long time so I decided to get the epidural.
The anaesthetist had come down to place the epidural and it worked for a maximum of 10 minutes before the lines became kinked. The anaesthetist had come back down to check and flush it to see if it was all inserted properly and it was so it started working again and about 3 minutes after it started working again the machine had a fault and stopped.
By this point I was screaming and crying in pain and Blair’s heart rate was going up and down and the midwife said “hm that’s strange, they usually do that when they’re ready to come”.
So at about 1:20pm we decided to do a cervical check to see how far dilated I was, her exact words whilst I was being checked was “you’re about to have a baby”
Once she saw I was 10cm dilated she gave me the opportunity to wait an hour before pushing to help her head come further down but because the epidural wasn’t working I told her I wanted to push now as I couldn’t do it for much longer.
So I pushed for 30 minutes and at 1:51pm our little princess made her way into this world.
I had the most amazing labour even with those small hiccups along the way and after she was out the epidural started working and doing it’s job 🥱
The midwives I had were absolutely AMAZING and I would absolutely recommend anyone expecting or planning to have a little bubba to try and get into the birthing centre as from day dot they were so supportive and just did their absolute all for me and our princess. 🤍😇
What do you wish you knew before birth?
I was very informed before giving birth but the one thing I wish I knew before giving birth is that for me it wasn’t as daunting as I thought it was. Obviously so much can go wrong but the staff are so well trained. I wish I had relaxed a lot more before going in to give birth because I was so so nervous and it took away a lot of the excitement for us.
If you could, would you do anything differently?
Absolutely nothing, my labour was perfect.
What did your partner do that really helped during labour/birth?
Before going into labour me and my partner had a chat about what I wanted my birth to look like: what helped me relax, what I wanted him to try to help me. I really didn’t want him in there constantly asking me what I needed. I wanted him to be able to just try everything and that’s exact What he did. He gave me water, he put my favourite music on, he rubbed my back and massaged my pressure points.
What advice/honest truth would give a mama-to-be about birth?
You’re in control, you tell the doctors what YOU want. Have your partner advocate for you, have them know exactly what you want so if you are out of it or in to much pain to tell them what you want, they do the talking. It is ALL worth it 🫶🏻