The REAL Miracle of Birth

WARNING: DO NOT READ if you do not want to know the truth about childbirth, are pregnant, are male, are under 18, are related to me or are eating liver.

I’ve done it twice.  What shocked me the first time was that no one EVER really tells you the truth about childbirth. Even “One Born Every Minute” which shows you some of the yucky bits is edited to show you the most interesting bits, but it doesn't show you the whole slog or what happens after the baby slops out. I can honestly say that after giving birth to Owen I was mentally traumatised and I wouldn’t be surprised if I had post-traumatic stress because there is nothing natural about pushing a little human being out of your front bottom. I know that everyone has vastly different experiences of labour, and some women are lucky to have their babies just fall out of them (these are the women who we jealously refer to as jammy bitches and don't believe for a second). After experiencing a gas-and-air birth with the first one, I decided that if I did it again I’d want to be knocked out with a hammer. After doing it once I had full intentions of Owen being an only child. Or adopting. And no, time didn’t make me forget the pain – I just knew that it was something that I had to do again in order to get my little girl...and that makes me well hard! There’s no way a man would do it twice.

BIRTH ONE: Two weeks before Owen’s due date, at about 9pm I was on the phone to my grandmother - aka Supergran - and I wet myself. I remember saying lots of naughty words, changing myself in the loo and phoning Supergran back on my landline. Then it happened again. It took a few times of going back and forth to the loo to realise that I hadn't developed sudden incontinence. When I phoned Dad, who was at work, to tell him that my waters were breaking I think his waters broke. He rushed home, shouted "what do we do??!!!" about twelve times and managed the twenty minute drive to the hospital in about two and a half minutes. I wanted to stop at a shop to get some Lucozade and Mars Bars - he thought I was going to give birth in the car park. I wish. At the hospital I had to drop my pants and a midwife stuck her head up there to tell me that – yes my waters were breaking – but that I was only about one centimetre dilated so I still had a way to go, especially as I wasn’t even feeling any pains yet.  I was advised to go home, have a warm bath and try and get some sleep (easier said than done when you’re excited and cacking yourself) and come back in the morning if I didn’t feel the need to return sooner. I asked if I could Immac my lady garden as I was unprepared in that area since the baby was making an early appearance - the midwife gave me a firm no. Well....it was her who had to plough her way through the nest. She wouldn't even let me have bubbles in my bath.

We swung by the hospital the next morning and I dropped my pants for another midwife – and I was still only one centimetre dilated. She asked if I wanted to go back home again and wait it out – or if I wanted to stay and use the television room?  I asked to stay because I had no idea what I was doing or what to expect and I didn’t want to risk giving birth on my bathroom floor (my landlord might not have been sympathetic). So we stayed and watched a bit of telly. For a few hours I rolled around on a yoga ball and jumped up and down hoping that the baby would just fall out...no such luck...and the contractions began to kick in...ow ow ow ow ow! It’s hard to describe how a contraction feels.  If you’ve ever had bad diarrhoea and felt those waves of cramp in your gut that gradually build up until you turn red in the face, froth at the mouth, squeal like Bon Jovi and feel like you want to drop your load...multiply that by a million billion trillion and you’re not even close.

After a few hours of bored bouncing, jumping and rolling around, the midwife advised me to go for a walk so we headed out to Greggs because Dad wanted a pasty. Even though you could hardly miss the giant red contracting woman at the counter, they managed to serve everybody but me until I blew up into a massive rage and verbally abused every useless member of staff and Dad was forced to apologise “on my behalf” and hope that they didn't spit in his steak bake.  On return to the hospital I thought I must’ve been at least fifty eight centimetres but when a third midwife shoved her head up there I was only two...arrrrghhhh! So they decided to start sweeping...and I don’t mean the floor. A sweep is really not nice.  It involves the midwife sticking a couple of gloved fingers up your fairy and “sweeping” your cervix to stimulate your contractions.  Though it doesn’t feel like anyone is sweeping – it feels like she’s trying to break in and pull the baby out there are them along with the rest of your internal organs.  It’s very uncomfortable and your contractions intensify quickly afterwards. They also decided to fully break my waters. So I was on my back again legs akimbo and the midwife shoved what looks like a crotchet hook up there.  It didn’t hurt – but a gallon of water gushed out of me and all over the bed. One soggy mattress later and we were off...

By 4pm I was told that I was now three centimetres and in “active” labour.  It bloody felt like it too with contractions coming regularly and painfully.  And then Dad’s entire family showed up. They chatted to us in the television room while I wobbled around on the yoga ball puffing and panting, and Dad decided to entertain them by playing cards on my back. When a midwife appeared at 5pm and asked me if I wanted any gas and air I nearly broke her arm off, pulled out the hose and inhaled the whole canister. The gas and air wasn’t bad.  It didn’t take any of the pain away but it did make everything okaaaay.  I remember watching Eggheads and thinking that CJ was hilaaaaaarious.  Everyone was laughing at me and I became really paranoid that they were all staring, so I passed it around and they all had a go.

At 7.30pm I flumped into the birthing pool, which took the edge off for about three seconds, but there was nothing to hold on to so every time I had a contraction I flapped about like a shot sea lion. A few hours earlier I wanted to wear my bikini in the birthing pool and didn't want Welsh Nanny in the room - by the time I got in there I was in so much pain my giant baps were bopping about all over the place and every inch was on show but its true when they say you really don't give a shit! I used Welsh Nanny as a squeezy stress reliever and had bruises up and down her arms. By 9pm I was crying my eyes out and my midwife asked if I wanted to push while I yelled at her to give me drugs or knock me out or kill me.  Two and a half canisters of gas and air later and sounding like Barry White, I climbed out of the pool and had a shot of Pethidine. I hoped she was putting me down. I felt something moving and yelled "is it coming??!!!" Nope. I did a poo. On the bed. By that point I think my body had had enough of me and decided to start pushing the baby out by itself – I flailed around like the girl from The Exorcist until by some miracle, Owen forced his way out of me at 12.22am.

The contractions stopped instantly. I nearly fell off the bed when the midwife told me that he weighed 9lbs 2oz. They even weighed him twice to make sure they'd done it right. No wonder it felt like I was birthing Alien. I looked down at my beautiful boy with his angry little face scrunched up looking like he wanted to punch me, looking a bit blue/grey and covered in gunk, it felt amazing that I'd ever gotten him out. I only held Owen for five minutes before handing him to Dad because I was so exhausted. Owen was passed from Dad to Welsh Nanny to Welsh Gransha while I tried to doze on the bed surrounded by guts.

For the next hour or so, the midwives poked and prodded every tender hole and I got high on more gas and air whilst they stitched me back together and I wanted to yell, “JUST LEAVE MY FANNY ALONE!!!!” Then I threw up everywhere.  As Dad’s parents cleaned and dressed our baby, Dad helped me to shower - it was like the famous scene from psycho. He helped me to get into my jammies with a sanitary towel the size of a brick stuck in my knickers and I dragged myself off to bed at about 3.30am...with a week of sitting on a rubber ring and only being able to walk ten yards at a time to look forward to.

BIRTH TWO: Ava was two weeks late and I had to be induced. I practically grabbed the midwife by the throat and demanded an epidural. I got one. And the rest is boring because I didn’t feel a thing. Even the epidural itself was painless. She was 8lbs 7oz and I didn’t have a single stitch. The only down side was that I lost a bit of blood and had to have a transfusion that took a couple of hours...and I still required a sanitary towel the size of a brick and a week of sitting on a rubber ring. But there was no screeching like a banshee or abuse hurled at my husband. I didn't want to be a Superhero today.