Editor’s Note: We are introducing a new series on Hello Creative Family. We will be sharing our birth stories and inviting our readers to do the same. If you haven’t yet written your story, please do. It will be a favour to yourself as it can be a powerful and liberating experience to re-visit and document that amazing moment when you brought life into the world. You may have been overcome with pain and emotion then, but now reflecting back you can still feel all of that wonder, awe and sweetness.
We are excited to kick off the series with a post by Salma of The Write Balance. Salma is a mom to two, and an occasional contributor to Hello Creative Family. This one features the surprise of a quick labour.
We would like to encourage all of you to spend time this week writing your birth story. Next week, we will be featuring one of my stories (Karen here) and we’d love to feature your story in future editions of this exciting new series. You can also comment here if you want to tell us how this resonates with you. Send your birth stories here.
Here’s Salma:
Kyah was due to be born on Aug 19, 2011. But like Keyan before her, she decided to come early.
On Aug 8, 2011 at around 10:45pm I started having contractions. For the 9 months leading up to that moment, not once did I worry about about labour and the pains that came along with it. It is so true that you really do forget. But the second those contractions hit, it all came flooding back and I almost started to cry, thinking, I can’t believe I’m going to have to do this again!
This time around, the contractions weren’t slow and steady, they came hard and fast. We grabbed our bag headed to the hospital right away, which luckily was only a three minute drive from our condo in Winnipeg. However, walking to the elevator and car was long and painful as the contractions kept on coming!
As we drove out of the car garage we stopped at a red light. I look at my husband and asked him, “Are you serious?! Just go!” So he went through the red light and guess what? A police car appeared out of no where right behind us. I thought great, just what we need.
They didn’t turn on their lights or sirens to pull us over but they did follow us the whole way to the hospital and into the emergency parking lot. They came over to the car and when they saw me, they just tried to be helpful. Of course I was probably not very nice to the officer as he came in the middle of the contraction, but I’m sure he understood.
The parking lot guy told my hubby he could leave the car in emergency while he took me inside, got me signed in and settled and then he could come move the car into the regular parking lot.
Well guess what? There was no time to come back. We got to the triage, I was in a lot of pain, they got me in, checked me out and took me right to the delivery room because apparently Kyah was ready to come out.
I was shocked and totally unprepared for this. The last labour was more than 26 hours and right now it had only been a few hours. Plus, I needed the epidural and I told that to the doctor. I actually told him that there is no way I would be able to do this without the epidural! And he said to me, get this, “I’ll give it to you after.” So not funny in the moment but it gives me a good laugh now.
Like so many other moms before me, Kyah came out and I was able to do it without the epidural. It all happened so fast and Kyah was born on August 9, 2011 at 3:09am weighing in at 6lbs and 4.8oz.
She was lovely, squishy and amazing. She had dark hair and grey eyes and she snuggled into me right away. It was another amazing moment that I will never forget, another miracle.
She is no longer a baby, but an amazing four-year old little girl. She’s energetic, intelligent, caring and her smile is contagious. It’s going to be a wonderful adventure watching her grow and blossom in the years ahead.
Happy Birthday to my little girl!
This post originally appeared on The Write Balance. It is re-published here with the author’s permission.
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