Birth Story by Lesley Flynn
I had been trying to conceive my first baby for around 6 months, when I found out I was super excited and couldn't wait to see that little heart beat on the monitor, cut to the 8 week scan the baby just looked like a big fuzz ball but with a heart beat me and my partner decided at the next scan we would find out what we were having.
At the 20 week scan we found out we were having a little girl, we were both very excited calling all of our family members with the news of a precious little girl entering our family.
Fast forward to having 2 extra scams as I was at high risk of gestational diabetes and a higher than normal BMI I got to see our little girl a few more times. I worked up until I was 39 weeks and 1 day and decided that I would spend the next week reading, getting a massage, and maybe having my hair done before our lives got turned upside down. The very next day instead of relaxing me and my partner decided we would go out for the day, we explored our area and came home late, I was very uncomfortable around 10pm and decided to go to bed, by 4 am I couldn't sleep anymore and thought maybe I might be in early labour, I called the nurse and she confirmed that I might be and to have a shower and try and get some sleep as I was in for a long day As some mums will know sleeping while so uncomfortable is no easy feat lol. No sleep for me, throughout the morning I had spontaneous contractions, and not knowing how labour actually pans out I thought I should go to the hospital around 10.30am, they sent me back home as I was still early on but my God do those pains hurt, I thought to myself does it really get worse.
At around 5pm, I thought ok I can't take this anymore I'm going back in, the nurse checked me over and said I was 5cm dilated and maybe try a bath as I had very bad back pain, I was also told my baby was in the posterior position so that would contribute to the back pain. The bath was amazing!! Anyone scared of birthing in a bath should not be at all. I however did not birth in the bath. I refused to stay in because I was afraid of birthing in a bath and I really wanted an epidural, by the time I got out and back into the room I was fully dilated so no pain killers for me . I pushed in every position imaginable for 2 hours before a lovely Doctor told me that my baby was pushing the front of the head out instead of the crown so there was no way it was ever going to be able to come out without help. She told me they would have to do a spinal and use forceps to help. As I lay on the table with my partner and two nurses helping me to push, we discussed how I was having a girl and that we were going to name her Lily, my contractions were 6 minutes apart so we had some time to chat.
After the last push my baby was finally out and placed on my chest, whilst kissing my new little girl, I smiled at my partner and told him, you're a daddy of this beautiful little girl, as we smiled at each other the Doctor poked her head up and said 'no it's not', every person in the room including myself stopped and stared at her, she leant forward and lifted the baby off my chest revealing a lovely large set of testicles!! Shock and laughter ensued with the moment going from sentimental and sweet to a joke.
We obviously love our baby boy so much but he started his life in a pink suit, no name and a mummy and daddy that had to change every thought they had for their little girl. It was a very sad and exciting time for us, I cried as I removed all the baby girl clothes from the nursery and it took us 3 days to name our son, I called him the baby for a really long time. Fast forward 4.5 years and we now have a baby girl as well and our family is complete. I cannot imagine my baby boy any other way. We will joke about how he is Lily with the willy for a long time to come!!!