MSE Pregnancy Club 24

fluffnutter

ginvzt wrote: »

Thanks all for kind words. I know I don't want her around soon and the shorter the visit, the beter. The problem with the feeling is that I may need someone to help me initially with passing the babies to me, especially as there are two of them! But we will see, maybe I will manage to cope myself with all this.

The thing is, I want the babies to meet their grandma and for her to be on ther lives, but in limited doses, please! My own mum is only coming in the second half of July, and she is not pressuring me that she needs to be here days after the birth, why would I want his mum on my neck soon after the birth?

I know just how you feel. My mother told me that her mother came to stay with her for a week after my brother (first baby) was born. She said it was wonderful having someone around to help her and looked at me wistfully. I just looked back in horror!

Gently work on your OH, gin. He should be putting you and the babies first and if you have his support I bet you'll be far more relaxed about being able to ask for the support you need whilst maintaining the boundaries that will keep you sane. Twins are hard work, particularly at first - the balance is in getting the help you need without feeling swamped.

Dizzi, I cried when I read your post. So pleased to hear that your little girl's doing well - Erin is a beautiful name. But what a frightening experience

MrsManda

*hugs for Gin*I managed to miss your post when looking through this morning. Sorry you're having such trouble with your MIL.

Is your OH going to be on paternity leave after the birth? If so then surely your OH can point out to his mother that you need at least a week to yourselves as a new family before being inundated by family, however well meaning?

One of the things my midwife suggested and which was suggested again at my antenatal classes was to tell people that your midwife has strongly advised against allowing anyone to visit in the first week because you'll need your rest and time to bond with your babies. After that to limit visitors to a few hours at a time rather than allowing them to stay with you as you and baby need time to relax and rest. The general view of the midwife seemed to be that blaming everything on them gives you an out in which you can get time to yourselves.
Could this work with your MIL?

My OH has two weeks paternity leave booked so we're thinking that we'll restrict visitors for the majority of those two weeks and allow people to come after that as we'll have had time to get to grips with things and I'll be alone most of the day so having people around could be helpful.

You need to point out (or get your midwife/doctor to) to your OH that his main priority is to reduce your stress levels and look after you and baby and that his mother is not going to help that.
Are you going to antenatal classes? Our last class had a large section basically telling future daddies that one of their jobs after the birth was to field phone calls and limit visitors including politely turning people away if they turn up uninvited on the doorstep.

*hugs* hope it works out for you and your MIL doesn't cause too much stress.

fluffnutter

MrsManda wrote: »

One of the things my midwife suggested and which was suggested again at my antenatal classes was to tell people that your midwife has strongly advised against allowing anyone to visit in the first week because you'll need your rest and time to bond with your babies. After that to limit visitors to a few hours at a time rather than allowing them to stay with you as you and baby need time to relax and rest. The general view of the midwife seemed to be that blaming everything on them gives you an out in which you can get time to yourselves.

This is great advice.

Thankfully I have no friends and am unlikely to be inundated by anyone after I give birth

GemmaE

Dizzi-Glad you are on the mend, but I am appalled by the treatment you received by your hospital. I had a bit of a traumatic birth with my DD and felt incredibly wobbly afterwards, I made an appointment with the lead midwife at my hospital to go through everything that had happened which did make me feel a lot better. I also considered counselling as felt on the verge of PND (history of depression and felt absolutely awful for a few weeks, not back to normal for about 2 months), but things did gradually improve. I'm glad you are both recovering, hope you get to go home soon.

Last time my boobs leaked from really early on, think they are going to start soon as feeling a bit tingly in that area now.

Whilst DH is on paternity leave we are taking a no/ very restricted visits policy, although my mum has planned to have some annual leave when he goes back to work in case I end up eith another C-Section, MIL is fab and will be over as much or as little as we want.

Anyhoo, must get back to analysing financial ratios and financial statements, only got an hour til I need to collect DD!

Amymo

I know just how you feel. My mother told me that her mother came to stay with her for a week after my brother (first baby) was born. She said it was wonderful having someone around to help her and looked at me wistfully. I just looked back in horror!

I had a similar experience this week, my mother was talking to my aunt, she thought out of my earshot at a family party, and asked her whether she attended her daughters birth as she'd jump at the chance to attend mine but we "don't want her there"! She went on to say she could understand why, but would love the opportunity - I felt a bit bad but this is something DH and I feel we have to experience together, and I want it to be something we share together. Thankfully she and I are on the same page re visiting as I've been really clear pat leave is precious little time for the new daddy to get to bond with his little girl

Amymo

Oh and whilst we're talking about other visitors, we have a lot of friends/close family, would I be mad to suggest that we have a bit of an 'open house' say 1-3 on one of the earlier days for closer family and friends to pop in, sort of like hospital visiting hours, was thinking MIL could be on hand to help with teas and coffees? I would have to weigh up overstimulating the baby but it could be a good way of getting people through the door!

