Michele Dillicar

Tell us a bit about yourself?

I recently turned 27 in lockdown, was born in Canberra but spent just over half my life in cairns where I started dating my partner at the ripe young age of 17. We were together for I think 6 or 7 years before we decided to start our family. Logan was born just before my 25th birthday.

What were you doing before babies?

I worked for a car dealership for almost 6 years before our son was born, had a few different roles there but admin was my favourite.

How did you come to be a mum?

We were trying for a baby for about 6 months before getting pregnant with our sweet Logie bear. I was so used to getting negatives and my cycle was all over the place so I didn’t even bother testing until 9pm on the 5th day that my period hadn’t arrived. Big fat blazing positive, I was so surprised and so excited. I had a very smooth and easy pregnancy truth be told. I had about a week or 2 of mild nausea in the very early stage of pregnancy, even before I found out I was pregnant at 4/5 weeks. I had food aversions for a few weeks after that, a lot of food just sounded disgusting. Around halfway through my pregnancy I started to get anxiety which was helped by seeing a psychologist regularly for the remainder of my pregnancy. I was unlucky enough to get gastro at 36 weeks so I had to spend the day in hospital being monitored for signs of early labour… labour didn’t started until 9 days past my due date. It started at 2:15am on the 6th of September. By 9am the contractions were pretty close together and lasting a while so we went to the hospital. By the time we got to the hospital and saw my midwife they had slowed down to over 10 minutes apart, she checked my cervix and I wasn’t dilated at all. I felt very defeated. I stayed at the hospital for a few hours hoping to make progress but didn’t so I was sent home. I continued to labour all night, I would make myself a pillow out of towels in our shower and try to use the hot water for some pain relief. By 7am the next morning I was exhausted and requested to go to hospital and get the epidural. When I arrived to the hospital the head midwife was getting me settled in and checking on everything. I still hadn’t dilated and Logan’s heart rate was lower than it should be so she wanted to break my water and monitor his heart rate from the clip they put on the baby’s head. Seeing as I hadn’t dilated, her trying to break my waters was excruciating and traumatising without pain relief (for me anyway) my mum ended up barging into the room and telling her off and to stop until I’d received the epidural. I ended up getting the epidural at 10/11am and it was amazing. I started dilating!

By 5pm it was time to try pushing… Logan’s heart kept decelerating a lot each time I pushed so the midwife advised to stop pushing and wait a little while. Eventually we had to get a team of doctors in and have a quick assisted delivery due to his heart rate dropping. I had an episiotomy which my partner accidentally watched and they used the vacuum to assist his birth. He was born at 6:27pm on the 7th of September 2019. Best night of my life and even after all of that I can’t wait to do it again.

What has your feeding journey been like?

I have been so very lucky to have absolutely no issue breastfeeding. My son is 2 and still feeding, I am ready for that journey to be over truthfully.

What has sleep been like in your house?

I co-slept with Logan for the first 2 years so my sleep was probably better than most new mums at first but the bigger he got the worse my sleep became. Made the decision to sleep train him just before his 2nd birthday and he now sleeps through the night in his own bed. It’s heaven.

The hardest bits…

The mum guilt and anxiety. I really struggle with intrusive thoughts and worry about worst case scenarios. I would stay up for hours during the night while he slept for the first few weeks because I was so scared of anything happening to him. I would think up the worst case scenarios about raising him and at the time we were living in cairns so I would panic about crocodiles because he’s a boy and he would be reckless and go swimming in spots where crocodiles are. Sounds silly to be worrying about that when he’s a newborn but it was pretty consuming at the time. I would constantly worry about how cigarette smoke could cause sids because a few of my partners family members were heavy smokers.

The best bits…

The overwhelming and all consuming love you feel and the pure joy on his face when he comes across a bus. He has recently learned to say I love you and smother me with kisses back which fills my cup beyond means.

How do you make time for you?

When he sleeps or my mum is generous enough to take him, I really need to work on this area for my own wellbeing.

What’s next for you and your family?

More babies I hope!

A piece of advice for our readers?

If something is working for you and your family don’t feel guilty if other people don’t agree, every baby is so different.