Jan Burton BLOG

At 5:57am this morning (Monday 20th March 2009), after 30 hours of labour, Jan gave birth (with much help) to an 8lb 13 ounce baby boy (4 Kilos - or in the UK, another way is to consider 4 bags of sugar)

Labour started at 11:45 on Saturday evening, and we went to the Birthing Centre about 3am Sunday morning. Jan was sent home as at that stage she was only 3 cm dilated. We lazed around the house for a few hours, with Jan's contractions coming every 10 mins or so. On returning to the Birthing Centre she was measured at 5 cm dilated, and we sat it out there for a number of hours. I forget how many. However Jan became stuck at 7cm dilated, contractions were coming every 4 or 5 minutes. Jan spent some time in a Birthing pool, and eventually decided to have a Pethidine injection (opiate based pain killer). However the cervix failed to dilate any further so we were transfered to the main Hospital in Ashford (Wililam Harvey) where they promptly broke her waters manually.

At this point labour picked up a pace and the pain became too unbearable for Jan. She had now been in labour for approaching 26 hours, neither of us had any sleep in this time, so she was becoming more and more exhausted. Jan opted for an Epidural. At last the pain went (more or less). A drug was applied intravenously to encourage contractinos which were coming every 2 mins. Finally with much pushing (and Jan swearing she would never have another child :S ) the head appeared. The baby then became stuck one of his shoulders becaome lodged behind the pubic bone, quite a serious condition by all acounts because suddenly our room was full of medical staff rushing around in a frenzy with very serious expressions on their faces .. a doctor had both hands tugging on the little chap, another doctor leaning heavily on her lower abdomen, and quick as a flash the boy was born.

I had the honour of cutting the cord .. and within minutes the room was empty.

I must say Jan was amazing, not once did she scream or holler. She just grit her teeth and got on with it. We heard regular wailing and moaning from the women either side of our room. Jan said Shit twice and Oh God twice and one almighty grunt as she pushed out his head, followed by another as the body came out. Never once did she raise her voice above a whipser. An amazing woman. She did cry a couple of times from the pain, and asked me to please take it away, she virtually begged me to get the staff to implement the Epidural . but after 20 odd hours of pain, I don't think thats unreasonable.

...

Jan is still in hospital now, recovering from the ordeal and while the staff ensure the stitches she received are healing properly.

Below are a few pics of Mum and Baby shortly after birth .. you can see Jan is exhausted.

All the best
Robin