Development So Far

Charlie has been surprising me and everyone we meet really by his development. He seems to be racing through the milestones. He rolled Back-to-Front at3 months, rolling Front-to-Back from 4 months, has been sitting unaided for several weeks and has been very busy practising crawling!
We had to buy a playpen 1 1/2 months ago,  as he repeatedly ended up under our coffee table when I left the room for a very brief period.
He loves playing in his playpen and we love the playpen, as his toys are contained!

On Sunday he cut his first tooth after many weeks of being grouchy. Within 10 hours he had cut his second tooth! We were amazed. There was no extra drooling, no red cheeks, nothing! He has been busy running his tongue over the new things in his mouth and he can bite quite hard now, which he loves doing.

I am blown away by the love I feel for this tiny, gorgeous boy. Tiny in comparison to an adult, because he is anything but tiny for his age! He is tracking the 91st percentile for weight and 98th percentile for height.
Each day my love seems to grow stronger.

I can't wait to see him develop further :)

Birth Story

First of all, I really must try harder to post regularly! I can't believe how much time has passed since my first post.

I am in much better mental health and have been working through my trauma.

Charlie has been growing so much! He's my absolute pride and joy.

As promised in my previous post, I have written up my birth story. My next post will hopefully be cheerier :)

My due date was 23rd November and I was determined to get baby to engage, so spent time on my feet, walking through shopping malls, down on hands and knees scrubbing floors, etc.

On the 23rd I went to see my OB for a scan, to check for dilation and to discuss the next steps (Singaporean doctors only let you go to 41 weeks). At this checkup, my bp was very high, my legs and arms were very swollen and he started getting concerned and started talking about a section (the last thing I wanted), due to concerns for my wellbeing. Baby was still free-floating and as such I wasn’t dilated at all! :(

DH and I discussed our options and decided to trust the OB, so we scheduled the section from Friday morning. I was sent away with dip tests and was told to test each time I had a wee to check for protein. Fortunately, this only ever showed a trace.

So, on Friday I checked into hospital and my DH and I were led into the tiniest, dingiest room I have ever seen.

I got changed into my hospital gown and in came a nurse wielding a bic razor and enema. I told her that the razor was not needed, but she wanted to check and then she started shaving...no water, no foam nothing! My DH got so angry with her, as there was nothing to be shaven. In the end he had to wrestle the razor out of her hand! I refused the enema too.

We then had an argument over my name, as they insisted going by everything in the passport...this includes the part that says “nee Hesse”. This wasn’t resolved when I was picked up.

In the lift, a little local guy joined us and started talking at DH and myself. Only as we left the lift did he introduce himself as the anesthetist!

I was then wheeled into theatre. Loads of nurses were standing around and everyone got busy with the epidural.

I still remember being very scared (needle phobia and I watched a video of an epi being placed before. Big mistake!!). The nurses all shoved and pulled me into a ball as tight as possible for the epi to be placed. I remember shaking and one nurse holding my hand and talking to me.

Once the epi was in, it took forever to work. I could keep lifting my legs when they asked me to, but had 4 top-ups in the end. The catheter was inserted before the epi worked (ouch!)

Finally, after 20 minutes I was ready for surgery.

At this point my DH appeared by my side and squeezed my hand telling me all would be ok.

The screen was above my breasts, so I started feeling claustrophobic. My OB peered over the screen and mumbled a brief “hello”

All was calm for a brief bit. Complete silence in fact before everyone started running around and towards my bottom half. I started panicking. Nobody had spoken to me. I wasn’t told what was happening. This was really scary.

Anyway, I was pushed and shoved by 2 guys and the anesthetist from the top of my belly. Michael (my DH) looked a bit shocked at me. Fortunately I could then hear a baby crying. Just in time for the anesthetist to reappear by my side pushing several canules of liquid into my IV. This is the last clear thing I remember. There was a picture taken of us all together, which I don’t remember. I remember coming to to the words “live birth” every now and again. Mostly it is all a blur though.

