And her name is...........

Well our little lady is ten days old now, (already, how did THAT happen) and it's probably about time that we shared her name with the rest of the world. So, drum roll, here it is, we've decided to call her Anja. The only problem is that we don't have a middle name yet, so any suggestions would be gratefully received, to fit with the others it needs to be short, but other than that, we're open to any ideas.

A week ago we were still in hospital, little Miss was only a day old, and I was trying to get a bit of extra rest after a few sleepless nights before I even had her. Time has just flown, and yet at the same time, gone really slowly. I can hardly believe that it was only just over a week ago that I was still pregnant and I hadn't met her yet. Just over a week ago that I had three children not four. Just over a week ago that I was sick of being pregnant and just wanted her here, now. So much can happen in such a short space of time, it feels as though she's always been here.

Welcome little Miss...

From the moment that I knew I was pregnant again, I expected to have a slightly early than due date baby. My first two had been over, (9 and 6 days) admittedly, but my third had arrived 3 days early, so logically this one would be slightly earlier still. Of course I was forgetting one important fact, babies don't generally follow patterns, and really I was foolish to think that mine would. The 6^th of June, (my due date) came and went and still no baby, I'd been quite happy to go over before, but as I really wasn't expecting it this time, I felt really miserable. That night I woke with quite strong contractions, and began to think that maybe this was it. Finally at around 5am, I drifted off, and things had ground to a halt, so now I was miserable, tired and completely over it.

My midwife came round to see me at home, for my weekly visit, and she pointed out that one day late wasn't really “over-due” as such, and I couldn't really complain. We discussed plans for what would happen if there was still no baby in a week, although she had every confidence that things would happen sooner than that. I can't say that I shared her optimism at that point, especially as we had all been saying that, with all the signs I'd had for well over two weeks now.

I went to playcentre as normal, and had a nice sit down with a cup of tea while they took all the kids to see a digger working up the road. I had thought maybe being there might help kick things off, as it was something to keep me busy, but I didn't even have a twinge. I was having a lot more show though, I'd been having bits and bobs for the last two weeks, but suddenly it had upped a gear, and every time I went to the loo I was getting heaps.

Bed time came, and in all honesty I'd had less tightenings and crampy feelings than I'd had in days, so I really wasn't expecting much. Lena woke up at around 1am though, and I went and got in bed with her for a bit, just to settle her. At around 2am, I woke up with quite a strong contraction, and made my way back to bed. I tried to stay there for a while to see what would happen, fully expecting the same as had happened the previous night, but it wasn't long before I felt that I needed to get out of bed to deal with them. By around 5 am, it was clear that things were actually progressing, and that this might really bit it. I got Mike to call his Mum, and gave my midwife a call. She was already at the hospital, and had been up all night with another delivery. Bit of a shame, but never mind.

At around 6.30 I felt a pop inside, and suddenly felt rather wet. I shouted Mike to bring me a towel, and somehow managed to keep any mess off the carpet. I tried to put on some clean pants and my jeans, so that I would be ready to go, but I just couldn't do it. Instead I grabbed another clean towel, and wore that to the hospital instead.

Mike's Mum was still quite a way off our house, and I was beginning to feel that I needed to get to the hospital, so we arranged to meet up with her on route, and swap cars, so that she could drive the kids back home. Mike piled them into the car, and then I got in, trying to get comfy between contractions, easier said than done while travelling in the car. It didn't seem to be long before we were swapping cars, and then pulling up outside the hospital. I must have looked a right sight; lower half wrapped in a towel, slippers on, and just a t-shirt and old cardi on my top half. It was freezing too, but I really didn't care at that point.

When we arrived we were shown to the delivery room, but my midwife was dealing with an emergency with her other delivery. I just lent over some chairs and rocked back and forth with each contraction. As soon as she was able, my midwife came in and checked my progress, I was already at 10 cm, although I was feeling no urge to push yet, there was just a lot of pressure. I continued in the bending over position, first of all over the chairs and then kneeling on the floor, rocking with each contraction, and breathing through it all. As Toni, my midwife had been up all night, she called in another midwife to help her, a student midwife came in to help to begin with, and gave me sips of iced water whenever I felt I needed them, and helped mop my brow. Then Judy the closest midwife from the “team” arrived to help, followed not long after by Nicky, who was supposed to be the back up midwife. So, my very easy, straightforward birth had three midwives and one student midwife in attendance.

After a while I decided I needed to wee, and once I was sitting on the toilet, I just didn't want to move. It was so comfortable, the contractions were even easier to deal with in that position. All of a sudden though, gravity kicked in and I had the uncontrollable urge to push, I'd breathed the baby down as far as I could and now it was time to get things moving. I was helped off the toilet, and back into the delivery room. Unfortunately, moving back into the all fours position meant that the urge to push vanished. After two contractions passed, and I had what felt like long breaks between each one, I still didn't feel the need to push, so I tried sitting back on my heels. Bingo, there it was again, there was a glimpse of the head, but the urge was gone before I got any further. Two more contractions passed with nothing and then it was back, this time the head was right there, but still in no hurry to fully come out. It was quite annoying to feel it slip back again, but one of my (many) midwives said that this was the best way to do it, stretch everything, so there was less chance of tearing. Two more contractions, and then we were on again, and the head was out. Mike was in position to catch the baby, who had the cord looped around the neck, and then with one more contraction and push she was out. Mike caught her, and then handed her though my legs so I could hold her against my chest. She had lots of black hair, and I couldn't believe that I had another little girl.

