Jin Jin's Birth Story - 'Fast & Furious' Malaysian style
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During my first birth, I would say Alex and I were prepared but not that prepared. We bought all the necessary baby stuff but did not attend any of the ante natal classes. The one good thing I did for my first pregnancy was to read "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth". I had no regrets reading the book as it helped me understand that there were alternatives to childbirth and prepared me somewhat i.e. no episiotomy required, opening blossom to speed up the dilation etc. The only thing it did not prepare me was the "level of pain of the contractions"
While my first childbirth was not difficult, I ended up being induced, strapped down, pressured to take epidural ("It's a Saturday, anesthetist will be off half day, if you don't take it now it will be too late") and had an episiotomy which lead to secondary tear and stitches. It left me wanting more. My oxytocin didn't kick in so the lovey dovey feeling with J wasn't there till later. Of course, my birth experience also delayed my breastfeeding journey too. Two years later, reflecting on my birth journey, I decided that for my next birth it had to be different. It was also during this time that I chanced upon "HypnoBirthing" and read many wonderful stories. Learning that birth could be calm and natural without the interventions sounded real and this further cemented my belief from reading Ina May's book. Reading about Lotus Birth also piqued my interests. Hmmm something to consider from a spiritual aspect? Fast forward 2 years later and I found out I was pregnant. The first thought that came to mind was to register for HypnoBirthing classes. I was only about 8 weeks when I first contacted Bee Ting and I asked myself was I overly anxious in contacting so early to ask for classes? I was worried that Bee Ting would laugh at me for being so 'early'. Luckily, Bee Ting did all she could to make me feel comfortable in choosing her as our mentor. Also the distance from our house to her place was an added bonus! Classes were casual and we met new friends and shared experiences. Each of us had our stories to share and our expectations of our birth experience-to-be. The classes dispelled myths, hearsay and gave both mum and dad the real picture. For Alex, going through the classes gave him a different perspective and prepared him for this birth. Whether it is for the first time dad or an experienced father, the things that we learned from the class was enlightening. My initial EDD was on 24 April but I had told myself and baby that I would prefer for her to come out on the 28th instead. For various reasons including work and also because 24.4 didn't sound nice. As the pregnancy progress, my line of work also became hectic (January to April would usually be my busy work season), that's when I probably gave baby conflicting ideas. While I preferred 28th, work made me feel that I wanted to get off earlier. So it came that fateful morning of our 39th week visit to the Dr that things happened. |
On oxytocin 'high' in the early hours after birth
Baby A sleeping with a smile, perhaps thinking of her fast and furious birth? |
At 3am, had a toilet break and to my surprise I found birth show. It was a red birth show which caught me by surprise as I had read earlier that it was usually pink to brown. It also got me worried as to whether baby was ok. (Also had the workaholic feeling that there was still so much work that I had not completed before delivery) Woke hubby up to let him know but still didn't feel any surges. Did a little research online and since it was not bleeding, I just went back to bed. Surges started after that but was still bearable and I did my surge breathing, visualization of the flower blossoming and that baby was coming closer to meet me with every surge. Managed to get some sleep through it all. Timed the surges about 6ish and noted that it was 15 mins apart.
In the morning, we went about our daily chores to get J ready for school and our Dr appointment. At the clinic, surges continued but was still bearable. Went in to see the Dr and told him about the birth show and the surges. We did a VE and he confirmed that I was technically in labour and if he swept the membrane, I would probably be able to deliver then. He respected my birth plan to keep it as natural as possible but had to break the news to me on my wish for a full lotus birth. Due to recent happenings, the hospital would not allow for full lotus birth. The best I could have was a delayed cord clamp. Upon hearing it, I was pretty devastated as I wanted a spiritual birth for baby. However, while the Dr was not an advocate of home birth, he mentioned that home birth was an option if I wanted to have the spiritual birth. Unfortunately, home birth had lingered in my mind but I was very clear that it would not be accepted in my household and neither of us were physically and mentally ready for it. So we ruled home birth out. Honestly, I was more confident in a hospital birth rather than a home birth since it was my first time using Hypnobirth. Next one? Perhaps.
The only person I could speak to was Bee Ting so I called her. While I could continue to insist on having a full lotus birth with the Dr and the hospital, I am not the type who wanted to force things and cause unnecessary problems for everyone. So Bee Ting suggested for us to seek other options ie Dr Paul Ng or Dr Tan Ee Peng. Dr Paul was probably out of the question since it was such a last minute request so we decided to consult Dr Tan to see whether she was comfortable to accept my case. Bee Ting helped us communicate with Dr Tan and spoke on our behalf.
