A Birth - baby Emily Liddell

Congratulations to Laura and Rob on the birth of their daughter Emily Esme Liddell, who arrived on Thursday 20th May at 4:10am weighing 8lb 7oz.

In Laura's words;
After 2 days of contractions on and off they finally kicked off at wednesday lunchtime. By 7pm they were 3 mins apart and i managed to stay at home until around 10:30pm leaning over my ball with Rob massaging my back between contractions. We got to Bracken just before 11pm and i was 8cm dilated. My contractions stepped up a gear for those last 2cm, which seemed to take a long time! At around 12am i got into the birthing pool, which was lovely, and had gas and air for last 20 mins before i started to push. I felt very much in control throughout my contractions and confident that with breathing and focusing techniques learnt, I was able to manage them. However, i did realise i had thought less about the 2nd stage and did feel a bit anxious about what was to come.
 As it turned out i needn't be worried as like you have said before, my body knew what to do and i went with it. Emily slid back 6 times before i finally managed to push her out (which i found very frustrating) but as a result i had little tearing so perhaps that was for the best. After an hour and half of pushing she arrived into the world and we had skin to skin time while the placenta stopped pulsating. Unfortunately, when it did stop pulsating Emily went a bit floppy and we had to cut the cord get her out of the pool. I didn't feel any urges to push the placenta out and wanted to get it out as soon as i could so i could be with Emily, so got out of the pool and had the injection to get me started.

 Emily was fine but developed a grunt to her breathing. The midwife didn't think it was a concern and was just mucus from the birth but thought it wise to get the paediatrician to check her out. The paediatrician agreed and we went to the ward, however another paediatrician on his morning round was concerned that her grunt was still there so they took her to special care baby unit to start her on a course of antibiotics incase she had a chest infection. This meant we had to be moved to Willow ward and would have to stay in for at least 3 days until they knew whether she did indeed have an infection.

 So 4 days later we were able to leave as surprise, surprise she had no infection. In fact, the grunt went on that day she was born and her breathing stabilised. While, i would have preferred not to have had to of stayed in hospital perhaps it was for the best as Emily struggled to latch on and staff on willow ward were great at helping us out.
Thank you for all of your valuable advice and coaching. I look forward to bringing Emily in to meet you!

Laura.