“You can’t birth breech twins vaginally” – wanna make a bet?

Our beautiful twins made their journey earthside in much the same way the rest of this pregnancy has gone, to the twins plan and agenda, the rest of us just got dragged along for the ride.

Saturday 6th November we spent the afternoon at the hospital.  I’d been having braxton hicks on and off since 32 weeks and I’d been losing small bits of my mucus plug.  On the Saturday the braxton hicks had been regular and increasing in intensity so we thought it best to get checked out.   We were given the all clear, my cervix was still closed and the babies were doing well.

Sunday I had a lovely long hot shower.  During the shower I finally let go and surrendered to my body and babies.  I had been stressing so much about making the babies turn.  I realised that my body is amazing, it was growing 2 babies!!  It had birthed 2 babies beautifully, my body and babies knew what they were doing, I just had to let go and trust that they knew the path of this journey even if I didn’t.

On Monday I had my usual appointments, my monitoring appointment wasn’t great, they couldn’t find the heartbeats.  Same thing happened when the obstetrician tried with the doppler, so the portable scanner was brought in and eventually heartbeats found.  By that point I was exhausted and stressed so when the doctor started talking about scheduling a c-section I wanted it booked asap.  C-section was booked for 25th November but I also had a scan scheduled for the next day to confirm the babies positions.

Tuesday and the scan confirmed the babies were still breech.  The scan was rough, the disappointment of them still being breech combined with the pain from lying flat on my back, I was so ready for the pregnancy to be over.  My best friend and intended support person was planning a holiday and trying to schedule it so she wouldn’t miss the babies’ arrival was seeming to be very difficult.  We were concerned that it would happen while she was away, we’d both have been devestated!  I sent her an email that night saying that I really didn’t think she’d miss it, I’d wanted to put it in writing so I had full “I told you so” rights.

3am Wednesday morning and Thommo had left for work, I had an urge to call him home but had no reason to do so.  Around 3.30-4 braxton hicks started, I kept track of them until just before 4.30, they were irregular so I decided to try and get some sleep.  At 4.45am I woke with a sharp pain, felt like a stabbing pain in my cervix.  I lay still for a minute before thinking it felt like I needed to go to the toilet.  As soon as I started to stand I felt fluid running down my legs, that’s when I realised my waters had broken and quickly sat back down.

I rang Kell “my waters just broke” i giggled when she answered, we were going to meet our babies that day!!  I rang Thommo’s work and asked them to get an urgent message to him, then rang my mum.  We decided that my mum’s husband would drive mum to our house so she could look after the boys, he would then drive me to the hospital and Thommo would meet us there.  I rang the hospital to let them know what was happening and was asked if I was contracting, at that stage no.

Naturally I tweeted and Facebooked the situation in between getting dressed and getting my things together.  Contractions started around 5-ish, they were still very irregular though, I’d get 2 close together then have a big gap of 5 minutes or so until the next one.

It felt like it took my mum forever to arrive but finally they did and I was on my way to the hospital.  Thommo managed to beat us to the hospital (he must have flown!) by 5 minutes.  By the time I arrived contractions were more regular, about 2 minutes apart.  We had to enter the hospital via emergency, the triage nurse asked a few questions while we were waiting for an orderly to take us up to birthing.  I explained to her that this was my 3rd pregnancy, breech twins and that my last child was born in the emergency department after a speedy labour.  Perhaps it was just my perception but she seemed to move a whole lot quicker after that 😉

We arrived in birthing at the same time as another woman was brought in on an ambulance stretcher.  There appeared to be only 1 midwife free, she quickly took us to our room then disappeared to get the other woman settled.  Within a minute or 2 she was back and asked me to hop on the bed.  As soon as I stood up I felt immense pressure and told her I needed to poo.  At that stage we were still trying to give her the details of the pregnancy, I don’t think she was even 100% sure on my name!

Another midwife came in and I was assisted onto the bed, the first midwife was fairly calm at that point and asked the 2nd to go and get the registrar because I was feeling pressure.  Luckily the registrar was already on the ward with another woman.  My legs were put in stirrups so the midwfie could do an exam. 9cms with a lip.  She ducked out the door to call for the registrar more urgently.  When she came back I shouted “I need to push!”, the midwife told me to just breathe.  That’s when the panic button got hit.  The midwife ran to the door shouting “Hassan, Hassan!!! Where did he go???!!!”.  The registrar appeared (the infamous Hassan!) and the midwife sounding panicked told him I had been 9cm with a lip but was now pushing and the babies were breech, she asked him what to do, “hands off and just watch” replied Hassan.

The atmosphere in the room was intense, people seemed to be pouring in from everywhere but all I could focus on was the intense contractions.  My body took over and I was pushing, Thommo was holding both my hands.  The “ring of fire” was huge, it felt like someone had doused me in petrol and set me on fire!  Unlike my previous births there was no moment of relief that comes after the head is birthed, this time I had to birth the whole body with the head coming last and yes, it HURT!

At 5.59am (1 hour and 15 minutes after my waters broke) Oliver Andrew arrived earthside.  Weighing 2.42kgs and 47.5cms long.

In the moments of relief after he was born I asked Thommo to check if Kell had arrived yet, he disappeared for a minute before reappearing at my side.  The registrar was checking my cervix and trying to ascertain the position of twin 2.  I heard him say that I was 6cms.  Kell appeared at my side with Ollie snuggled in her arms.

The registrar then called for a c-section, apparently twin 2 wasn’t coming down.  Clearly my precious boy had his own ideas, within seconds of the midwife leaving the room to organise the c-section the urge to push hit again.  “Go for it” the regsitrar said, so I did.  I felt a pop and then heard a splash and Thommo laughed “cop that!”.  Apparently twin 2’s sac of waters broke hitting the registrar in the chest with a stream of fluid.  Seconds later the burn began again but this time it was much quicker and at 6.08am Sebastian Kelly arrived, weighing 2.59kgs and also measuring 47.5cms.   At 6.13am I was given an injection to bring on the placenta although it slithered out at 6.14am so it was probably already on it’s way.

Within minutes I had both boys snuggled on my chest

They spent about 30 minutes on my chest before being taken to special care.  Both twins breech.  Birthed vaginally.  No epidural, not episiotomy, no tears, no forceps.  Just my babies and my body.  They knew what to do.

Welcome to the world Oliver and Sebastian, you are more precious than we imagined and we are so blessed to have you.