A friend gave me some advice that others may like, I'm not too cautious on germs etc but with her new baby she had discreetly put some of that antibac handwash on the table!!

Triangle

Fluffnutter - I'll be your friend/stalker if you want!

Ladies, thank you so much about your reassurance about leaky breasts - I didn't know it was common so early on and feel much better now

MrsManda - great advice from midwife about visitors, thank you. I'm another one who is a bit concerned. DH has 5 nephews/nieces and I'm already a little worried about how the whole family of his side will be descending on us - his sister has already said she wants to visit me in hospital which I'm not keen on (all being well, I don't even expect to be in for long). I feel a tad selfish as I want my mum, dad and sister round asap but panic about the the house being full of visitors too early on

Txxx

Triangle

Amymo wrote: »

A friend gave me some advice that others may like, I'm not too cautious on germs etc but with her new baby she had discreetly put some of that antibac handwash on the table!!

Ooooh, like this, thanks Amy

lovecrafting

I havent read back verry far but had to post to dizzi.

isla was 34+4 and needed phototherapy, ng tubes 6 hrly bloods, you name it she had it. all i can say is please make sure you take some time for yourself, remember to eat and drink and dont let them bully you into the breast feeding. take some time to think over what has happened and please please dont let them discharge baby until she is 12 hrs clear on her blood tests with the jaundice. if baby is on the heat mat it is ok to take her out for skin to skin contact, no matter what they say kangaroo care is just as good as the heat mat, but most of all (((hug)))

dizziblonde wrote: »

OK I kind of vanished... apologies - this will be long and may be distressing/worrying to some - for someone who was never freaked by horror stories - I kind of had one, and appear to have majorly jumped the queue a bit. Before I say anything - I'll say the horror story part isn't the birth bit - but the behaviour of the hospital really. Haven't been able to post for a loooong while, hell, haven't seen the sunlight for a looooong while either - persuaded hubby to buy me a wireless dongle thingee and bring my laptop in tonight so I wasn't climbing the walls in here.

So gather round and I'll give you the list of how NOT to behave in labour, things not to say that'll flag you up as a nutcase and similar...

OK, so we last saw our heroine, sat at her PC, at 33 weeks pregnant - armed with one mahoosive Green and Blacks easter egg - and then she kind of vanished into the sunset. Basically I had periody-type pains, nowt unbearable, nowt "contracty" - but on a regular timeframe - which was what worried me... rang the hospital in the end expecting them to tell me to go in, get checked, get told it was ok, and get home within a few hours.

Got to hospital, and they put me on the trace monitor, baby was fine, uterus wasn't doing much but they did an internal exam and found some fluid around, tested it and it was amniotic fluid so there was obviously a leak in my membranes somewhere - so they gave me the first of the two steroid injections to mature the baby's lungs and basically were taking the line that they were going into infection-control mode and trying to keep the baby cooking as long as possible - but to mentally prepare for a premie baby really. Pain was bearable - they got a member of the neo-natal unit to come and talk to me about how 33-34 weekers were likely to be and be treated - and left me and hubby in a room on the delivery suite overnight. Because of the infection risk - no exams other than speculums up there, no fingers, no one checking for dilation - and not allowed to move around in case the baby suddenly dropped and the cord got stuck in the way.

Pain got worse so they put me on diamorphine and I spent the night having pains at 2 mins apart, which started to show on the monitor - but still didn't rank as proper labour - in fact no one used the "l" word at all but more a "we don't know what your body's doing" lots... come the morning - I got asked to go onto a ward and freaked out at the idea of hubby having to leave me overnight (this becomes the first bit of the whole snowball of disaster) - I've mentioned on here before that my biggest fear was being stuck on a ward alone overnight without hubby - had a relative die from a hospital infection, also the one and only time I've stayed in hospital before, they left me overnight and forgot about me till mid-morning the day after... so after a while of me becoming mildly hysterical (painrelief had worn off, I'd had no sleep and was getting scared by it all, but coming to terms with the idea you're going to have a premature baby is a pretty big deal to cope with as well) at the idea of being alone - they said they'd secured me a side room in a ward where hubby could stay with me overnight... moved me there and the second the nice delivery ward sister had left the room - the previously nice midwife there turned into the Trunchbull from Matilda - told hubby he'd be made to go home, and started being vile to me when I said I'd discharge myself and come back for the second injection (they have to be 24 hrs apart) at midnight rather than be there alone... midwife became more and more angry towards me, making me more and more scared - and I really really started to need a poo (you can guess where this is going) - I'd been promised more pain relief was en-route for 3 hours then - it never came and the only relief I was getting was sitting on the loo... and pop - woosh - remaining waters went like nothing else... all of a sudden THEN they would examine me - and I was 8cm dilated, with nowt more than a flipping paracetamol!

