Amélie's Birth Story

^^Right after giving birth to little Amélie. 

Thursday night on May 15 around 11pm, Andrea and I were in bed getting ready to go to sleep. We just came back earlier that evening from an NCT class and finished up learning about pain relief techniques. I was looking up something called a TENS machine which many people in the UK use during labor. I was about to place an order to rent one when I felt my first contraction. I thought it was just a practice one, but they kept coming. We both got out of bed and didn't really think it was really going to happen that night. I was just about 38 1/2 weeks and my due date wasn't until May 27th.

When the contractions kept getting stronger and became more frequent, we called the hospital, but the midwife told us just to take two paracetamol and to go to sleep. I couldn't imagine going to sleep during the contractions. They were not consistent, but coming every 3-5 minutes. I took a shower, which was the best idea ever thinking back and we waited some more. After 2 more calls to the hospital, they finally said to come in to get checked out. My water still did not break, but Andrea really pushed for us to go to the hospital since there was some blood with every contraction.

We quickly gathered everything together and I tried to make it to the car in between contractions. It was around 3am when we were at the hospital so it was very quiet and was quite a mission to even get inside since it involved buzzing through multiple doors and entrances. By this time, the contractions were STRONG and I really struggled to make it to the third floor of the hospital. The midwife on duty, who was AMAZING throughout the whole process, did a quick assessment and said I was already more than 6 out of 10 centimeters dilated.

I had to walk to the delivery room across the hallway and two contractions later, I was already ready to push. No time for any pain relief or epidural since I was so far along when I reached the hospital, but I was planning on a natural birth anyways. It was just me, Andrea and the midwife in the room, which was a very calm environment, different than what I expected for some reason. I pushed for about an hour and little Amélie was born at 4:27am on May 16. I was exhausted after all the pushing, but the midwife immediately wiped Amélie off quickly and then we had skin to skin and feeding time. Andrea and I fell in love with her right away and from then on, she never left my side at the hospital.

Afterwards, we were offered tea and toast (so English) and made our way down to the recovery room with the baby. I was surprised how calm I was during the whole hospital stay. I thought I would be an emotional wreck and start crying immediately after Amélie was born, but instead I was just overjoyed to meet her and relieved it all went well. The whole experience went so smoothly and I was extremely lucky to have such an easy and short labor/delivery.

She's just 11 days old today and the most perfect baby girl. I'm of course tired, but feeling pretty good and have been able to be out and about already with her and Andrea. I've yet to go to with Amélie solo, but maybe I'll try that this week. More to come on her first week in the next post.

^^This was on the day the contractions started. 38 weeks and a few days and very ready to pop. 

^^Sweet Amélie sleeping at the hospital, she was very very sleepy the first 24 hours.