While waiting for Bee Ting's reply, the only thing left for us to do was to spend some time together before baby came out. So we head on over to Sunrise for some roast duck and had a feast. After which we picked J from school and headed to my office to pack my laptop, sent out instructions to my teams and spoke to the bosses. I am very blessed to have understanding teams and bosses who stand by me. Thus, I was shooed off after staying for an hour or so. Back home, I continued to work while managing the surges. At 3ish, Bee Ting replied that Dr Tan was ok with us but we were still not sure whether to head on over then or wait till later. Bee Ting called to check on us and I told her the surges were still manageable. I could still hold a proper conversation so we were expecting the baby to come out either late that night or early the next morning. While we had settled the part of Dr Tan, my biggest worry was that Pantai Cheras was very far from us. Would we reach in time especially with Friday evening traffic and threats of rain appearing? It seems baby had other plans too.
At 4ish , I decided that I had enough of work and started walking round the house. This was short lived as my membrane ruptured and the water came gushing out (same as the first birth). For the next 10 mins, I didn't feel the surges grow any stronger and told my mum that I was not due to deliver. My mum on the other hand was very worried and encouraged us to go to the hospital and continue with the current Dr. I thought it was still early but in the end agreed with her. While I changed into clean clothes, I suddenly felt the surge getting very strong. I had to brace myself for each surge and adopt my most comfortable position which was the all four position either on the bed or leaning against the bed. As I walked to the car, I suddenly felt the urge to poo and rushed back to the toilet. Spent about a good 10 mins in the toilet yet again. This time the surge was so strong but the urge to poop was not satisfied. Also, had the hallmark feeling that I wanted all this to go away and wanted epidural when I reached the hospital. Alex helped me relax by doing the light touch massage. That felt extremely good and relieved me of the hallmark feeling. Without having satisfied my urge to poo, I dragged myself out of the house into the car. It was 5pm when we started the 15 min journey to the hospital and it was drizzling as we travelled. Traffic on the LDP was building up so the journey was still slow. It didn't help that the surges was strong and J was seeking for attention. So hubby distracted J by asking J to tell me to relax. That helped a lot as it gave J a chance to be part of the birth process and allowed me to use J's voice to breath through the surges.
As we reached the emergency center of the hospital, hubby went in to get the nurses to bring a wheelchair and take me in. It took a while for them to locate a wheelchair to take me in. I believe the nurse was skeptical that I was in labour as she asked Alex to confirm that my membrane had actually ruptured. Perhaps, I appeared to calm? Anyway, while the journey to the labour room was excruciatingly long (nurse walked pretty slowly to the lift, a lot of people in the lift etc). Yet again my calmness did more harm than good, the nurse wheeled me to the maternity ward instead of the labour room. There, another nurse asked me to visit the toilet before doing the CTG scan to which I told her I wanted intermittent scanning but I doubt she heard me as I was wheeled to the toilet. Fine, I said to myself, I will just try to poop again. But this time, it felt different, I actually felt the baby's head crowning. So I called out to Alex and told him I could deliver, the nurse who wheeled me into the toilet heard and that started a frenzy in the maternity ward. A head nurse came over to try to confirm whether I could deliver but sitting on the toilet bowl didn't help so they picked up the pace and finally sent me to the labour room.
In the labour room, 4 nurses stood guard and there was an atmosphere of chaos and clatter. Luckily, I still managed to stay calm through the mess and zoned all the noise out. One of nurses wanted to administer laughing gas for me which I gently denied. The head nurse wanted to do a VE for me but decided against as she could probably see that I was fully dilated.
All wanted me to wait for the Dr to arrive before I delivered but we had other plans and I couldn't wait any longer so I told them I had to deliver. I turned into an all 4 position and asked for the head of the bed to be elevated to 45 degrees. This I felt was the most comfortable position for me. While waiting for the surges, the head nurse asked for our birth plan (I believed the Dr must have told them about it when they called him). Unfortunately, I left my birth plan at the office so we pulled out the only birth plan sample in Bee Ting's folder and shared with the nurses. It was not exactly the same but better than nothing. The nurses were very accommodating and respected our 'wishes'. Thus, allowing me to birth freely and calmly.
