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At my first childbirth education class the instructor went
around the room asking all the women what they were most worried about. Her
goal was to make sure she allayed each of our fears during the course. My
answer was completely different from everyone else’s: I was afraid I would be
in labour and not know it. She assured me that my fear was unfounded. At my
36-week checkup when I repeated the concern to the midwife, she too told me
that it was very highly unlikely.
Perhaps it was my particular situation that made this fear
so acute for me- at the time my husband worked in another state and I would
commute a 100 miles daily by car. My
head was full of ideas of having to deliver my baby by myself in my car on the
highway or on the bathroom floor, even as my screams went unheard. But every single person I expressed this
concern to told me it was unfounded; since this was my first child, I would
surely have plenty of time to get to the hospital and get my husband to rush
back too.
On the last day of week 37, I woke up at 4 am to use the
bathroom. The instant I climbed back into bed I felt a rush of something and, thinking my water had broken, rapidly waddled back into the bathroom. To my
horror, it wasn’t amniotic fluid but blood. I yelled for my husband to call the
doctor and get dressed- we were going to the hospital. We were there in 15 mins
with nothing but the clothes on our backs, we left two days later with our
daughter. As soon as the midwife
finished examining me she exclaimed, “You’re fully dilated, you’re ready to
push!” I think my response was something along the lines of, “No, no my baby isn’t due for another 2
weeks, I’m just here to stop this bleeding and then I’m going home.” They showed me the full-strength contractions
on the monitor and kept asking me again and again if I felt anything? No! I had
felt nothing at all- the hours of agonizing pain that I had braced for before I
would be hearing those exact words the midwife had greeted me with- they never
happened. A mere 12 hours before being wheeled into the OR (a precaution due to
the bleeding) I was at my baby shower. I
had literally slept through 10 cms of dilation and to everyone’s utter surprise
I was, in fact, in labour and did not know it! I watched the monitor with
surreal interest as the nurse’s aide told me, “Look here comes another
contraction!” Without the monitor, I
would have no idea. I can only imagine how absurd that sounds to anyone who has
ever experienced a contraction, and that too one in active labour!
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Snehal is the mother of a two-year old, a molecular geneticist by training, and a research scientist by profession. Thankfully she only commutes 15 miles now, but her husband continues to work in a different state. Discussions on part-time single parenting or the effects of a traveling parent on a growing toddler are always of interest to her.
Great post!! Thanks for sharing!
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