Joshua Stephen Hudson Sex: boy Born: 14 September, 2009 Age: 0 years & 70 days Birthday in: 295 days Starsign: Virgo Development: See the 2 months page. Biggest achievement so far: -

Birth details

Last Sunday we were out and about in town and walking Jack and my lower back was really hurting me, didn’t think much of it as you get really bad back ache once you get a bump anyway but I somehow felt different, at about 4pm we went to lay in bed as it usually helped with my back ache but the pain carried on. I told Steve I was in a lot of pain and he just went quiet cause he was scared! Anyway, I had a bath and then I went down to make tea, straight after tea I said to Steve I think I’m going to have the shits (sorry) as my stomach and lower back were all gurgly and painful, I stood up to go to the loo at 7pm and I heard this massive pop and by the time I got to the utility room my waters broke all over the floor! We both started crying and I rang the home and they told us to go straight in. We spent the next half hour running around getting all our bags together and crying and rang our parents etc. Every few minutes more water would just gush out all over. We were so excited! Got to the home about 7:30pm and the nurse checked me for dilation, I was only 1-2cm dilated and she said I should think about going home, then the contractions started and she saw all the water gushing out and she said actually it would be best if I stayed. From then I was getting contractions every 2 minutes that lasted 40 seconds each time so the only break I got was for a minute after each contraction. I thought I had a high pain threshold but I was shouting owwww at the top of my voice and rocking around the room not knowing what position to get in for the best. Anyway, she gave me some codine (which did nothing) and I got into my nightie and for the next hour or so I just sat on the loo in agony. I had back labour because the baby was back to back which they say is much more painful and is why the delivery was so difficult. So every contractions made me want to poo myself (which I did twice but on the toilet)! Sorry again. After an hour or so I was begging for better pain relief so she gave me some pethidine, this made me really sleepy so I got in the bath and laid there on my side for about an hour, then that wore off and the contractions got worse, she checked me again at around midnight and I was fully dilated and she said this baby is on it’s way ring your mum. She got the baby’s cot out and got her apron on and brought another midwife in etc and we’re thinking great this was a quick labour. My mum turned up at 1am and we thought the baby would be born in the next hour or so. Still in horrendous pain so I had some gas and air and she set me up on the bed on my left side and told me start pushing with every contraction 3 times. Which I did. Anyway, I did this for about 2 hours and nothing was happening, no crowning or anything. By 3am I was absolutely exhausted and crying and begging them to do something. I kept looking at my mums face and she was absolutely panic stricken. Then my contractions started slowing down so they put me on a monitor and kept checking babies heart beat, I’ll never forget that noise, it was so loud and everytime it dipped I knew the next contraction was coming. Anyway, next they put a thing in my arm and started giving me drugs to speed the contractions back up, by this time I had no energy left at all and no pain relief and they just kept shouting at me to push with each contraction and I just couldn’t. I was crying saying I couldn’t do it. Then they said the baby was tachicardic which I think is an irregular heartbeat so they had to slow the drugs back down which slowed the contractions back down. By the time they were discussing bringing a doctor in as everything was not going well. By about 5am the doctor came in so I’d been pushing for 4 hours and baby wasn’t moving. The pain was just unbearable and if someone had given me a gun at this point I would have killed myself, no word of a lie. The doctor told me there were 4 options at this point, getting baby out by pushing on my own, suction, forceps or a caesarean. They told me they were going for forceps as the first 2 wouldn’t work and the caesarean was the worst case scenario. So they all got sorted and ready and put my legs up in stirrups and speeded up my drugs so the contractions came fast again. They told my mum and Steve to come to the top of the bed and that the baby would be here soon. The doctor gave me about ¾ injections inside and outside of my bits to numb it then she cut me (didn’t feel that though) and then I had about 6 people round the bed telling me with the next contraction I had to push like I’d been constipated for days. She then put the forceps inside and oh my god I thought I was going to die. I can’t explain the pain and the pressure, I could feel the forceps scraping against my bones and the pressure of her pulling on the babys head was pulling me down the bed. Anyway, I think after about 4 contractions the head was out, then the shoulders, I could hear my mum and Steve crying their eyes out and saying they could see the head and then all of a sudden this purple warm little man was placed on my chest and all the pain disappeared. He was so warm and his eyes were wide open, I will never forget that moment for as long as I live. And I’ll never forget Steve’s face, he was sobbing! I’m laid there going what is it, and Steve said I don’t know I can’t see and then they told us it was a boy. God I’m crying now. They left him on my chest for a few minutes then took him away to the left of me to be cleaned then they gave me him back and then Steve had a hold. The doctor then told me to get back on the gas and air, gave me more numbing injections down below and spent 45 minutes stitching me back up. To be honest I didn’t feel much, just pressure and tightening of the stitches, I was just too busy looking at Joshua and smiling and sucking on the gas and air.

It was definately the most horrendous thing I have ever been through but worth every second of the pain. I am madly in love with Joshua and cannot imagine life without him now. Will I do it again? YES but not for a while!

So that’s that. We went home 12 hours later and then the fun started.