It’s been a couple of weeks since our baby no 2 decided to join our little tribe. It still feels surreal. After 41 hours with absolutely no sleep (just discovered a new level of tiredness I never knew it actually existed), 21 hours of fun, intense labour & 23 hours of hospital (in and out, but who’s counting!) I’m ready to share the joy (and pains) of creating her.
Giving birth to baby no 1 (about 3 and a half years ago) was a completely different story than my experience with Amelie a couple of weeks ago. ‘How hard could it be?’ was the constant question on my mind. I made the mistake of comparing my mum’s two successfully shorter labours with the unknown thinking I’d be equally lucky. Funny thing is, I’m not my mum or my sister or my friends who happened to have had it easier or quicker. Strangely enough, after a smooth first pregnancy, I blocked all thoughts that both labour and birth could take another turn of events. Which they eventually did…When I found myself on a hospital bed talking to a bunch of doctors about an emergency c section (after three glorious days of labour and over 24h since the waters had broken which made us both prone to infections) I realised that little goes according to the ideal plan we mentally set for ourselves. Result? In my case frustration, blue days and guilty feelings after an instrumental birth (forceps still is and will always be a scary thought)…
Nevertheless this time I had my mind set on no birth expectations and this was probably the very best thing I’ve ever done to keep safe and sane through the fun process of giving birth while still trying to fully comprehend how it happened because I never thought this baby would made it without more help again! No forceps, no vacuum, I even ditched the epidural in the end (I have to admit I though screaming for one, but we all knew it was too late). The gas & air provided enough entertainment for the entire evening and left me in better spirits, making me feel brave enough to think I could possibly go through this again (baby no 3 another scary thought, but that’s a story for another time!). I gave birth standing up by the bed, I ‘helped’ the midwives catch the baby and since I put my hands around her perfect little body, I never wanted to give her back. 41 weeks of waiting and she was finally here…
After weeks of horrible nausea, heartburn and terrible cravings while creating tiny eyeballs and fingerprints, Amelie was mine to hold and my mum was next to me catching the every bit of emotion, just like she did 30 years ago when I made an appearance into their life. This time she even cut the umbilical cord.
There’s so many thanks I need to share (starting with the brilliant midwives team at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington), and to brilliant Anna Pawleta Photography for translating some amazing pixels into life memories! Having her photographing through birth was one of the best decisions I made, has any of you thought about it? I’ll let the gallery below finish off this birth story.
Last, but not least, I said it before and I’ll continue saying it, I’d like to officially thank the one who brought gas & air into our lives!! Ironically and strangely enough, it might have been the main reason behind the huge appetite I had between contractions which made everyone wonder how on earth was I able to eat during those interesting times…
