lola born at sunshine coast university hospital, kawana 3 apr 2019

Hey Carrie,

It’s been a big month, please forgive me for not touching base sooner :)

Our little Lola George Thomas joined us 4 weeks ago on the 3/4/2019, things certainly didn’t pan out the way we had hoped, but we have a happy healthy 4 week old baby girl.

I ended up being induced at 39 weeks due to high blood pressure. They had been monitoring us, I had been in and out of hospital 3 times a week for BP checks, induction had been discussed since 37 weeks but it was put off for as long as we could. By 39 weeks it had gone to a dangerously high level, and our induction was booked.

Induction wasn’t a pleasant process, it then over an hour to get the balloon catheter inserted, and I struggled with a lot of pain that night so missed a lot of sleep. The next morning my waters were broken, took 3 midwives and an obstetrician to get it done, I was hooked up to the drip and monitored closely.

I was having regular contractions but I couldn’t feel them, by midday the drip was turned up as high as the doctors would allow it, and my contractions started to become more and more uncomfortable, but I used all my breathing, my rainbow relaxation, and yoga nidra playing in my ears.

By about 6 pm, I was having one contraction on top of another, without any break, and I had reached my breaking point. I was examined and I was only at 3 cm, I lost my cool for a while and Cam helped calm me down. We decided to try an epidural, if I could relax maybe I would dilate, that was given and I was able to get some sleep. I was checked again 4 hours later and was fully dilated and ready to try and birth her.

I tried to move her down for an hour, and was fairly out of it by this point, I was so exhausted. The obstetrician came in, she had been monitoring myself and Lola from another room, Lola’s heart rate was dropping with every contraction and it wasn’t coming back up. She checked me over, and realised Lola had changed position during labour, she was posterior and her chin was not tucked down, which is why I hadn’t been able to move her down, she was stuck in my pelvis.

The doctors spoke to me about what was happening and given Lola was distressed, I agreed to the emergency caesarean.
I was wheeled off to theatre and she was born at 11 pm.
Recovery was really good, she latched straight away and is feeding really well, I was up and about and about 6 or so hours later and have been feeling really good.

I just wanted to thank you, everything that could go wrong did go wrong for us, but I was able to stay calm, and think about our decisions and accept the path that our birth took. Prior to your class, I would never have remained so calm and made educated decisions, I would have been in panic mode.

So thank you again, while it wasn’t the birth we had hoped for, we are all happy and healthy and just pleased we live in a place with such a wonderful hospital, it could have gone a very different way.

All the best,

Ella and Cam 

While it wasn’t the birth we had hoped for, we are all happy and healthy and just pleased we live in a place with such a wonderful hospital, it could have gone a very different way.