28.8.15

"A beautiful memory"...My pregnancy and birth story (Elise)

I have joined up with a fellow mummy blogger to share "a beautiful memory" you xz. Learn all about Hannah and her lovely family and read her fab blog here
http://faithsmummy.blogspot.ie/?m=1&zx=e0a208f06244f88

With Elise starting school I have been very sentimental and emotional lately. I can't quite believe my beautiful baby girl is all grown up and heading off to big girl school. Here is my beautiful memory of my journey in to motherhood...

My pregnancy with Elise was a complete surprise!November 2010 and I had not long booked my wedding and had just chosen my perfect dress. Rich proposed the December before, and we knew we wanted to start a family after our wedding. Around the middle of November I started to feel very tired and extremely moody and generally just felt a bit off. The following week I started to feel quite sick and had to leave a couple of fitness classes I attended early, because I felt very dizzy and unwell. I put it down to coming down with a bug. I went to work and was sick and got sent home and told to rest up for a couple of days. I returned to work and had my annual review with my manager. I came over all dizzy and was sick in my managers bin (not my finest moment) I remember her commenting on the fact I had been Quite sick recently and she even joked about me being pregnant! I got sent home. I called my GP and they told me to take a pregnancy test just to rule it out but said I probably had a bug.


That night rich had finished work early for the week and came home. I told him the GP told me to take a test but I knew I couldn't be pregnant. 3.30am, I will always remember that time. I woke up and desperately needed the toilet. I did the test and placed it on the side not giving it a second thought. As I was washing my hands I glanced over and a very dark blue cross appeared. I picked it up shaking and felt like the wind had been knocked out of me. I called for rich and shouted "rich I am pregnant" (I am surprised my neighbours didn't hear) he replied a really confused "what" I ran in the bedroom turned on the lights, waving this pregnancy test in front of him asking him if I really was pregnant. His reaction was amazing and more than I could have hoped for. He smiled and looked at me and said were having a baby. The first words that came out my mouth was "my wedding dress" I was in total shock and started jabbering away about the wedding and how I wasn't ready to be a mum. I started to shake and cry. Rich made me tea and we sat up in bed watching FRIENDS dvds until it was a suitable hour for me to call my mum and tell her.


It took a few days to really sink in but I was so happy and excited to become a mum. I had sickness till 14 weeks and felt tired, and had a major craving for ice lolly's in the first few months. But apart from that I felt great! We had our 12 week scan and got to see our baby for the first time. It was such an amazing and overwhelming feeling to see your little baby on that screen, and see its little heartbeat. It hit me right then and there that my life would never be the same and finally it felt very  real. We were so happy and announced our pregnancy to everyone. Then the next day I felt like part of my world had shattered. Rich told me he was being deployed to Afghanistan for possibly up to 6 months and he was leaving in 10 weeks. I cried a lot and stressed and worried, a million and one questions and worries ran through my head but I knew I had to stay strong for him and for our baby.

We had our 20 weeks scan and decided to find out the gender. When the lady announced it was a girl I squealed with delight. ever since I can remember I always wanted a girl first. I am very close with my mum and I wanted to have that sort of relationship with my daughter. We found out I was rhesus negative and that I needed to have some jabs to protect any future pregnancy's I may have, in case my baby was a positive blood type (which she is). With just a few weeks to go we shopped and organised everything we could for the baby before rich left, so that he could be a part of the process. The day he left was surreal. I had cried so much leading up to that day that when it came to say goodbye I waved him off as if he was just going to work for the day. I didn't want him to worry about me, even though I knew he would.




It was the hardest 4 months of my life. I was lucky enough to have my mum by my side for hospital appointments and ante natal classes but I felt so out of place being the only one there without there partner. I don't know if people didn't know what to say to me or just generally had no idea, but people would ask me silly questions like, do you miss him? are you worried he wont come back? are you scared in case you have to raise your baby on your own? Word to the wise, these are not questions you should be asking anyone who is pregnant when there partner is in a war zone, but I had to stay strong.

Five days before my due date an unexpected person walked through the door...rich! He got an earlier flight which meant we had a few extra days together before we welcomed our daughter into the world. I had been sending rich weekly photos of my bump and letters about how much my back hurt, how tired and huge I felt, and how bad my heartburn was so he felt like he was going though it with me. He left when I was 23 weeks pregnant and came back when I was 39 weeks so I was pretty huge!





My due date 30 July 2011 I woke up around 7.30 am with some strong contractions. The night before I made a visit to the hospital as I had been having contractions on and off but they had died off once I got to the hospital. We called the hospital and they said for me to stay at home as long as I could. By 10 am I was in the hospital with my mum and rich by my side and in a lot of pain. The midwife examined me and told me I was 2 to 3 cm dilated. I felt so deflated. They agreed to keep me in as my contractions were strong and regular. I was given a shot of diamorphine to help with the pain so I would sleep as they explaied it would take a while. 4 hours later after bouncy on a ball and walking round and the diamorphine well and truly worn off, they started to fill up the pool after declaring I had finally reached 4cm. It took a good half hour for the pool to fill up, and at 2.30pm I was saying I needed to push. The midwife told me there was no way I was ready to push and told me to try some gas and air. The pain was unbearable and I had this overwhelming urge to push. I asked that they either let me push or give me an epidural because the pain was unbearable. The midwife said she would check me and then get my epidural. As she checked me she asked me to push. My waters broke and I was 10 cm. They realised she was back to back and might be difficult to push out. After 20 minutes of pushing and without any assistance I gave birth to our beautiful daughter Elise Marie. A full head of dark hair, big eyes and weighing 6lbs 9oz she was perfect. Once her head was out the midwife got me to deliver her myself and I pulled her up onto me. It was the most amazing thing I have ever done and the rush of love I felt for her was indescribable.

After spending the night at the hospital and having family and friends visit, we were allowed to leave the hospital and start our new life as a mummy and daddy with our perfect princess.





Sorry it was a long post but I hope you enjoyed reading it. Please leave any comments or feedback below.

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