I was helped onto the bed, and was soon feeding like a pro, while I delivered the placenta. We waited until it had stopped pulsing, before Mike cut the cord, and then I delivered it ten minutes or so later, without the injection. I was checked out, and apart from a little scratch or two, was all intact, so the stretching must have helped. Apparently my perineum looks as though I've never had kids!

All that was left was to have the best tea and toast I've ever had, the best shower I've ever had, and to weigh my lovely little lady. Who was a little bigger than her sister and one of her brothers had been, at a healthy 8lb 8oz. So there you have it, baby number four, and my best birth to date.

Random thoughts about time....

Well my little lady is already pushing six months, I'm not sure quite how or when that happened.  It all goes so fast.  The funny thing is, quite often I find myself thinking that I wish that Kai and Mahe weren't so old already, I miss them being babies.  Mahe was two last week, and Kai was four.  But if one of them was still a baby, then I wouldn't have Lena, and I wouldn't want that.  I wouldn't want all of them to be small at the same time either, people think I'm mad enough having three under five.  (It was three under four.)

I suppose I'm happy with it all really, and there's always part of me waiting for the next stage, seeing the new things that they learn, but at the same time, I really don't want them to get older, just keep them small forever.  Can I have them little and old all at once please?

Welcome to the world Lena Jo

I wrote this not long after having our third baby, Lena Jo on April 23rd, but I haven't added it to here until now:

Although I know that every pregnancy,
every birth and every baby is different, this being my third baby, I
had quite a few preconceptions about how things would pan out. Although
I'd been doing everything in my power to ensure that I didn't have
another long labour, I was fully expecting to be at it for quite a
while again, and to be overdue. In the last week or so though, I'd
begun to have doubts, I was pretty sure that I'd had a show, and this
baby was engaged and much lower than either of the boys ever had been
at this stage, maybe this time it would be different?

On the Thursday evening, I gave Mahe his
bedtime feed, and immediately got quite bad braxton hicks contractions,
they didn't last for too long, and soon stopped. He was awake again in
the night, and after another feed, I had about half an hour more of
contractions that came to nothing. I didn't really think much more
about it, I'd decided that Friday wasn't going to be the day that I had
my baby, although I'd quite have liked it to be, as it was my Nana's
birthday.

I spent most of the day pottering round
and finishing off little jobs that I'd been meaning to do for a while
but just hadn't got around to as yet. I didn't have a twinge all
morning, and at three, when I was picking up Kai from Big Steps, I was
really quite surprised to suddenly have a big contraction that took my
breath away. I still didn't really think that it was the start of
anything, so once I'd driven home, I walked up to the shop to post some
letters. It quickly became apparent that things were happening and that
my baby was on the way. I timed the contractions and found that I was
having them every five minutes or so, and they were lasting about 30
seconds. I text my midwife, and tried to keep my mind busy so that I
wasn't thinking about the pain. Because I've been being a good girl and
doing my homework, I was doing my best to get into the right position,
seeing as I've had such long labours before, I spent each contraction
on all fours with my bottom wiggling.

Unfortunately I'd decided to go into
labour on one of the few occasions when my midwife wasn't on call, so
after looking forward to knowing the midwife who was going to deliver
my baby, right at the last fence, it wasn't to be. Her back up midwife
knew all about me though, and shared similar ideas with my midwife, so
it was ok. I spoke to her first at about five and she said that they
would be back in touch with me shortly to decide what to do. Usually
they waited until the contractions were coming around every three
minutes, but as I was going for a vbac they thought they might want me
sooner.

It became clear, as I waited for them to
call back that perhaps my body wasn't waiting around in quite the same
way that it had in the past, he contractions were now coming every four
minutes, and between them I managed to let M know that we'd better get
his sister round to watch the boys and get going. I called the midwife
back, and said I thought I'd better come in.

It's a half hour drive to the hospital,
and I spent much of the journey thinking, just slow down and hold on a
bit longer, as things were certainly moving along. We reached Waitati
only to discover that they were diverting the traffic up into the back
of beyond due to a bad accident on the main road. M pulled up at the
road block, and in true television fashion explained that his wife was
in labour, they quickly waved us through, I think M was a little
disappointed that we didn't get a police escort though.