Took me BACK down to the labour suite, in the world's worst-driven trolley banging off every wall on the way there... and they finally let me loose on the gas and air (by this point I'd been waiting for my promised diamorphine for 3 and a half hours)... which made things bearable and pleasantly blurry - and then the urge to push came.

Sidetrack at this point to the SPD issue. Now loads of the stuff about SPD talks about making sure no one pushes you to get your legs open past your comfort gap, and trying to avoid being made to lie on your back with your legs akimbo to give birth... and the nice possibility of long-term damage particularly with stuff like the epidural - legs in stirrups wide apart situation... and my SPD was blooming well bad by this point, had been for months and I was worried about being permanently crippled by it... keep this terror in mind as it becomes relevant to the story later.

So I had words with the new midwife as I hit shift change - we talked about my SPD and fear of damaging my pelvis permanently - but she kept on pulling my legs apart out of habit during each push... and then apologising for it. Because the baby's always been a lil wriggler - they kept losing the heart trace as well - so grabbed someone to come in and hold it on my stomach... so I was basically being pinned to the bed - with my legs being pulled apart causing me pain. Pushed for an hour - was pretty ok and bearable... but they'd warned me the neo-natal team would be rushing in when the time came because of the fact this was a 33 weeker.

Her heart rate started to drop - and things started to go badly wrong. Already upset by the suddeness of it all, the crap over the ward and evil midwife, they started talking of forceps (cesarians were out of the option as she was low down in my pelvis at this point) as she was becoming distressed... and the choice I was given was - forceps in the room with no pain relief and agonising pain, or forceps in surgery with a spinal - and the whole legs in stirrups, potential SPD hell issue. I started mentioning the SPD thing and my fear of my legs being spread too far - and was getting ignored and ignored and ignored and guilt tripped with the bad mother crap, and even my job used against me... making everything worse and worse and worse and worse and me more and more hysterical. Eventually I said something I remember fairly clearly "I don't care anymore if I die here, my baby's going to die like all the others did anyway - I just don't care - leave me alone"... and eventually they brow beat me down to consenting to the surgery - claimed to measure my leg gap and promised to not go beyond it, promised they never did episiotomies without asking consent, promised the moon on a stick... and off we went. Through it all they kept firing this at me and demanding instant responses to things - even though I couldn't speak during contractions and had explained to them that I would reply, but they'd have to wait till the pain was over.

Got into theatre and they tried to get me vertical to put a spinal block in - and funnily, since they'd had me pretty much pinned to a bed for 2 days by then against my wishes - boy could you feel her start to get un-wedged... spinal went in, and legs went up into stirrups - about level with the level of my hips - so they completely ignored my fears about this and the promises they'd made. I was told to push - couldn't feel anything so no idea if I did or not - and then they said the baby was out - and I was just numb and someone pointed out the whitey-blue coconutty looking type thing being lifted from the dead zone somewhere where my lower half should have been... I didn't get to see her (they confirmed it was a her at least) at all - hubby's glad I didn't to be honest as she came out silent and floppy... but eventually she cried (I heard that) - and they rushed her out of the theatre without me seeing her at all - I remember them saying "you're a mummy" - but I was just numb, and scared witless and wanting to know what they were all doing around my ladybits - got told one guy was removing bits of placenta (basically up to his armpits in my chuff yanking bits out I think) and then they spent ages sewing - so I was asking what was wrong and how badly damaged I was - and they kept on fobbing me off and avoiding the question - when I would have been less panicked by them telling me it was bad. They were sewing for a good 20 minutes - felt like a year.

Then they wheeled me outside - and told me the baby had gone to NNICU, that I'd had a 3rd degree tear as she'd come flying out back to back and they'd cut me as well (they didn't tell or ask about that like they said they would), and they'd take me to see the baby... wheeled me into neo-natal, showed me her and I just felt utterly numb about it all - then they kicked me out so they could x-ray her and took me to a ward.

Yes, I'm sure you've guessed this part - they put the mother of a premature baby in intensive care - onto their regular post-natal do yer 6 hours or overnight stay and off you go ward... so I spent the night in shock, scared cos although they'd put hubby up overnight (she was born at 10.41 on Easter Monday) it was in a different room so I was on my own, with numb legs, no pants on, no pad so just bleeding out over the sheets and one of those pads they put on the bed - listening to newborn babies cry all night in the same room - and I just lay there and sobbed... on top of which, the bed I was in was right next to the nurses' station so I could hear the talk of how they'd got a new patient who was aggressive, obstructive and difficult to deal with... and they immediately had begun acting like that - I had a huge canula in my hand and it kept getting caught on stuff, so I asked if they could just restick one of the wires so it pathed ever so slightly differently and didn't wobble as much... they immediately had launched into a huge speech about how silly I was being, how I needed the drugs, how I'd die without them etc - just all in that tone of voice when all I was asking was for a bit of micropore tape to stick a tube down properly... that sort of thing.

