17 Feb (Sat) -

Actually, I can't remember the chronologically how things went. But I think at around 2 plus am on Sat morning, my gynae came to see me (finally!) and when he wanted to do another VE, I refused to let him do it. The lousy young doctor just did one like 5 min ago before they wheeled me to the delivery ward and I was only 2cm dilated. How much difference can that 5-10 min make?! My gynae suggested doing the 4th prostin but I refused and begged him to cut me up.

I was suffering more from the 'imprisonment' than anything. I just wanted to get out. If I need to get the baby out before I can get out of my predicament, then do anything to get the baby out fast! I wasn't really suffering much from the slow labour per se.

So, finally, my gynae suggested that we break the waterbag, put me on epidural and drip and speed things up. And thus, that was what happened. I was on epidural, my membrane was burst, an intermal fetal monitor was harpooned to Dominic's head, I was put on oxytocin drip and then we waited again.

From then on, I stayed in the labour ward until the baby finally came out on early Sunday morning. Throughout this time, I was completely knocked out, dozing in and out of consciousness. Richard was with me, but poor thing, it must have been really terrible for him too, to do nothing and just watching in that depressing room.

18 Feb (Sun) -

In the wee hours on Sunday morning, I was finally fully dilated and my epidural was actually finishing. The good midwife actually suggested that we don't top it up so that the effect would wear off and I could feel the contractions so that I know when to push. We were agreeable to this. So I started what I now know is 'purple pushing'. The midwife asked me to lie on my side (which is a better position than lying down) and then started the cheering squad thingy. I could actually feel the contraction and was pushing as the midwife told me to.

After some time, I was just too weary and was crying, not because of the pain, but I was just too weary. Remember, I have not had anything to eat since Friday afternoon. That's more than 24 hours. I barely had anything to drink except ice cubes to suck on. I was also puking up now and then. I puked nothing because I ate nothing.

Again, I was begging my gynae to just cut me up but he was encouraging me and telling me that I could have my baby 'naturally'. When he came in and found out that my epidural is off, he asked them to top it up again.

Finally, at the early hours of Sunday morning (5 plus in the morning), Dominic was delivered by forcep. He was 3.905kg at birth. Of course, because it's forcep delivery, I had episiotomy done. When he was placed on my stomach right after he came out, I was too daze to react. The next thing I knew, I was gasping for breath. They quickly took Dominic away and brought in all the equipments, like ER style, because I was complaining I didn't have enough air.

I was stuck in the delivery ward until my condition stabilised.  Turnout my blood count was half of what it was supposed to be.  During this time, Dominic was wheeled to the NICU for monitoring because he was having a bit of fever.  I did not have a chance to see him, touch him or breastfeed him.  I was not in the condition to do so anyway.  He was subsequently moved to the normal nursery after his fever came down.  Later on, I found out that the fever could be a side effect of the epidural. 

After all that ordeal, when I came to and became more stabilised, the first person I wanted was my mother. Funny thing is that I was never very close to my mother but in times like this, you want the comfort of mommy again. Richard called my parents and they came down quickly and even the usually not-very-accomodating hospital made an exception and let my mother in to the delivery ward to see me.

I only got to see and hold Dominic when I eventually was sent back to my ward in the afternoon.

And that's the whole story of Dominic's birth and why I dread going through the factory process induction process, and the 'imprisonment' in the delivery ward so much.  This is why for subsequent births, I was adamant that we would wait for the labour to start on its own - no induction - and we would not go to the hospital too early.  I was also determined to have as little intervention as possible.