A dream came true

Having going through the 9 months without much pain and difficulties, the final 10 hours were pretty much the most excruciating moment of mummy's life. First 5 hours passed by slowly with irregular contractions, the next 5 hours (which felt like eternity) full of dramas and heavy groanings and shoutings from mummy. A fren of us, who is a doctor in University Hospital once said, you can identify the race of the mother based on the shouting in the labour room. Malay has the highest pain tolerance, Chinese a step behind, and guess what, the lowest pain tolerance champion belongs to Indian!!! So, next time, if you pass by a labour ward, you can test out this theory yourselves. Based on mummy's shouting and groaning, probably mummy belongs to the later catergory!!!! Hehehehehe.

Back to mummy's labour, 3 minutes apart, and every contractions lasted for more than one minutes. From 5am to 8am, nothing much to do except kept using the breathing techniques to manage the contraction pain. At abt 8 sumthing, Mummy really felt like pushing baby Hahn out, but sister Lee said not the right time yet. She checked mummy's cervic opening, still abt 8cm. "Keep on breathing, you are doing very well!!!!", words of encouragement from sister Lee. Daddy was by mummy side all the time, mummy's ever faithful companion. Honestly speaking, without daddy by mummy's side, mummy dont think mummy can brave through the whole labour process. Thanks Daddy!!!!

At abt 9am, sister Lee checked the cervic opening again, oredi 9.5 cm!!!! "Now you can try to push when contractions come, call me in when your waterbag burst". Thank God!!!! Mummy is allowed to push!!!! The next push broke my water bag straight away. Mummy was shouting "Waterbag burst!!! Waterbag burst!!! Call missi!!!" Somehow all the pains have disappeared just like that after the water bag burst. Now is the moment of truth to bring baby Hahn out to the world.

The next 1.5 hours was purely pushing and pushing. At each push, can see the head was crowning, but when mummy let go, the head went back in, according to granny which was there to witness it. At the end of the hour, mummy already did not have much strength left. Dr Wong has then suggested to used suction to facilitate the birthing process. The longer we wait, the baby might go into distress. Daddy and mummy agreed. Dr Wong get himself ready for the moment, putting on his apron and Phua Chu Kang boots. One glance, he really looked like a fishmonger. The suction was placed on the head of baby Hahn. "Push as hard as you can on the next contraction!!!!" Here we go!!!, First push!!!!! Aaaaaaaahhhhh!!!!!! The whole head came out!!!! It was truly amazing seeing the baby head at the vaginal opening, according to daddy. Second push!!!!! Aaaaaaahhhhhh!!!!! The whole body came out!!!! And the 3rd push basically complete the whole moment!!!! Baby Hahn was born at 10:36am on 10 June 2006, definitely a World Cup baby. No words can describe the feeling of joy and fulfillment seeing baby Hahn for the first time. Not to be forgotten, kudos to Dr Wong, our gynae and Sister Lee and Sister Chitra for the great support and help in realizing our dream of experiencing a drug-free labour. No epidural, no pethidine, no etonox!!!! Yeah!!!

Proud parent of baby Hahn

Baby Hahn soundly asleep

Confused look of baby Hahn

He was coming!

The most important food for confinement.

Although it was expected, it was still very much unexpected.

It started with "show", a bright pinkish patch of blood the size of our 50 sen coin. We just enjoyed the first half of the first match of World Cup 2006, the one where Germany beat Costa Rica 2 - 0. Mommy wanted to go to bed but discovered "show" on her panties after a bathroom visit. Then the contractions came. Irregular and irratic at first.

10 minutes apart... 15 minutes apart... 5 minutes apart... 15 minutes apart...

As our doc have said, contractions are an unmistakable feeling. None which mommy have ever experienced before. The time was about 12.45am.

Mommy was a bit restless and could not go to sleep. Doc advised to go to the hospital when contractions are about 15 minutes apart, but a knowledgeable friend told us not to hurry and only go when they are 5 minutes apart. Spend as much time as is safe in the comforts of your own home. Once in the hospital, their clock will start, and you might be pressured and rushed into ARM (artificial rupture of membranes) and other birth induction methods when mother and baby is not quite ready.

Our friend is a proponent of hypno-birthing (or here and here), a movement that promotes the use of meditation and self-hypnosis to empower women to give birth naturally without any medical intervention (analgesics like pethidine and pitocin via epidural or injection), unless necessary, and to give birth in a mind-state and environment of peace and calm. She told us she have a mother who was out shopping even with contractions coming every 5 minutes. More about analgesia here.

Calm and peace is a birthing mother's good companions. Fear and panic can easily lead to maternal and fetal distress, and hence a caesarean.

Daddy did some last minute packing while mommy started reading "What to Expect When You Are Expecting". Both our hearts were beating faster. Daddy kept asking mommy if she's alrite. Mommy is a tough cookie and told daddy to sleep and she will wake him when it's time. Even granny was excited and got up to boil red dates water. Mommy rested on the couch and experienced her contractions without distractions.

It was about 5am when we reached our birth-site or hospital. Daddy drove with extra caution. Granny keeping a watchful eye from behind. Mommy was in her birthing zone in the front.

Mommy & granny went straight up to the delivery ward via entrance at the Emergency ward.

Once there, her cervix dilation was checked. 6 cm already! Then she was strapped with the EFM (electronic fetal monitoring) listening device. Fetal heart rate in the CTG (cardiotocography) seems stable to us but the nurse insisted that mommy remain strapped since our baby's heartbeat is a bit lower than they expected. Base line of 110.

Her contractions were coming fast and furious, 3 minutes or less.

To be continued...

Due but not quite yet...

Today is Baby Hahn's estimated due date! But looks like he's not going to show up as expected. Think he's more interested in making a more grand belated entrance into the world (like the father who's always a little late). However, there are signs that mom will be going into labor very soon. Over the weekend, she felt some kind of muscle pull around her loins and it's happening more often. However, it's not the regular contraction (1 contraction every 15 minutes or closer) one looks for as a sign to go to the hospital.

She's starting to feel an uncomfortable muscle pull around her left hip and buttocks area which travels to her thigh and calf. This could be due to the baby pressing against the lumbar region of her spine and the many leg nerves there.

She's also starting to have more vaginal discharge that is clear and odorless. However, it's still too little and inconsistent to imply that her waterbag has "broken". Anyways, we will be seeing our doc this evening, unless birth starts before that :D, and hoping for him to give us a clearer picture of the above signs.

About syntometrine, which we talked about here, our doc told us that it helps to reduce heavy bleeding (major uterine haemorrhage) in about 2% of deliveries. He mentioned that major haemorrhage occurs in about 6-7% of deliveries and with syntometrine, it's about 5%. By the way, we have decided to forgo the syntometrine injection unless there are signs that bleeding is more than it should be.