'After pushing for an hour, I heard the midwife say: "We'll have to intervene if he's not out on the next push".' Louisa's induction birth story
Louisa Cockcroft shares her experience of finding out she had gestational diabetes followed by an unexpected back-to-back birth. Here's her full, positive labour and birth story
Louisa, a member of the MadeForMums Top Testers Club community, discovered she had gestational diabetes for the second time when she was 7 months pregnant. She gave birth to Louis after being induced at 38 weeks on 6th July with a surprise discovery... he was back-to-back upon arrival.
An induced labour is one that is started artificially – with hormones, administered as tablets, a vaginal pessary or through an IV drip. Induction may be offered if your baby's overdue, if your waters have broken, if you have a health condition or if your baby is not thriving.
Gestational diabetes is a type of diabetes that can affect some women during pregnancy. It tends to appear in later pregnancy and usually disappears after your baby is born. You can usually treat it with changes in the way you eat and exercise but some women may need medication.
This is Louisa's induction birth story:
"It was confirmed in May that I had gestational diabetes 7 months into the pregnancy of my second child by way of a fasting plasma glucose (FPG) test that measures your blood glucose levels. I had been closely monitored during this pregnancy prior to the tests as I also had gestational diabetes with my first born too.
"I felt extremely deflated as it meant I had to be very careful with what I ate as certain foods caused my blood sugars to spike quite high - I was hoping I could indulge a little being pregnant! I eventually had to control my diabetes with diabetic medication and insulin injections.
"Because I had gestational diabetes I was consultant-led during the pregnancy rather than just being seen by midwives. They decided to induce me at 38 weeks. I was quite upset about being induced - I was in two minds about what the right thing to do was.
I didn’t want to force him to come early if he wasn’t ready, but at the same time I would never have forgiven myself if I’d gone against the consultant's advice and something bad had happened.
"Ultimately I wanted my baby to be safe and decided to go ahead with the induction. I’m self-employed too, so I had to plan for my business to “holiday” for a week or so as I didn’t know how long I would be in hospital and it’s only myself who runs it and does all the work.
"I was given 3 inductions over 3 days, the method used was the Propess pessary. My partner was with me the whole time which helped a lot. Luckily my mum came to stay for the week to look after our son, but I felt extremely guilt leaving him for so long as I naively expected I’d be in and out within a couple of days!
"None of the methods worked so they broke my waters at 1cm dilated on day 3 of the hospital stay. I was put on the oxytocin drip to bring labour on faster at around 6pm.
"The pain intensified quite quickly as they put the drip on too strong but I was left to deal with it as there was an emergency elsewhere. I was in so much pain but slightly out of it as I had gas and air to help me deal with it. My partner didn’t know what to do as he could see how much pain I was in and there was little he could do.
"The midwife finally came back and dropped it down but I was in full-on labour by this point. I used lots of gas and air to get me through and I remember thinking, this is way more painful than my first. After pushing for about an hour, I heard the midwife say: "We'll have to intervene if he's not out on the next push".
I was determined to have no intervention and he came out on that push head facing the world, which explains why it was so painful as we were back-to-back and no one knew until he came out!
"Louis Stuart was born at exactly 10pm on Wednesday 6th July weighing 6lb 10oz."
Pic credit: Louisa Cockcroft. As told to Janet Mtima
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