Next morning they took me down to neo-natal, and she was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life... still didn't really feel the wall of disassociation broken down, didn't feel like her mum - with her in this incubator with wires everywhere - but when I held her I kind of felt it. Then got taken back up to the ward, started trying to mentally make sense of it - hubby went home for a little while - and while he was gone, they called me into one of the side rooms and told me they'd referred me to social services as a risk to the baby because of my obstructive attitude and the fear I'd put the baby in danger from my comments in the delivery room.

I had to sit and explain my entire reproductive history, all the fertility problems, all the miscarriages - to explain the comment about my babies dying... then I had to explain why I had a referral to mental health services on my midwife notes - the referral I myself had requested in order to make sure I was in the system in case post-natal depression struck... everything gone into, and the woman talking to me gradually realised I'd been terrified, been lied to and mishandled since I got into the hospital - and I'd basically been backed into a corner and put in a fight or flight situation... said she'd verify that all with social services, that there wasn't a real risk they'd take the baby away from me - but I had that hanging over me for a good couple of days and I still don't feel fully free from the whole big brother watching me idea to be honest... even though lots of the ward staff who've been lovely have assured me the threat is past.

Anyway the result of that all was that they accepted the whole thing was, to use the technical term, ballocks - but it left me so scared of doing anything, challenging anything, questioning any treatment... and very very traumatised to be honest.

Back to the baby stuff anyway - she spent 2 days in the high-dependency part of NNICU, then another day and a bit on lower dependency - and now she's on the normal ward with me... she's still not out of the woods, and we've had a few brushes with bad apples on the staff who didn't help or support - but we've met a few angels along the way as well. She's being tube-fed still, while we try to establish feeding - I've just today thrown the breastfeeding plan out of the window because I think it's holding her back in terms of her finding it hard to maintain a latch when she so desperately wants to feed herself... so we're expressing and mixed-feeding through a mixture of a nasal tube and bottles... having issues with recurring jaundice and having to spend time under the light treatment - but she's a lil trooper - was a smidge under 5lb when she was born, hasn't stopped losing birth weight yet - but she is utterly utterly beautiful, a tiny little doll and such a good little girl... she can also raise one eyebrow - a talent I've always been jealous of... and funnily - she looks exactly how I imagined (only smaller obviously) - a shock of dark hair and these big blue eyes and a permanently puzzled expression on her face... and she missed being a 34 weeker by about an hour and a bit!

Sorry about the length - the birth horror story though is mainly the hospital treatment of me - the stitches and tear didn't hurt much at all (bring yer own soft loo roll in yer hospital bag though - the sadist who put crinkly school loo roll in the loos of a post-natal ward is an evil git), and those pillows with the hole in really do work wonders... even dilating to 8cm on only two paracetamol (although I did threaten on a few occasions to insert those paracetamol in places where the sun didn't shine when people chirpily offered 'em) wasn't too bad, and pushing on only gas and air wasn't bad either... just my hospital that let us down really.

But me, dad and Erin (we changed our choice of name very close to the last minute - she was destined for months to be an Anna or Imogen - just had a late night chat and threw names out and Erin came out there and stuck) are Team Awesome - and Mini-Awesome is gonna rock this place and get out of here... cos we're still stuck on this blooming post-natal ward, with some very interesting fellow occupants - a mix of premie babies on the mend, plus people on short stays after birth and longer ones... and so far we've had one daddy thrown out, another mum who needed to be shouted at to feed her baby more than 9 hours apart, fisticuffs over jaundice vs suntan this afternoon and god-knows what else!

So yeah - there's the update anyway.

fluffnutter

Amymo wrote: »

I had a similar experience this week, my mother was talking to my aunt, she thought out of my earshot at a family party, and asked her whether she attended her daughters birth as she'd jump at the chance to attend mine but we "don't want her there"! She went on to say she could understand why, but would love the opportunity - I felt a bit bad but this is something DH and I feel we have to experience together, and I want it to be something we share together. Thankfully she and I are on the same page re visiting as I've been really clear pat leave is precious little time for the new daddy to get to bond with his little girl

There is no way on earth my mother is looking up my mooer. I know she's my mother and everything, but even so!

You see this a lot on OBEM with the younger mums though don't you? It's quite common for both partner and mum to be there, and if they need a caesarean they always want their mums in theatre with them, not their other halves! Must be an age thing. At the ripe old age of <cough cough> late thirties, I'm happy for it just to be me and mr fluffnutter.

Having said that, if I didn't have a mr fluffnutter, perhaps I would choose my mum as my birthing partner... probably not actually. Maybe my SIL.