Once at the hospital, all should have
been plain sailing, but a few little things started to go wrong. My
promised cordless monitoring went out of the window, as no one could
actually get the one remaining machine to work. (The other two were out
of order due to error in one case, and someone accidentaly chucking one
of the $4,000 pads into the laundry basket in the other.) So for a
third time I was to spend my labour wired to the monitor. Next came the
fun of trying to site the cannula, which they were putting in just in
case I needed a drip. They also needed to take some blood as I seemed
to have two NHI numbers and no one could work out my blood group as a
result. When I had Mahe they took two attempts to get it in, and I
ended up with a very swollen hand, due to my small veins. This time,
the midwife decided to get the consultant in to do it, and even he took
quite a while to find a suitable site to place it.

Finally it was time to check how far
along I was, and after my previous experiences of having to be told
that I was only a few centimetres dilated, I could have kissed the
midwife when she told me that I was already 7 - 8 cm. I quickly got
back into the bottom in the air, on all fours and wiggling like a mad
thing with every contraction position that I'd been in before. They
gave me gas and air, which helped a little bit, but to be honest I only
used a handful of times because it made my mouth so dry.

By this point the student midwife I'd
been seeing had also arrived, so although I hadn't got my midwife,
there was someone there who'd been following the rest of my pregnancy
which was nice. They kept telling me how well I was doing, and how well
I seemed to be coping. I told them that it must be my British stiff
upper lip, but I'm not sure that these Kiwi's always know how to take
my sense of humour. I decided about now that I needed to go to the
toilet, and discovered that actually sitting on the loo was really very
comfortable. I stayed there for three contractions, and was a little
concerned in case I ended up having the baby on the loo, but the
midwife assured me that although she'd had some close calls in the
past, she'd always managed to prevent the baby arriving in the toilet
bowl in the past.

She'd been asking me if I was feeling
any need to push for a little while, but I wasn't feeling the need at
all. Once off the loo, she wanted to see how far along I was. I was
quite surprised to find out that not only was I fully dilated, but the
babies head was actually only about an inch from appearing. I still
felt absolutely no need to push, and I continued to breath through each
contraction, letting my body do the work. After a while the midwife
said that I should perhaps think about trying a push with the next
contraction as the doctors tended to start to panic if things went on
for too long, with me having a vbac. Trying to push, when I didn't
actually feel the need to was very hard, the midwife used her fingers
to give me something to push against, and before long little baby was
on the way out.

I think the whole pushing process took
about 45 minutes, which was a similar length of time that it took with
Mahe, but everything else had been much faster. They held up a mirror
so that I could see the head emerge, and the progress I was making with
each push. When the head arrived, unlike Mahe, who lay there still
until he actually fully arrived, little babe opened one eye and wiggled
a bit. Little babe was delivered straight onto my chest and half
wrapped in a towel, while I had my first cuddle. M cut the cord, and
they gave me an injection for the placenta which followed fairly
quickly.

We'd been busy taking in our new arrival
for about ten minutes, when a different midwife (the one who'd been
there for the birth had to go and deliver another baby, apparently
there is very rarely more than one lady in labour at a time, but that
night there were three,) asked what we'd had. M had a look, and had to
double check “is it a girl?” I could hardly believe it, I'd actually
got a daughter!

She was soon having her first feed, and
although feeding a little one again took a bit of getting used to, she
was soon having a mammoth feed. Meanwhile I was having an array of
different midwives checking my blood loss, and that things were
returning to normal. Mic-feed and mic-being poked and prodded Lena
suddenly went blue and floppy, and she was quickly whisked away. I
don't know exactly what happened, and she quickly recovered, but it was
perhaps the scariest thing that I've ever experienced. Apparently
sometimes they forget to breath and swallow, and she was thoroughly
checked over to rule out any other problems.

After everything had been sorted out I
got my tea and toast, which were divine, and then a shower, which was
so good that I would have been quite happy to spend the rest of the the
week in there. A few more checks were done, and we made our way back to
the ward. I was still too full of adrenaline to get much sleep, that
and the noises of the hospital and the need to check my little girl
every few minutes, meant that I did little more than doze for half an
hour here and there.

I'd done it though, a little girl and my third, and by far my easiest, birth.

So tired

I really could do with more sleep, this whole pregnancy thing makes you tired at the best of times, but with Mahe not sleeping very well at the moment, and then me not able to get back to sleep after getting up to him, I'm really suffering at the moment.  Sorry, didn't mean to just moan, but I am feeling pretty rotten at the moment.  Still when baby number three turns up, at least I'll be used to sleepless nights I suppose......

Another new venture.

Well, since my last entry, when I think I mentioned my new on-line shop, http://www.nzwools.co.uk I've also become involved in something else. 
I ordered a load of bamboo knitting needles and crochet hooks for the site, and thought I'd try selling a few here in New Zealand too, so I listed them on Trademe.  (Which, in case you are wondering, is a bit like ebay.)  They sold far better than I expected, so now I have another on-line store, this time just for needles and hooks, and it's got everything from circular needles, to crochet hooks, to tunisian crochet hooks on it.  All quite exciting really.  http://www.knitnacks.webs.com

KnitNacks

I'll have to try to keep you up to date more often though, I seem to go ages between making entries on here.