I wasn’t taken back to my room until 2 hours after my son was born. In the room was only Michael. I started panicking and almost screamed where the baby was. Turns out that against our explicit request, they had taken the baby to nursery.

When they wheeled him in, we chose his name, Charles William Peter.

He was very sleepy and wasn’t feeding. There was no LC in hospital and he did vomit mucous every now and again and needed redressing.

We then had a battle with the nurses who refused to give me food. As I could potentially be sick!! (I did get food in the end)

In the evening I told Michael to go home, so that at least one of us would get a good night’s sleep. This was after they asked permission to give Charlie the Hep B jab. Upon their return we were told that they also did a blood sugar test. We had not agreed to this and were not asked prior.

At roughly 1am Saturday morning, Charlie vomited more mucous and I pressed the call button. But nobody came. I was so scared, as Charlie made the most awful gagging noises. In the end I pulled myself screaming onto my side so I could grab his little arm to pull him onto his side.

Around 5 minutes later a nurse came in. I asked her to redress the baby. She said she would burp him first and settled onto my sofa. She then told me that he felt cold and that she would take him to the nursery to be warmed up. She never came back. I pressed the bell after an hour and the nurse told me that he was still being warmed. Another half hour later and I got the same message. At 3:17am another nurse came in and told me how awful of me to not let them give him formula. He was apparently freezing cold and blue. She kept talking at me, who had broken down into tears. I felt the most useless mum for starving my baby. I could only manage a nod to her repeated order that I should agree to let them give him a teaspoon of formula.

For the remainder of the night I kept pressing the call button roughly every half hour. After responding twice they simply stopped coming. I kept begging for them to bring my baby back to me.

They did in the morning around 7:40. Shortly after my DH arrived and I told him what happened. He didn’t leave my side for the remainder of our stay.

I then begged for my drip to be removed, as I had started getting inflamed.

In the evening the pediatrician told us that he wanted to wash out Charlie’s stomach, as he still brought mucous up and hadn’t eaten. They did another heel prick test, again without our permission. We were told that the levels were fine, but the paedi told us that Charlie needed to go to NICU and be put on a drip. As we didn’t know any better and were really scared for our poor baby, we agreed.

The paedi left, telling us to start pumping and that Charlie needed 2oz every 3 hours! So, here I was forcing myself out of bed into a wheelchair to pump every 3 hours. My DH was amazing in supporting me and taking me downstairs into NICU to see our son as often as I could manage. My first pump yielded 0.5oz and I was ecstatic. By the time Monday morning had come around I had managed to pump just shy of 2oz.

We were told that the drip would be turned down, but each time we went down they had turned it up. I was close to having a breakdown.

The paedi never came to see us and we were told things by the lovely NICU nurse.

In the meantime, my OB came on Saturday evening to check the incision. The nurse that lowered my head end was very rough and the head end just dropped, causing excruciating pain as my reflex to tense core muscles kicked in.

TMI I had a huge gush of blood and thought that my incision had ripped open. Fortunately it hadn’t. I was told to get up and have a shower. So I did, which was agony, but I kept forcing myself to get up and walk around.

Sunday didn’t show any change. We kept struggling to get sterilized pump parts and bottles, etc. It was a nightmare.

My OB was ready to discharge me, but I refused to leave without Charles.

On Monday (without a handover) we were told by the NICU nurse that we could take Charlie home.

I don’t think I have been this happy ever before.

Leaving the hospital behind has been the best thing after having my boy. I have only been back once for my 6 week check-up, where my OB told me the POP was not available in Singapore and I had to go on a combined pill. After 3 days my supply dipped, so I stopped taking it. My GP gave me the POP, which is of course available in Singapore.

I have done some research since based on my hospital bill and I was sedated with 3 different sedatives when Charlie had just been born.

