Birth Story #7

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Home birthing in Singapore. I never thought I would do it and yet, I did it, by the grace of God. Here is the birth story of our unplanned home birth, right here in Singapore.

Truly, the labour and birth of our 7th child brought a new meaning to me on depending on God for birthing and not on man. If you had read My Homebirthing Journey, you would have known that I had not planned for a home birth at the beginning. All along, I had planned to go to the hospital.

A Home Birth in Singapore?

However, there were a handful of people who asked if I was planning a home birth this time since our 6th labour and birth was so quick. In fact, our older children started to ask us to birth at home!

That was when I started to think that perhaps I should prepare for one in case I birth even faster this time round. So I started to read up (articles as well as natural birthing forums) and view home birth videos and asked questions of those who had birthed at home in Singapore, UK and the US. And as I prepared to pack my hospital bag, I prepared a home birth “kit” of sorts as a standby as well.

Birth Stats

But before we get into the story let us get the stats out of the way :

• EDD : Friday, 6th March 2009
• Date of birth : Thursday 12th March 2009
• Weight at birth : 4.3kg (our biggest baby!)
• Head circumference : 36cm (again, the biggest!)
• Length of labour : 20hours from start to end (longest labour ever!)

14th Wedding Anniversary

And here is how the labour and birth panned out.

Wednesday, 11th March 2009 (40 weeks 5days)

We saw our doctor in the morning and as he palpated my swollen belly, asked how big my biggest baby was. I told him that she was 3.5kg (#4) He nodded and casually mentioned that this baby was going to be much larger than her. The ultrasound had showed a possible 3.7kg baby. I really didn’t want to know how big she was and had often in the past, deliberately not asked about the size of any of my babies. But he offered that he thought the baby would be around 3.8kg based on his palpation.

About 6pm

As it was our 14th wedding anniversary, we had planned a family dinner at Peach Garden that night. However, as we left for dinner, early labour started. Just before  6pm, I had very mild contractions every 10 minutes apart. But I didn’t say anything as I have been having these contractions before. Contractions continued during dinner. I couldn’t really eat much.

About 8pm – went to the toilet.

This is IT!

Thursday, 12th March 2009 (40weeks 6days)

Midnight – went to sleep with contractions still coming on every 10 minutes. A little more intense now. Feeling the urge to empty bowels but nothing happens. Am quite sure today is the day!

12:35 am – woken up with urge to pee. Almost immediately felt intense contraction. Managed to go right back to sleep after relieving myself.

3:10 am – contractions woke me up. Contractions seem to have moved closer. Every 5 minutes. Urge to go to the toilet again. Successful! 🙂 Started to time length of contractions. 30 – 45seconds long. Pressure on rectal area is felt.

Lying down was not comfortable at all. Stood and leant against the bed with pillow and bolster as props.

4:10 am went downstairs to get a drink. Contractions continue at 5 minutes apart, 30 – 45 seconds long. Went back up to rest. Feeling rather restless though. Contractions still 5 minutes apart. Realising that there was no breakfast in the house (we were planning to have breakfast out and have an outing), I started to write out what to order for whom from MacDonald’s and stuck it up on our whiteboard in the dining area.

About 7 am When Henson stirred at around 7 am, I told him that the morning’s plan of visiting the chiropractor and Science Centre was off 🙂 Told him to call McDelivery for breakfast instead.

I started to SMS friends to inform them that labour is established and to pray for me 🙂 In my mind, it would be all over in 1 – 2 hrs. But what did I know! 🙂

Contractions that last longer

The contractions started to last longer but did not get closer. From 30 to 45 seconds and then from 45 seconds to 1 minute. All this while I was walking and getting on all fours and rocking. I even sat on the toilet bowl to labour!

10:25am – went to the toilet and passed out the mucous plug. Was most pleased because from past experience, it meant labour was very imminent – for me, that is. At that moment, Henson popped his head into the room and I happily told him – soon!

Contractions began lasting 1 minute 15 seconds to 1 minute 30 seconds long but they were still at 5 minute intervals. I had no urge to push. I was starting to get tired and annoyed. After all, I hadn’t slept since 3am and had no appetite for any food. And the fast labour I had anticipated was just not happening. I kept asking God, “What is happening???”

Sleeping through labour

All this while I was labouring alone in the room. I much prefer it this way – quiet and peaceful. Meanwhile Henson was popping his head in every now and then to check on my progress. Each time he was met with a shake of the head, indicating – no progress! The next time he popped his head in, I told him, I was going to sleep.

So I lay down & promptly fell asleep, waking only upon each contraction. At about 12:30pm, I felt a gush of stuff coming out of me. I thought my waterbag had broken. But when I checked, it was just a small puddle. Henson said, “so little?” Lol.

