I don’t talk about my pregnancy and birth with Baby bear very often anymore. Its like as soon as your child reaches a certain age (around a year roughly – at least that’s what I think) it stops becoming a conversation topic. However, I’ve been seeing #ThankYouMidwife a lot lately I’ve decided to share my story and just how amazing my midwives were.

As you may know Baby bear was totally unplanned and because my cycle was so irregular we had no idea how far along I actually was. This meant I booked in with a midwife as soon as I found out. As soon as I met Michelle, my midwife, I knew how amazing she would be throughout my pregnancy. I wasn’t wrong.

Due to not knowing how far along I was, we had a scan not long after my booking appointment. That scan wasn’t only to book me in it was to also check everything was okay with the baby because of my medical issues. He was perfect, that’s all the worrying over. Right?

#ThankYouMidwife

Cute Turtle.

Wrong… From the moment we entered our first consultant appointment things just kept going wrong through my pregnancy. However, throughout this whole time, Michelle was so helpful and took the time each appointment to help me with anything while settling my nerves. I just wanted an easy and straightforward pregnancy that everyone else around me was seeming to have.

Anyway, fast forward to 38 weeks pregnant. We hadn’t really got any straight answers about how baby bear would be coming into the world but he wasn’t waiting for them he was ready to meet us. My contractions were starting, but being a first-time mumma I didn’t know what they were so I rung Michelle to see what her advice was. Amazingly she came round to see me at home and see what was going on. To all our surprise I was in early labour. My contractions were coming every 10 minutes roughly but when she did my internal check for dilation I was only half a centimeter so I was advised to bounce on my birthing ball (I’d recommend just a gym ball they are a lot cheaper and do the same job!) to try and help things progress.

By the next day my contractions were still going strong and slightly closer together so I called Michelle again to see if I could go in to see how dilated I was as my consultant had said to keep on eye on my contractions so we could go into hospital and get the help offered before I got too far ahead in my labour. However, Michelle and a training midwife were free to come for another home visit which was even better as I wasn’t in the mood to put proper clothes on to leave the house (I hated clothes at the end of my pregnancy – I can’t be the only one?). To my despair, I was still less than 1cm but because my contractions were so close for only being 1cm and baby bears movements had really slowed she advised we went upto labour ward so off we went.

This continued for nearly 2 weeks until I was sat up the hospital for the 4th time because baby bear had stopped moving for the 4th time for longer than 12 hours. While we were at the hospital being checked this amazing midwife (I gutted I can’t remember her name) had a look through all my notes and noticed I didn’t have anything written down about being induced. She advised me to go back to the hospital the next day to sit up the assessment unit until a consultant had come and made these decisions about what was to happen. I am so thankful for her as if it wasn’t for her taking a little more time to look through my notes and try and see what the plan was because baby bear was becoming distressed I dread to think what could have happened.

It was decided that I would be induced as soon as possible which happened to be on my due date. We had to wait a couple of days before my induction as I was high risk so we had to wait for the next day that there wasn’t already a high-risk lady booked in for. Me and daddy bear felt so relieved we were finally being listened to and we would meet our baby soon.

But again nothing is ever straight forward, when we arrived at the hospital in the morning there wasn’t a consultant available so everything was delayed by 5 hours. The midwife I had the first day was clearly stretched on the ward but she was honestly amazing nothing was to much trouble for her and I am lucky enough to say all my midwives after her were just as amazing. I am truly thankful for them all.

However, the day after I was induced (baby bears birthday) our midwife we had during the day was simply amazing (again, to out of it to remember her name and daddy bear is not help in remember!). I don’t remember her leaving my side very often, she was so gentle and caring. I don’t remember much from that day I couldn’t have any medication to help with the pain other than gas and air. I tried everything other than an epidural (which I can’t have due to other medical issues) the first day but it slowed baby bears heartrate right down and after my waters burst and we found out he had opened his bowls they didn’t want me to take anything that could do that to him.

I do remember telling her my back really hurt and I felt like I needed to push so she checked me and found I was only 2cm dilated so called the consultant on call to come to see me. Once the consultant see me she confirmed my body was starting to naturally push baby out so she wanted to put me on Pitocin to make my body dilate which my midwife refused to give me as the pain was already so painful so she wasn’t happy giving me that without being able to give me an epidural or other painkillers to help. I remember begging the consultant to give me a c-section like I had asked for earlier in my pregnancy.

Between them taking me off the monitor to take me down to theatre and delivering baby bear he had stopped breathing and was turning blue. He was also in shock because he was so far down my birth canal they struggled to deliver him via c-section. Again I don’t want to think what could have happened if my amazing midwife hadn’t fought my corner and helped us push for a c-section.

I am so thankful for the actions of all the midwives who cared for me and Baby bear throughout my whole pregnancy they made a stressful and unenjoyable experience better and I will never be able to thank them enough in helping me get Baby bear here safely as I truly believe if they didn’t listen to me and was in my corner as much as they were things could have ended differently for us.

So thank you to every midwife. You are truly amazing people who don’t get half the amount of credit and thanks you deserve. I will never be able to thank you or repay you for everything you did for us and do for women every day.

Go share love for the midwifes who cared for you during your pregnancy over on social media using the hashtag #ThankYouMidwife.

#ThankYouMidwife.