Having worked with my LC and an Osteopath, we were able to get Charlie on the breast in January.

I have change pediatrician and will be looking for a new OB when the time comes.

My new paedi told me how unreasonable it was to tell me that Charlie needed 2oz every three hours.

I am slowly working through the trauma, but I think I am a long way from healing. Only now can I even think of potentially having a second child.

Reflections

My husband Michael and I moved out of Europe for him to take a secondment in his company in Asia. We have been here for just over a year now and all in all are getting on well with the country.

With our new life we decided that we wanted to start trying for a baby. We were very fortunate to fall pregnant the very first month of stopping contraception.
I still remember the day I took that home pregnancy test very clearly. It was 20th March 2011 and I only took the test to rule out pregnancy prior to Michael and I going on holiday. I was stunned when the second line appeared. It was very faint, so I woke Michael to take a look.

I made a last minute appointment with the first OB I could get an appointment with and we went to see him on Wednesday.
It was too early to see anything on the scan as I was only 5 weeks pregnant. We were able to rule an ectopic pregnancy out however, which reassured me ahead of our holiday.

The next time we saw the OB, at 7 weeks pregnant I was terrified of the scan. I was convinced that we could not be so lucky. I remember looking at the screen expecting to be told that there was nothing there, when Michael asked if the flickering was a heartbeat! And sure enough, it was confirmed that I was carrying a single pregnancy and the embryo had a heartbeat. I was over the moon.
We were making plans for our baby, due 23rd November.

A mere week later I told my Manager that I was expecting. I had just accepted a promotion prior to falling pregnant. He too was very happy for us.
The 12 week Down's screening test showed a low risk, so we were not worried. We were at this point seeing the OB every 4 weeks and at 15 weeks the baby was pronounced a little girl. I was confused for a little while, as I was convinced that I was carrying a little boy.
The anomaly scan came around and the sonographer exclaimed very early that "This baby is a boy!". I still remember Michael and I looking at each other in surprise. This scan too came back clear.

I was still very exhausted all the time and had difficulty sleeping. Added to this I started getting dizzy spells, which were uncomfortable and scared me. We had taken the decision that I would stop work, rather than take the 12 weeks of maternity leave.
The remainder of the pregnancy was rather uneventful with minimal problems until the 30 week mark, where my feet started swelling and my blood pressure started climbing slowly. There was nothing to worry about yet though and I tried to stay as active as possible.
I suffered from a lot of illness in the final weeks and was struggling with the large bump I was sporting at this point.

In the final weeks I saw the OB weekly to check on the baby's progress and to monitor his development closely. He measured big and was refusing to engage. With that I was also not starting to dilate.
My due date approached rapidly and there was no change in his move to be born.
Induction and c-section was touched on and we were going to decide what to do on 25th November.

The week of my due date my blood pressure started climbing further, I was very uncomfortable with tightenings and feet that were swollen like elephant stumps. I saw the OB on my due date and I was given the following options:

• Go for an inducton
• Go for a c-section
• Wait another week and see where we are at

The baby was still free floating, so we did not expect him to engage on his own accord. As he wasn't engaged, I refused induction, as I found the risk of it ending in a section too high and I was desperate for Michael to be present at the birth of his son.

After this appointment I transferred to the hospital the OB operates in, rather than the swanky expat hospital I had pre-registered at. I took the decision as the hospital was closer to home. This was the decision I would come to regret a lot.

I agreed to have the section on Friday 25th in the local hospital. I was excited and scared at the same time. I had a date to meet my baby, but it involved the dreaded surgery. I decided that it didn't matter how he was born, as long as he was healthy.

That Friday is now 7 weeks ago and it feels as if our baby boy has been with us for much longer than this. I have had time to recover from pregnancy, the happenings in hospital and start to find my feet as Charles' Mummy.

I am still struggling with the avalanche that was triggered by the decisions I took. However, that is destined for its own dedicated post.