Contractions became a little more intense after that. Each contraction pushed out more mucous. I now got up from bed to walk, rock, go on all fours, squat – whatever I’d read that can help labour progress. But nope! things remained the same. Frustrating. Still 5 minutes apart!

Baby not in correct position?

I began to suspect that my baby is not facing the correct position (baby was ROA throughout the pregnancy) and hence there was a lot of movement in between the contractions and I was feeling a lot of back aches, totally non-existent in my previous 6 births.

At that point in time I was still wondering when to make a move to go to the hospital. In my mind, going by past experiences, I had planned to make a move to the hospital once I started to feel the urge to push but so far, I have had no urge to push and the contractions were not getting any closer at all.

But at about 1:00pm, I decided to SMS my dad to make his way over to our home to watch the children, regardless of the stage of labour. I didn’t need one more thing to worry about while labouring!

Pray

Shortly after that, when Henson popped his head in again and I told him, “I think  the baby is not in the correct position and that’s why we’re not progressing. And my back is aching!” So he came in and started to pray and command Anna to get into the right position. After that he massaged my back a little then the doorbell rang!  My dad had arrived.

1:50pm – As Henson left the room to open the door, I felt a movement down into my cervix (the head?!) and then an intense contraction which broke the real waterbag. This time it was a huge gush. (I have no idea what the previous gush of water was!) The bed was soaked. The back ache was gone! And then I felt the urge to push!

The unplanned home birth

Well, at that point, I wasn’t about to make my way to the hospital for sure! I supposed I could have but the thought of walking down the stairs to my front door,  walk down the corridor to get to the lift, go down 12 floors, walk to the car, drive to Mount Alvernia….Nope. Not doing it!

When Henson came back in, he immediately saw the mess on the bed. I had made my way down from our bed to the mattress I had specially prepared on the floor. I immediately got on all fours and started to push with the contractions.

But guess what? Each contraction was still very far apart. And as I pushed, I would feel the slight ring of fire at the cervix and just as I thought I could bring forth the head, the contractions would stop and and the baby would slip right back in! Argh! I did this 3 times! I was getting increasingly fed-up 🙁

What was happening?!

So when the next contraction came, I told myself, I am going to push her out, with all I have got. So I did – or thought I did. I felt the stretch and burn of the perineum. But since I couldn’t see what was happening, I asked Henson for a description. I was hoping that the head was completely out and all I had to do was wait for the next contraction to push the shoulders out. Nope!

After that huge effort of pushing, all I got out was was just the rim of the head, just before the eyebrows! Oh man! Frustration is an understatement!

Then I felt another contraction and I pushed. This time, I felt the burning sensation all around while the perineum stretched for all it was worth! Then the sting subsided. No more stinging. But the head was not out either!

I was very puzzled. With my previous births, once I felt the ring of fire, the head would be out and in a twinkling of an eye, the shoulders and the rest of the body. But not this time. And why was the interval between the contractions taking so long???* I tried to push some more on my own but of course nothing happened. Then I tried to breathe her out. Nothing happened either!

Home birth in slow motion!

Then I felt more contractions coming along but they were very mild. With each contraction, Henson would go, “I see the eyes now”, “I see the nose”, “I see the lips”.** Then NOTHING!!! I’m like, “huh?” It was like a slow motion movie!

Henson asked, “Do I do anything?” “No!” came my quick reply! “Just leave her alone. Don’t pull her!” Meanwhile, she was just stuck in me. It was highly awkward and uncomfortable.  I asked hopefully, “Are her shoulders out?” “No, it isn’t.” Grrr…. 

I asked,”So what do we do now?” It was of course a rhetorical question. We were clueless. Lol! I tried shifting around slowly but no position was comfortable except on all fours. So I stayed in that position and waited for the next contraction to come that seemed to take forever! Talk about total and complete dependence on God!

Although neither of us knew what to do, what was awesome was that I was very calm* inside. No fear. No pain. No panic. All glory to God!

Totally awesome!

Then comes the awesome part, I felt her turn very slowly. Usually this part happens so fast I don’t feel it but this time I did! I remember yelling at Henson, “Don’t pull her! Don’t touch her” And he goes, “I’m not doing anything! She’s turning on her own!”

And then there was a pause.

I prayed for contractions to re-start while Henson was praying for Anna to cooperate with my body.

A mild contraction came on, one which result in some liquid coming out of me, not the shoulders. Another contraction, more liquid, no shoulders.

Born at home, caught by dad

Suddenly felt huge contraction coming on, I pushed with all my might and the shoulders slid right out into Henson’s hands. Hurray! baby was out! Henson said that as the baby turned, he saw something white pushing through. It was actually one of the shoulders! Cool, eh?

