scoutmarigold-blog

[scoutmarigold-blog]

The birth of Scout Marigold

Scout’s birth story started much like Lyra’s - it was a Friday, and I was suddenly drawn to the idea of scrubbing the floors (which is incredibly unusual…I tidy. Levi cleans)

Despite this being approximately the second time ever I had done this in my life, I still didn’t think much of it, I had completely convinced myself that I would go overdue as I did with Lyra.

The next day was Saturday the 29th of September, Lyra’s last day of swimming for the term. I was 39+2 this day. As we were about to leave for her class at 9am I lost my cervical plug. Still, I didn’t get too excited, I’d lost it almost a week before with Lyra.

We went to swimming, out to lunch, then back home afterward. I was getting contractions now, randomly, sometimes once an hour sometimes more. It was at this point I thought maybe I should wash Scout’s clothes. I also made a batch of vanilla slice.

It got to about 5pm, I’d washed and dried Scout’s clothes and packed a hospital bag. The contractions were getting closer together, and I started writing them down. I was still a bit in denial.

We’d finished the bed time routine with Lyra, she was asleep by 8pm and my contractions were three minutes apart. They didn’t feel very strong, or last very long, I was completely fine talking through them and felt a little silly calling my midwife. She visited our house and checked - I was 4cm dilated. We didn’t know if we should go to hospital or not, I was worried if I went too early my labour would stall and I’d be stuck there for ages. And I was enjoying watching Back to the Future with Levi. We called Mariah and Dylan to come over to look after Lyra.

We ended up deciding to head to hospital as we’d heard so many stories about the speedy delivery of second babies. I’d never noticed how bumpy the road from our house to the hospital was until I was having contractions every three minutes along it. Although they were still very mild, I was starting to need to breathe through them, and was feeling a little uncomfortable.

We met our midwife and student at the hospital and settled in to the birthing suite - the same birthing suite where I laboured with Lyra. I didn’t end up having Lyra in it, I had to go to the delivery suite, but it was still nice to have that familiarity of not only the same midwife but the same space.

After arriving at around 9pm, I walked in tiny circles around the room for hours. Through my contractions I focused on relaxing my jaw through my breaths, this helped a lot! I started feeling tired and laid down on the bed, I listened to Black Sands by Bonobo and I remember feeling really relaxed and calm. Eventually I needed to start listening to my meditation to get through the contractions, and got in the bath.

I spent hours in the bath, and must’ve reached 10cms at around 2.30am as this is when I started to feel the urge to push, and my body couldn’t help but make noise through each contraction. It felt like I couldn’t control the sounds coming out of my body! I realised after a while that actually making these noises through contractions seemed to be halting or holding back the pushing progress. As hard as it was I tried to instead breathe through the pushing contractions, and from this I was able to get closer and closer to her head coming out.

It had been 1.5 hours before we realised Scout was still in her waters. We thought she might be born en caul! At this point I was so tired. I couldn’t believe how incredibly exhausted I was. I remember feeling very pathetic about it and a little whingy (okay I was super whingy, like really bad). I kept saying ‘I’m so tired. I’m just so tired.’ Everyone was so encouraging. Levi kept telling me he was proud of me. My midwife was basically a cheer squad through every contraction. She got me a jug of cordial and a zooper dooper. I absolutely devoured the ice block and felt much better. Every time I pushed the bubble of water came out a little more, and a little more. It was the most bizarre feeling. I remember likening the feeling of my belly blobbing like a water balloon in my aqua physio classes, and now I felt like the water balloon was coming out.

A huge push, and Scout’s head was half out. Half out? I didn’t realise this was a thing, but apparently it is. I reached down and it was pointy. I freaked out. ‘What’s this? Is this her head? Why’s it pointy!!??’

My midwifery student reassured me immediately - ‘It’s okay, it’s her head, remember how they get squished? It’s fine.’

My midwife suddenly said, ‘Okay Esther, you’re going to need to get out of the bath right now’

I was like ‘Sorry what?’ (I just want to reaffirm that Scout’s head was HALF out my body at this point).

She was like ‘Yes. You can do it.’

Oh my god. Okay, so I got up, out of the bath, and immediately another contraction overtook me as I knelt down on a beanbag next to the bed. Holding Levi’s hands and leaning against the bed I got her whole head out and felt my waters finally break. Scout started crying. Did you know babies can cry when their body is still inside you? I definitely didn’t.

Next contraction my midwife pulled Scout out, her limbs flopping out was such a bizarre feeling. She was wailing! I reached down and tried to grab her but from the side and my cord was too short. My midwife said ‘I’m just going to pass her through your legs, here you go’ I grabbed Scout and clutched her to my chest. Oh my god! I couldn’t believe I did it. I looked up at Levi and said ‘I can’t believe I did it!’ Haha.

I kept saying ‘Happy Birthday Scout!’ and ‘I love you so much!’. I stood and walked to the bed, and laid down next to Levi. I put Scout near my boob and she was pretty bad at breastfeeding. Unlike Lyra who immediately latched on, Scout really wanted my nipple near her mouth but didn’t know what to do with it. She got there eventually and I was amazed to hear her suck, gulp, suck, gulp. Giving birth is wild. This baby who was inside me barely half an hour ago was now able to cry, breathe, suck, swallow, it completely blows my mind. Scout was born at 4.44am on Sunday the 30th of September.

This photo was taken about an hour after she was born! Levi looks way more tired than me haha (he says ‘That’s because you got that zooper dooper’).

We rested in the birthing suite for a couple of hours, then headed up to postnatal as I needed a follow up blood test before I could leave (I’d had low hemoglobin/platelet levels throughout my third trimester, and as I lost around 700mls of blood after my placenta came out my midwife wanted to check my levels before we went home). We left at around 1pm that day, after a visit from Lyra, Mariah and Dylan. Lyra was completely enamoured with her baby sister, holding her so tenderly and gently stroking her head.

I had a much better experience this time around being able to have Scout in a position where I wasn’t laying down on the bed! My midwife was incredible - she had been my midwifery student previously, and delivered Lyra 3.5 years earlier. She was intuitive, unobtrusive, and respected all my wishes throughout the entirety of my birthing process. She trusted that I knew what I was doing, and I felt so empowered and in control of the process with her expertly helping and providing support when needed. She made the world of difference to my experience.

I’m so grateful I was able to again have the natural birth I had hoped for.

Scout Marigold at two days old - complete sunshine!