Noah's arrival

While he is contentedly asleep and having a cuddle with Daddy, and I'm waiting for the midwife I thought I'd do the whole 'how he actually got here' post.

Things kicked off at about 11.30pm on 15th when my water started leaking. By about half twelve I had to get up and out of bed as I was too achey when lying down and I didn't want to disturb hubby too much with the constant trips to the toilet. So I went and did what all sensible women in early labour might do and came and plonked myself in front of the internet for a while. I know some people also recommend shopping, however given the time and the fact that would have involved moving, the internet had to suffice.

By about 2.30am I had contractions coming thick and fast, every 5 minutes or less which I thought was fairly good going for a first baby, from nothing at all a couple of hours earlier to increasingly regular and painful contractions. Got to the hospital at about 3am and got hooked up to the monitors etc to measure babies heart rate and contraction strength. It was at this point I was gutted to be told I was only 1cm dilated. Given the strength of the contractions I was hoping for a couple more cm then that! She said that although they often send people home at this point they would probably keep me in and try and speed things up with some drugs as the baby's heart rate was dropping a bit more then they would like with each contraction. They left me for a bit longer though and went to find a doctor to see what they thought. At this point I hadn't had any pain relief and my contractions were getting increasingly more and more painful and difficult for me to deal with. Noah's heart rate started dropping more and more as the contractions got much stronger, I'm sure I saw it was down to mid 50's during some of the strongest contractions, but at least it was going back to normal inbetween! At this point the doctor examined me and decided as because I still wasn't dilating and the heart rate was now dropping significantly every contraction they would take me through for an emergency c-section.

Then it was all go. The room suddenly filled with people, one person stripping me off, another putting a cannula in my hand, while someone else explaining and getting me to sign consent forms. Then I was whisked off to be prepped and have a spinal, before Noah was officially born at 5.52am on 16 June 2009, weighing 7lb 12.

Stitching up took longer then I anticipated, ended up losing 1000ml of blood and was then sick several times through out the morning, turns out he had been back to back too which would of not helped the pain, but he is completely worth it all. Despite it not being the birth I anticipated I think it was a really positive birth and the main thing is that he is here and we are both fine and healthy. Recovery is going really really well, and he is such a good and contented baby.

I'll finish with a picture our little family a few hours after he was born
And one of him from friday when we came home