When Ellen Met Harry

Ellen had four hours of active labour and 20 minutes of pushing to welcome her first born, Harry into the world, and a lot happened in that time.

Harry’s heart rate dropped dangerously low while Ellen was pushing and she was told she needed an emergency cesarean.

But Harry had a mind of his own. Cue vacuum, episiotomy and forceps.

Ellen tells her birth story in her own words…

We found out we were pregnant in June 2020, following a miscarriage. Despite feeling so excited, we couldn’t help but have that awful looming feeling of anxiety the whole pregnancy, waiting to hit all of those milestones. I am very lucky that most of the pregnancy was smooth sailing.

Luke and I had organised to move house on 13 February 2021, a few weeks before Harry was due. (PSA, do not recommend moving house while 9 months pregnant). We had been in our new house for a week. I was quite tired and had been experiencing braxton hicks over night, so spent most of the morning in bed. I hadn’t really felt much movement that morning but didn’t think much of it as he was mostly active in the afternoons and at night.

My mum always told me ‘you’ll know when you are in labour’ ha…. 12:57pm on Sunday 21 February, I had my first contraction, and boy, I knew straight away that I was in labour. I was sort of in disbelief. The first thing I did was call my mum and told her. She was super annoyed because she was down the coast on a girls weekend (how dare Harry decide to come early).

I waddled outside to Luke and told him I had my first contraction. I think he thought I was joking because he continued mowing the lawn. I decided to have a shower, wash my hair, tint my eyes, you know, the important things when you are about to have a baby. I decided to call the hospital because I still hadn’t felt Harry move much. They asked me to come in for monitoring. We parked on the road and I thought ‘why not just walk instead of accepting the offer of getting dropped at the front’.

I was immediately put into a room for observation. In less than hour of being there, my waters broke. I was in a bit of disbelief, is this really happening? I was told to go home and wait until my contractions were closer together.

Within a few minutes of that advice, the contractions were happening back to back, no break in between. I was put into a birthing suite and immediately started using the gas which did absolutely nothing for me. No matter what I did, I could not get comfortable. I tried the shower, bouncing on a ball, different positions and no matter what I did nothing was helping. I was practically begging for an epidural at this point.

The midwife checked and I had dilated 6cm’s in 30 minutes. I found it really hard to get myself into a positive mind set, the pain was horrible and to make it worse I was told it was too late for an epidural. At this point I was fully dilated and the urge to push was so intense.

As I started to push, Harry became very distressed. His heart rate had dropped dangerously low and was not improving. The midwives made a decision to push the button that every woman in labour dreads.

Before I knew it, there was a flock of doctors, nurses and midwives in my room. I was told I needed an emergency caesarean as Harry’s life was in danger. I still had an overwhelming feeling to push, the midwives asked me to stop pushing but I wasn’t able to control it, Harry had a mind of his own.

I was told in order to get Harry out safely, I needed to have an episiotomy and he needed to be delivered by a vacuum. Unfortunately this didn’t work, meaning they had to intervene with forceps.

Within a matter of minutes Harry was out and on my chest. It was the most surreal feeling of my entire life. Harry was born at 9:07pm after four hours of active labour and 20 minutes of pushing.

What do you wish you knew before birth?

I’m not sure there’s anything I wish I knew before I gave birth. I am an over thinker so I did it a lot of research before I gave birth.

If you could, would you do anything differently?

I think I would have invested in learning about how to focus on breathing during labour. I had a lot of anxiety about giving birth and really worked myself up when I was in labour. I feel like if I had the tools to be able to work through my contractions through breathing my outcome could’ve been a little bit different.

What did your partner do that really helped during labour/birth?

Honestly, I don’t remember much of Luke in my labour experience. It makes me sad because I had envisioned what it would be like with Luke by my side. Bringing a baby into the world is such a special moment to experience with your partner, and I was in so much agony that I wasn’t taking much notice of anything else around me. I just remember him following me around hugging and reassuring me, cleaning up after I was leaving a snail trail of amniotic fluid in the room and making me vegemite toast after Harry was born!

What advice/honest truth would give a mama-to-be about birth?

Go in with an open mind, do your research, remember to breathe and don’t be disheartened if your birth plan doesn’t go to plan. Accept all the help that is offered to you and be kind to yourself.