The Birth (extended blog)

I'm led to believe that women have some form of natural ability to forget the birth over time. This is why they are able to go back and experience it again.

Men...not so much

I remember every detail about the lead up to the birth, the aftermath and everything in between. It's impossible to forget.

Before the main event, the weeks and days before the birth are really eye opening.

Enter...the sweep!

I remember going to the midwife appointments as we got closer to the due date and the midwife offering my wife a sweep. I had heard of this before from other friends but really had no idea what it involved.

Long story short...midwife gets her fingers and has a good rummage around inside my wife trying to create friction in the cervix to kick start the body into natural birth.

Wild!

The wife had a few of these and on the last one, a load of blood and gloop came out. So much in fact the midwife called the maternity ward and said we needed to go right away. The bleeding stopped and the midwife calmed down but predicted it would be at most 48 hours before Orla came. For now...we went home and just waited. This was Thursday.

Orla was born on Saturday morning. On the Friday night before, we were sat at home, my wife bouncing away on her ball, flicking between watching a murder documentary and Father Ted and the contractions started.

This was it. Reasonable panic ensued. My wife was hunched over on the bed room floor whilst I was trying to count the length of the contractions and how many were in a 10 minute period. The pain was starting to become too much for her so I called the triage at the maternity ward and was met with.... suspicion

"Do you really need to come in?"

"Are you sure they are coming thick and fast?"

"Ok well you can come in, if you want, and we will have a look"

I know the maternity wards have seen it all and probably deal with over anxious parents everyday...but this was massive to us and they kind of made it sound a little like we were being an inconvenience.

This wasn't the last time that would happen.

We made it to Haywards Heath hospital around 9pm and went to the delivery suite. The check for readiness is how many centimetres my wife is dilated. 4 is the magic number before you are in active labour.

They checked her once...said you are only 2 cm's. The contractions were coming really quickly with barely any breaks between them. I asked if my wife could have something for the pain. They gave her some paracetamol and told us we may as well go home and come back...it's unlikely she will be giving birth in the next 24 hours.

Go home? My first thought was...are you mad?

They said we couldn't wait in the delivery suite and if we didn't want to go home we would have to go to the labour ward and wait. At around midnight, we did just that...they checked her again and it was still 2 cm's.

"Can you please give her something for the pain? The contractions are not stopping"

"Here is a sleeping pill Mrs Britton...try and sleep and we will check you again in the morning"

For the next hour, my wife was crumbled on the floor in pain, the paracetamol not even touching the sides and the sleeping pills making her a little drowsy but they did nothing for the pain.

I had enough. I went to find the midwife and said something isn't right. The contractions are literally not stopping.

Please help us!

"Yeah it's just like this darling. Nothing we can do at this stage and it's going to be a long wait so you may as well get comfortable"

I asked if we could at least get my wife into a bath...after the drama of getting her in and quickly out...all with no let up in the pain, I took her to the toilet.

It's fair to say at this point, my wife turned into some kind of farm animal. From the toilet floor, she shouted that she felt like she needed to push and proceeded to moo quite loudly.

I was totally helpless. No one was listening to me and I had no idea what to do.

A midwife who happened to be on her break in the room next to the toilet knocked on the door and asked if my wife said she needed to push.

Yes!

She helped us back to the bed, and said let me just check your dilation to see if there has been any change.

"Ermm...she is now at 6 cm's, let me just get my colleague"

No shit I thought...why have you not been listening to us for the last 2 hours. Why have we gone through the 4 cm mark where different pain medication becomes available with nothing on offer.

Off to the delivery suite we went..by the time we went 200 yards round the corner and she was checked again...8 cm's.

Jesus Christ!

The gas and air was now a permanent fixture in my wife's mouth but because she had dilated so quickly, with no one checking along the way, all other pain relief was off the table...it was basically too late.

I am thinking to myself..I really hope this hypnobirthing breathing routine has the same medicinal power as an injection into the spine...spoiler...it does not.

One thing that the books, NCT classes, podcasts and conversations do not tell you is how difficult it is for a father to stand there and watch the person he loves most in the world go through this trauma...and not be able to do anything about it.

I was so anxious and terrified of what was happening but really cognisant of the fact that I could not let my wife see how I was feeling because she needed me now more than ever.

So what did I do?

I stood next to her, counting her breaths to try and keep her calm. I held her hand to comfort her. I told her how amazing she was.

The truth...I wish I was anywhere other than in that space at that moment in time.

Not because all of what I was saying to my wife was not true. It was very true..she was a superstar. But I was so scared by what I was seeing and wanted to run a mile.

I stayed up at the head end for two reasons. The first reason was my wife had me in a head lock so I didn't really have a choice.

The second reason was I was worried enough without seeing all of this unfold. There was nothing magical about watching the birth. This was a horror scene and I wanted to stay well clear.

From my head locked position, I did the same thing I did all those months ago at the scans...I assumed I knew what I was looking for and that everything was going wrong.

Hearing the midwife's whisper to each other, weigh the blood that is coming out on some scales, call in their colleagues to check something...this is absolutely soul destroying.

My head was all over the place and I just thought the worst. The baby was in trouble or my wife was in danger. Or both.

Eventually a Dr came in and said that my wife had been pushing for too long with not enough progress and had lost a lot of blood in the process. She said we might have to make a cut to make some room and use a suction cup to get her out.

The Dr asked my wife if she would consent.

We had already talked about me being the voice for her when she was unable to speak. In fact, we were told very clearly in our NCT class that this is exactly what you need of do. Take charge, ask questions and be the mouth peace.

At this point...my wife's response was "get this baby out of me"

I said to the Dr..do what you need to do. The Dr told me, it wasn't my body and my wife needed to consent.

If I wasn't in a head lock I would of chucked a bloody pillow at this Dr...why are these people so cold? Can they not see the distress everyone is in?

My wife mumbled that she consented and on we went. But this time, a neo-natal nurse entered the room with a special unit to take the baby away if there was an emergency.

I mean...if my head wasn't spinning before...it was now.

Whilst this was normal for assisted deliveries and falls into the category of 'just in the case', it wasn't explained why they were there to me so I just assumed the worst.

I was so angry with how this whole thing was being played out. I was terrified for my wife and I was aching to sit down after standing bent over for 4 hours.

But at 5.33am, Orla finally came out. I looked from the head end, saw Orla had a load of hair. I heard her crying and just stood there...in complete silence...not saying anything, not moving, not feeling.

I was in total shock. She was here. She was alive. She was my daughter.

But just like the heart beat...I didn't feel what I thought I should of done. I barely looked at her.

What the hell was wrong with me

Key learnings

It is not a comparable experience...often men and women have this debate about the most painful thing...child birth Vs being hit in the nether regions with a ball. Watching my wife going through the trauma of birth was deeply unpleasant and I can not imagine the pain. However, my experience as a husband was painful in a different way. They can not be compared to each other. Men and women experience this in a unique way to them ...both should be respected for what they are

Be strong but be realistic - I can say now that my determination to be strong for my wife was absolutely the right thing to do. But I wish I had talked about my feelings much sooner after the birth to help me process what I had been through as well

Women might forget...but men won't- there is no shame in admitting how difficult this whole thing is for father's. The trauma of seeing what you see and hearing what you hear sticks with you. It is 100% ok to not be ok with it