Transformation

Wow. What an unbelievable few days it has been! Poor Kati, she must be so exhausted! Well, I am happy to announce that Kati and I are the proud parents of a beautiful baby girl!

The birth didnt go exactly as planned, which shouldnt be too big of a surprise given our history with ‘planning’, but nonetheless it was the best birth possible given the circumstances, and we couldnt be happier!

So heres the rundown… After a few days in pre-labour, kati started to get regular contractions around 2.30 on Tuesday afternoon about 15 minutes apart. They continued throughout Tuesday and tuesday night. It looked like she was getting towards final stages of labour late Wednesday morning with a lunchtime birth the guess. I knew it was getting close wen Kati started telling me she couldnt do it anymore, this being a sign things were coming to an end soon. I still felt really bad saying that she could, and in fact was doing it, and things were going to be really soon. Fast forward about 5 or so hours later, in what seemed like 3 days for me and must have felt like an eternity to Kati, there was still no baby, and I dont know how encouraging my ‘almost there’ whispers were any more, I have a feeling they may have lost some of their meaning

After a couple more hours, and complete exhaustian on poor Kati, we took the midwifes advice to head to the hospital to get a helping hand. Our midwife had already spoken to the people at the hospital to get us sorted quickly. Kati and I both were really not wanting to have to go the hospital, but it seemed that there was some excessive tissue that was seemingly ‘blocking’ the birth from progressing. Kati had been fully dilated for about 5 hours or so by now. When talk of caesarians started aswell, this really got Kati worried, but there was just no way she could do it on her own anymore, I felt her pain and exhaustion in her cries of not being able to do it anymore. I convinced her that she had done REALLY well, and I was so proud of her and she was so strong. I told her not to feel defeated, and that this was the best thing for her.

We eventually got to the hospital and were seen to straight away, a few too many needles later in my opinion and some painstaking screams with each contraction, and next thing I knew I was at the end of the bed catching our beautiful daughter River Sage Brickwood at 8.35pm on the 5th of November, 2008. I was so proud of Kati, she is such a remarkable woman. She managed to birth the baby all on her own without too much intervention, and bonded with River immediately. She is such a good mother, wonderful instincts! They got her stitched back up from minor tearing and the obtrusive piece of tissue that the dr was quite confused about what to do with, and we spent the next few hours with the baby getting ready to leave as soon as we could. 

The staff at the hospital were really good, we were very lucky to get good people. Mum and dad, especially mum who was with us from about 10pm Tuesday night, and of course Jan, the midwife, were such a great help aswell. We really were lucky, and had the best birth we could under the circumstance. Perhaps next time we will have the successful home birth we had both imagined. I still believe it was successful in my opinion anyway, Kati laboured there for 27 or so hours, and if it were possible, we would have had the baby there. Jan was just not confident to do the necessary cut and thought it best at the hosiptal. Everything was over in the hospital within 1-2 hours too, so in my opinion Kati did everything possible to have a successful homebirth, and did really, REALLY well!

We left around midnight or so, and got to bed around 3am this morning. We were both exhausted, although Kati seemed to be managing well with the extra hormones she had, tried to get some sleep and saw the midwife again today.

So the transformation begins….. a son becomes a father, and such is the circle of life.

River’s weight was 3550grams (7lbs/13oz) and length was 50cm. Pictures will be coming in the next few days!

It has been a nice, easy, quiet day today, and Im going to go and have a rest with my girls again now.