I started to do my J breathing as I could feel the baby's birth dance. It felt so long and I thought I was not breathing the right way. In the next surge, I told myself that I would breath down strongly and push baby's head out. With that surge, I felt the so called "ring of fire". The next surge didn't come as quickly as I wanted and it was difficult having to feel through the ring of fire. Finally, the surge came and with the last breath, I felt baby come out all at once. It felt like a minute before the nurses announced that baby was out and baby started to cry. When I held her in my arms, I felt very emotional and the feeling that I had for her was so strong. It was the feeling of being able to bring her into this world in a safe and gentle environment. That meant a lot to me and perhaps created a stronger bond for me with her.
I was asked to gently and slowly flip over to receive her and we started our skin to skin bonding. Hubby asked the nurses how long did we take to deliver and the nurses said not long. We came in at 5.30 and baby was out by 5.49. (Really? Wow, they told me the 2nd birth would be fast but I never imagined it would be this fast!)
Dr came around 6, allowed us to birth the placenta first then clamped the cord. In the end I had my lotus birth and I took baby's placenta back to have a burial for her placenta. Dr checked and noted a small tear which was stitched up subsequently. The Dr did joke that I could have done a home birth but I was still comfortable with the environment that I was in. Other than that, all was done and I could continue bonding and breastfeeding her. We continued to bond for the next 3 hours and she breastfed like a champ.
Overall, for Alex and I, we both felt this birth was very different from our first birth. I felt more comforted on the decisions that I made for her, while Alex felt that it was not as gory as the first.
On reflection, would we have done anything differently? The only thing I would change is to have practiced my breathing more. Other than that, I would not have done anything else differently. To every mum or mum-to-be out there, birth can be a very enlightening feeling, it is just finding the right person to take you on that journey. For us, that person was Bee Ting. Thanks once again to Bee Ting for her guidance and help throughout our birth journey, without her, we wouldn't have done it.
In the morning, we went about our daily chores to get J ready for school and our Dr appointment. At the clinic, surges continued but was still bearable. Went in to see the Dr and told him about the birth show and the surges. We did a VE and he confirmed that I was technically in labour and if he swept the membrane, I would probably be able to deliver then. He respected my birth plan to keep it as natural as possible but had to break the news to me on my wish for a full lotus birth. Due to recent happenings, the hospital would not allow for full lotus birth. The best I could have was a delayed cord clamp. Upon hearing it, I was pretty devastated as I wanted a spiritual birth for baby. However, while the Dr was not an advocate of home birth, he mentioned that home birth was an option if I wanted to have the spiritual birth. Unfortunately, home birth had lingered in my mind but I was very clear that it would not be accepted in my household and neither of us were physically and mentally ready for it. So we ruled home birth out. Honestly, I was more confident in a hospital birth rather than a home birth since it was my first time using Hypnobirth. Next one? Perhaps.
The only person I could speak to was Bee Ting so I called her. While I could continue to insist on having a full lotus birth with the Dr and the hospital, I am not the type who wanted to force things and cause unnecessary problems for everyone. So Bee Ting suggested for us to seek other options ie Dr Paul Ng or Dr Tan Ee Peng. Dr Paul was probably out of the question since it was such a last minute request so we decided to consult Dr Tan to see whether she was comfortable to accept my case. Bee Ting helped us communicate with Dr Tan and spoke on our behalf.
While waiting for Bee Ting's reply, the only thing left for us to do was to spend some time together before baby came out. So we head on over to Sunrise for some roast duck and had a feast. After which we picked J from school and headed to my office to pack my laptop, sent out instructions to my teams and spoke to the bosses. I am very blessed to have understanding teams and bosses who stand by me. Thus, I was shooed off after staying for an hour or so. Back home, I continued to work while managing the surges. At 3ish, Bee Ting replied that Dr Tan was ok with us but we were still not sure whether to head on over then or wait till later. Bee Ting called to check on us and I told her the surges were still manageable. I could still hold a proper conversation so we were expecting the baby to come out either late that night or early the next morning. While we had settled the part of Dr Tan, my biggest worry was that Pantai Cheras was very far from us. Would we reach in time especially with Friday evening traffic and threats of rain appearing? It seems baby had other plans too.