Henson had the privilege of catching his own baby and I had the privilege of birthing a baby as God designed the body to. I looked at the baby. She looked a bit shell shocked, spitting out stuff from her mouth. She lay very quietly, looking all around. Even as Henson handed her to me, she remained observant and very quiet. I took her and started rubbing her back, as I’d read to do and asked for a clean towel to be wrapped around her. And then she started to cry and cry and cry. She wouldn’t stop!

Henson then went outside and called all the children up. They were so thrilled! Our 21 month old kept going, “baby, baby!” And “wet, wet!” referring to the amniotic fluid that had flowed off the the mattress to all over the floor.

Immediately Post-Partum

I tried to nurse her but she was too busy crying. As I sat next to the bed rubbing and admiring her, I felt a slight contraction and something whooshed out of me. I thought it was the placenta but it was just some blood clots. So I told Henson that I wanted to sit on the bed instead of the thin mattress on the floor.

So I climbed up and sat down with the intention of nursing the baby once I was comfortable. In my mind, I was going to put the designated placenta basin under me to catch the placenta when it comes out.

But before I could do anything, I felt a contraction. I lifted up myself slightly and the placenta slipped right out of me, effortlessly! My poor husband had to scoop it up – all warm, squishy and slimy – into the basin instead 🙂

Then the baby started to nurse a little. But she wasn’t very interested. So I decided to go wash up and put on some clothes. I was starting to feel cold.

Messy, very messy!

As I stepped off the bed and took a step towards the bathroom, a huge gush of water and blood flowed out and splashed all over the floor, walls, standing fan, dresser….It looked like a crime scene from the show CSI 🙂 But as I made my way slowly to the bathroom, I started to feel giddy and started to hear voices drifting off. Not a good sign. I was going to faint. I quickly knelt down on the toilet floor and the giddiness went away. I managed to shower off most of the blood and made my way back to the bed to lie back and nurse the baby. This time she was very interested in nursing!

Meanwhile, Henson had to clean up the entire mess all by himself! He’s been just so great! He not only had to clean up the bed and floor and walls, he also had to hurry since I wanted to get to the hospital to get the baby and myself checked.

More mess!

As he finished up, I got up to rinse off more blood that had pooled as I lay nursing. Little did I know that as I stood up, I deposited another huge puddle of blood on the floor! He had to clean up AGAIN! Poor guy.

Again, I felt that I was going to faint, so I quickly changed and made our way down to the car as quickly as possible so that I wouldn’t faint on him!

If you are wondering about the umbilical cord – we did not cut it. I wanted baby to get all her blood to her. So we carried the basin containing the placenta which was still attached to the baby to the hospital.

Mount Alvernia

Trying to us admitted into the hospital was really funny though. They just didn’t know what to do with us. The nurse on duty first asked me, then Henson, “Do you have an appointment?” Like huh? I just had a baby. I need an appointment?! They couldn’t figure out if I should go into the Delivery Suite or not.

In the end, Henson just told them, “We’re going to the Delivery Suite.” Once there, they did their usual procedures while I waited for my doctor to come and check on me. That was when we found out what a big baby she was! 4.3 kg!

The doctor stepped in after a while and confirmed that I didn’t tear.** Praise God! But he advised that I should take the injection to help the uterus contract. faster. I didn’t argue with him on that. But I must say that that injection hurt more than the stretching of my cervix to accommodate the baby’s 36cm head!

Why Get Myself Checked In?

Are you are wondering why I chose to get myself checked into the hospital instead of staying home? That’s because I really needed to rest! At the hospital, I would be waited on hand and foot. And once I finished nursing the baby, I could just hand her over to the nursery while I got some rest. If I were at home, I wouldn’t have this luxury. Plus Henson would have to look after 2 more persons.

So this is the story of my unplanned, planned homebirth. And how marvellous that I had the opportunity and honour to experience full dependence on God for this birth. Praise God indeed!

Notes :

* This was an answered prayer. I had prayed from the beginning that the birth be a calm one. Well the birth itself was very exciting but God kept be calm and at peace.

** On hindsight, it was God’s hand that allowed a longer than usual interval between the contractions. If it had happened any faster, I would have torn. But because it was so slow, the perineum had the chance to slowly stretch to accommodate the head without tearing. Isn’t God awesome???

*** Henson said that as her lips emerged, Anna started spitting out brownish liquid. I guess that would be the amniotic fluid being flushed out?

**** You may also want to read my “What Did I Learn“, reflective post.

***** And no, I never get tired of telling this story over and over 🙂

Read my other birth stories

• Birth Story #1
• Birth Story #2
• Birth Story #3
• Birth Story #4
• Birth Story #5
• Birth Story #6

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