You Wouldn't Believe It

Here is my darling wee Sian on her first day in the world:



And here she is at about 2 weeks:


And in hospital at nearly 3 weeks old with a drip in her arm:


Yes - hospital! My 4 and a half weeks since Sian has been born have been full of drama. At first I got a huge haemorrhoid, and I am talking the size of a nectarine. If it wasn't for that I would have had a pretty good first two weeks. Then colic hit in and Phoebe got quite sick with a chesty cold. I was running on the reserves of energy. Sian started having seizures. They would last from a minute to five minutes and consisted of her limbs jerking violently and her respiration rate going up quite high. Then her temperature started to go up and down all over the place. I felt something was different and took her to the doctor on the Tuesday, 2 days before she turned 3 weeks. He was concerned and sent us to hospital to get some blood tests. Everything went topsy turvey. Drs were convinced that they had to rule out all the nasties as she had a few symptoms of meningitis and encephalities etc so they did a lumbar puncture!! It was bloody hideous and they took 3 goes to get it right. Blair thought he would be up to handling it but left the room crying in a matter of seconds. I have never felt more useless. We ended up in hospital for four days while they tested her on every possible thing and put her on three different IV antibiotics. Policy with newborns is to treat first and find results later. Things just happen too quickly with that age group and they have to err on the side of caution. You can imagine by the time I got home both Blair and I were exhausted. Finally got diagnosed as having benign neonatal sleep myoclonus, which is a sleep seizure thing that about 1 in 30 newborns can have. Should go by about 3 months but have to have some more blood tests etc to rule out epilepsy in about another month.

Had been home five days and I woke with a bit of heartburn sort of pain at 3am in the morning. It went after an hour so I thought nothing of it. At 3pm the next day I was rushing around trying to get two young uns in the car in the pouring rain to pick up kids from school when I started to get pain again. Took a mylanta and then headed off to school. Pain got worse and worse just below my breast bone and was stabbing into my back and radiating out in both directions. I started to panic on the way back home that I was dying! Stopped at my doctors surgery in handicap park and went into surgery and started to cry to receptionist. Kids were surrounding me in consulting room as I had an ECG to check whether I was having a heart attack. I wasn't, thank god!! Blair arrived and took kids and they waited for pain to ebb. It didn't. Ended up in hospital on morphine with suspected gallstones. They ultrasounded and found no gallstones so I ended up bunking in with Sian for another two nights in hosptial while they ran more tests and then on the Friday morning they did a gastroscopy, where they put camera into stomach to see if any ulcers or inflammation. All a bit horrible but nothing showed up and I haven't had any pain since. My guess is that I passed a gallstone and that is why they didn't see one on the ultrasound. So I got out of hospital 3 days before Christmas and had a mad rush to get organised.

So, my friends, that is why I have not posted. But, I am back.

Number Four

Welcome!!

Let's go back a few days to the 23rd November 2006 .......

Arrived at Christchurch Womens Hospital at 8.00am. Went to labour ward and went on monitor to see how bubs was doing. At 8.50am Prostin was inserted and I waited on monitor for another half hour or so. Bubs was active and tightenings were happening but nothing worth mentioning. Blair and I went for a walk through the part of the Botanic Gardens that is adjacent to the hospital. I was getting plenty of tightenings and crampings but no contractions. We went back to the birthing suite and yarned and relaxed and then had some lunch. At around 2pm my midwife came back after doing a few errands and decided to see if things were favourable for breaking the waters. I was only dilated 3cms but when I was having a tightening the head was down low enough to break waters without cord getting in the way. So next tightening I had Anne (midwife) broke the waters at 2.24pm. The waters were absolutely flooding out and there was a big mop up job needed. I relaxed for about 5 mins before I got my first contraction. Had two more in the next 10 mins and then decided it was time to get into gown so that I was preparing for the labour process. Blair was doing up my gown at the back when I got hit with a whopper of a contraction that made my knees buckle. I then felt the desperate need to go to the loo. Went and did wee wees and as soon as I stood up from toilet I got another cracker of a contraction that had me buckling again and groaning like a sumo wrestler. Anne came into the toilet and said it was time to get me on the bed and onto the gas. So at this count I had totalled 4 contractions. Just as I tried to get on bed had the 5th. Made it onto the bed for the next one with a little gas to help. Anne started getting the trolley ready and had asked someone to look for a bassinett as the room was missing it's one. 7th contraction hit and I felt like I was going to poo all over the place. Anne and I both knew that things were progressing exceedingly fast. She started loudly instructing me to not push. "Don't you dare push until I get these gloves on!!" I was panting away but we both knew that this was not gonna last for long. Gloves on - right push. 8th contraction - and our 6 pd 4 oz (2.84kg)baby girl shot out at 3.02pm - a 38 minute labour!! I was joking about beating your 39 minute labour Chris, but looks like the sub concious mind took it seriously. Blair actually took photos of the big digital clock in the room at the start of labour (waters being broken) and at 3.02pm when she was born so we have proof!!

So, baby Sian Anna Nathan arrived at 3.02pm on 23rd November 2006. I transferred to St Georges Maternity Hospital at 5.00pm and was discharged today (26th November) at 11am. Our wee girl is a darling and I will have photos up soon.