My Birth Story...By Jenny Worrall

Apologies to anyone who is currently pregnant reading this - it isn't intended to put you off or scare you, but if you don't want to know, don't read on!

My water broke at 38 weeks and 2 days. I was relieved as I was sooo big and uncomfortable at that stage, I could hardly move. The contractions started pretty quickly, so I went straight to the hospital. As I arrived and went to the labour ward, I was examined and was fully dilated!! I had hoped for an epidural or at least a shot of good ol' pethedine!! Instead I was rushed to the delivery suite and delivered Ross Brandon within minutes, vaginally, weighing 6lbs 12oz. Luckily, I only had a small tear. I was surprised that he had hair as my other babies had been baldies!

My husband held Ross while the doctor broke the water of twin 2. I was told to push, but did not feel anything, the babies head was too high up. They examined me again and the doctor panicked as the cord was prolapsing. The fetal monitor attached to twin 2 was showing his heart beat was dangerously low and got to 60bpm. A load of doctors rushed in and were shouting at me to push. I tried and felt stupid because I still couldn't feel anything to push. The doctor examined me again and said the cord was prolapsed, cutting off the babies oxygen. He attempted a ventous delivery as I was fully dilated, this failed, and I was rushed to theatre for a crash c-section.

On the way to the theatre, I suddenly felt something heavy inside and was convinced the baby had died. I was terrified and remember being on the operating table while they put me to sleep. I just wanted to go sleep quick to get away from all the horrifying panic and uncertainty. While I was asleep, the got Luke Ethan out, weighing 7lbs 7oz, and he was in 'poor' condition with low apgar scores. They rushed him to neonatal intensive care.

While I was in the recovery room, I started feeling very faint. My blood pressure was dropping drastically and an alarm went off, a load of doctors rushed in. They said there was bleeding internally, and they rushed me back to theatre. I was sure I wouldn't make it and told DH to take care of the kids for me. I was given another general anaesthetic and they re-opened my abdomen and an artery had burst. There was over a litre of blood in there. Luckily, they managed to repair the vessels and saved my womb too. I came round and had a life saving blood transfusion. One of several.

I felt terrible and my belly was black with bruising. I also developed a hemotoma (blood clot under the skin) the size of a grapefruit. The panic wasn't over, some NICU doctors came to see us and told us that Luke had had a seizure. This could mean brain damage or he could die. It was a horrid feeling. I had had twins but there was no celebration. I didn't see Luke for 3 more days (was very ill on high dependency ward on oxygen and fluid therapy) and there were no cards as people didn't know what to say. Amazingly, I managed to breastfeed Ross, and eventually Luke too.

After 3 days, I was taken to see Luke on neonatal. His seizures had stopped, and although they couldn't yet say whether he would have any long term problems, it looked promising. When I saw him, it didn't seem like it was 'my baby'. He looked so different to Ross. I began to breastfeed them together and I actually felt that I had twins when after 5 days, Luke came to join us on the maternity ward. I was over the moon. It took me a good 3 months to recover from the birth but I did and feel very lucky that despite all the trauma, we all came out of it OK.

It was all worth it and we're all very healthy today.

Jenny, Mum to Ross and Luke..

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Page last updated: 29-Jan-2008

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