At 4ish , I decided that I had enough of work and started walking round the house. This was short lived as my membrane ruptured and the water came gushing out (same as the first birth). For the next 10 mins, I didn't feel the surges grow any stronger and told my mum that I was not due to deliver. My mum on the other hand was very worried and encouraged us to go to the hospital and continue with the current Dr. I thought it was still early but in the end agreed with her. While I changed into clean clothes, I suddenly felt the surge getting very strong. I had to brace myself for each surge and adopt my most comfortable position which was the all four position either on the bed or leaning against the bed. As I walked to the car, I suddenly felt the urge to poo and rushed back to the toilet. Spent about a good 10 mins in the toilet yet again. This time the surge was so strong but the urge to poop was not satisfied. Also, had the hallmark feeling that I wanted all this to go away and wanted epidural when I reached the hospital. Alex helped me relax by doing the light touch massage. That felt extremely good and relieved me of the hallmark feeling. Without having satisfied my urge to poo, I dragged myself out of the house into the car. It was 5pm when we started the 15 min journey to the hospital and it was drizzling as we travelled. Traffic on the LDP was building up so the journey was still slow. It didn't help that the surges was strong and J was seeking for attention. So hubby distracted J by asking J to tell me to relax. That helped a lot as it gave J a chance to be part of the birth process and allowed me to use J's voice to breath through the surges.
As we reached the emergency center of the hospital, hubby went in to get the nurses to bring a wheelchair and take me in. It took a while for them to locate a wheelchair to take me in. I believe the nurse was skeptical that I was in labour as she asked Alex to confirm that my membrane had actually ruptured. Perhaps, I appeared to calm? Anyway, while the journey to the labour room was excruciatingly long (nurse walked pretty slowly to the lift, a lot of people in the lift etc). Yet again my calmness did more harm than good, the nurse wheeled me to the maternity ward instead of the labour room. There, another nurse asked me to visit the toilet before doing the CTG scan to which I told her I wanted intermittent scanning but I doubt she heard me as I was wheeled to the toilet. Fine, I said to myself, I will just try to poop again. But this time, it felt different, I actually felt the baby's head crowning. So I called out to Alex and told him I could deliver, the nurse who wheeled me into the toilet heard and that started a frenzy in the maternity ward. A head nurse came over to try to confirm whether I could deliver but sitting on the toilet bowl didn't help so they picked up the pace and finally sent me to the labour room.
In the labour room, 4 nurses stood guard and there was an atmosphere of chaos and clatter. Luckily, I still managed to stay calm through the mess and zoned all the noise out. One of nurses wanted to administer laughing gas for me which I gently denied. The head nurse wanted to do a VE for me but decided against as she could probably see that I was fully dilated.
All wanted me to wait for the Dr to arrive before I delivered but we had other plans and I couldn't wait any longer so I told them I had to deliver. I turned into an all 4 position and asked for the head of the bed to be elevated to 45 degrees. This I felt was the most comfortable position for me. While waiting for the surges, the head nurse asked for our birth plan (I believed the Dr must have told them about it when they called him). Unfortunately, I left my birth plan at the office so we pulled out the only birth plan sample in Bee Ting's folder and shared with the nurses. It was not exactly the same but better than nothing. The nurses were very accommodating and respected our 'wishes'. Thus, allowing me to birth freely and calmly.
I started to do my J breathing as I could feel the baby's birth dance. It felt so long and I thought I was not breathing the right way. In the next surge, I told myself that I would breath down strongly and push baby's head out. With that surge, I felt the so called "ring of fire". The next surge didn't come as quickly as I wanted and it was difficult having to feel through the ring of fire. Finally, the surge came and with the last breath, I felt baby come out all at once. It felt like a minute before the nurses announced that baby was out and baby started to cry. When I held her in my arms, I felt very emotional and the feeling that I had for her was so strong. It was the feeling of being able to bring her into this world in a safe and gentle environment. That meant a lot to me and perhaps created a stronger bond for me with her.
I was asked to gently and slowly flip over to receive her and we started our skin to skin bonding. Hubby asked the nurses how long did we take to deliver and the nurses said not long. We came in at 5.30 and baby was out by 5.49. (Really? Wow, they told me the 2nd birth would be fast but I never imagined it would be this fast!)
Dr came around 6, allowed us to birth the placenta first then clamped the cord. In the end I had my lotus birth and I took baby's placenta back to have a burial for her placenta. Dr checked and noted a small tear which was stitched up subsequently. The Dr did joke that I could have done a home birth but I was still comfortable with the environment that I was in. Other than that, all was done and I could continue bonding and breastfeeding her. We continued to bond for the next 3 hours and she breastfed like a champ.
Overall, for Alex and I, we both felt this birth was very different from our first birth. I felt more comforted on the decisions that I made for her, while Alex felt that it was not as gory as the first.
On reflection, would we have done anything differently? The only thing I would change is to have practiced my breathing more. Other than that, I would not have done anything else differently. To every mum or mum-to-be out there, birth can be a very enlightening feeling, it is just finding the right person to take you on that journey. For us, that person was Bee Ting. Thanks once again to Bee Ting for her guidance and help throughout our birth journey, without her, we wouldn't have done it.