Madelyn's Birth Story

So, it’s taken me a lot longer than I’d hoped to add to my blog.  I’ve been torn between which part of life after baby loss would be best to start with after my last post, but I eventually decided the best place to start would be back at the beginning of this journey; when our beautiful girl was born.

Madelyn was 6lb 6oz and was 46cm long, something not a lot of people know as they don’t tend to ask after your baby has died.  You also don’t really get the chance to share your birth story as you don’t really get asked about it.  I’m not sure if people think it’s inappropriate to ask these things when you didn’t get to take your baby home, or if maybe it’s just the sort of thing some people find too upsetting to hear about.  To be honest, I’ve taken a long time to decide whether I want to tell everyone Madelyn’s birth story because I’ve always been very conscious of upsetting or scaring people - especially those who may be expecting a baby themselves - but I want to share as much of her as I can and what happened during her birth is such a huge part of who I am now.  I relive it several times a day.  Most of the time it’s just a fleeting memory that I can process or push to the back of my mind again, but sometimes it’s more vivid and almost takes my breath away.

Early on in my pregnancy, Adam and I discussed the idea of having a homebirth and I brought it up at my first appointment with my midwife.  We talked about how it all worked and said we’d do some research on it at home before making our decision, as there were no leaflets or books available from the midwife specifically about homebirth.  My first labour and birth had been very straightforward and quite fast, so once we looked into homebirth online we decided to go for it.  I’d read that it was just as safe to have a second or subsequent baby at home as it was in hospital for a low risk pregnancy.  As long, as we stayed low risk then surely it would be fine?  The closer it got to Madelyn’s due date, the more excited we got.  When all the equipment had been delivered to the house a few weeks before, the midwife came to check it all over.  We got talking and discussed any concerns we had.  When we spoke about how quickly the on call midwife would come out to us, Adam joked and said he didn’t want to have to deliver the baby himself if they didn’t make it in time.

Looking back, I’m struggling to justify my decision to have a homebirth but at the time we felt comfortable with it, and thought we’d be safe.  To be honest I will regret that decision for the rest of my life.  I’ve told myself a million times that none of this is my fault, and I really know that it isn’t, but if we hadn’t had a homebirth Madelyn would most likely have been born safely.  I don’t think I’ll ever feel better about that.

I remember everything I did, the day I went in to labour.  I was 39 weeks and 2 days along, and was getting very impatient as Noah had been born at 37 weeks and 1 day, so I already felt like I was overdue.  I went to a shopping centre that day with two of my sisters, had lunch and a browse around the shops, trying my hardest to refrain from buying any more baby clothes.  I remember seeing a lady holding a new born baby girl in her arms and suddenly getting a rush of excitement.  The baby had a beautiful full head of dark hair, and I said to my sisters “I wonder if this will be a hairy baby too”.  I don’t know why that memory has stayed with me; it was such a small part of that day.  On our drive home, I said I was feeling more uncomfortable than usual.  Not in pain but felt like I may go in to labour in the next few days.  We decided to take a different road home as there were more speed bumps that way and we hoped that it might get things moving.  The rest of the day was quite relaxing, but after bouncing on my birthing ball for a while I started to get a few contractions in the evening.  As Adam got Noah ready for bed, we made a plan of what to do if this was it and had my sister on standby.  I will always remember that when Noah went to bed that night, he gave me a kiss and cuddle as he always does, but out of the blue he asked to give ”baby sister” a kiss too so I pulled up my top for him to give my bump a kiss.  He’d never done that before, and I remember thinking it was the sweetest thing as he had no idea that she might be arriving soon.

Not long after that, I felt a gush of waters with a contraction so we called the hospital to arrange for the on-call community midwife to call me.  As my labour with Noah had started with my waters braking and then gone very quickly, the midwife decided she’d best come to the house to examine me.  Noah was still chatting in his bed, so we had my sister come to take him to hers for the night.  When the midwife arrived, she felt around my tummy and said Madelyn’s head was fully engaged and after an internal examination and sweep she said I was 2 to 3 cm dilated so she told Adam to start filling the birthing pool.  Over the next hour or so, my contractions were anything between four and seven minutes apart but were getting slightly more intense, although I was coping fine with the pain.  The midwife thought it was best if we went for a walk to try and get things moving along, and she said she’d go home to allow my labour to establish.  I was told to call her when my contractions were closer together, lasting longer and more painful.

At around 1.45am, I was struggling with the pain and my contractions were now two to three minutes apart so I called the midwife to come back.  She said she’d be half an hour.  At around 2.30am we were still waiting for the midwife and since my contractions were so intense, I changed into my bikini and got into the birthing pool for some relief.  I posed for a couple of photos, but as I lowered myself into the water I felt a sudden pop and the next contraction was so much more painful.  I felt a sudden urge to push so I started to panic and told Adam to call the midwife again.  She was still 10 minutes away she said, so I knew I needed an ambulance.  My mum called 999 and they talked us through the birth.  I was looking at Adam and telling him he could do it as I knew how squeamish he was.  We were laughing and saying we couldn’t believe this was actually happening when we’d told the midwives that this had been a worry of ours.  At that point, though, I remember thinking “this is going to be such a cool story”; never once imagining it could all go horribly wrong. 

As my mum relayed instructions to Adam to keep pressure on the baby’s head so it didn’t birth too quickly, I remember having a quick feel down below to see what was happening and it didn’t feel like a head to me.  As she started to be born, I was looking down and I shouted that it was her bum not her head, but the water was making it difficult to see.  We weren’t completely sure until I saw her legs and I shouted “she’s breech!”  Even then, I remember laughing and saying I couldn’t believe I was giving birth to a baby the wrong way up.  I had no idea that a breech delivery could be dangerous, which I’m glad about as I didn’t panic any more than I already was.  I remember looking at Adam supporting Madelyn’s body and thinking how lucky I was that my Husband was delivering our daughter.  To this day, I’m so proud that he did that for her. 

After her body was born, my contractions seemed to stop but her head was still stuck.  We waited for a contraction that didn’t come, so when the call handler told me to get out of the pool, Madelyn was born as I stood up and the placenta quickly followed.  It took me a few seconds to realise she was pale, floppy and silent.  I handed her to my mum and we all started rubbing and drying her to try to get her to cry.  Just at that moment, the midwife walked through the door.  She took Madelyn and started to dry her, then she started resuscitation after she told us there was no heartbeat.  The call handler was still relaying instructions to her when the first ambulance crew arrived and took over the resuscitation.  I was now out of the birthing pool, sitting on the couch wrapped in a towel staring in to space.  I looked round to Madelyn at one point to see the paramedics lifting and repositioning her and I felt like screaming at the horror.  After around five or ten minutes of resuscitation, I was saying over and over that she had gone too long without oxygen.  I knew whatever the outcome; it was going to be bad.

The first two ambulance crews took Madelyn to hospital in one ambulance.  They said I had to go in a separate ambulance but I wanted Madelyn to have someone with her that loved her, so my Mum went too.  As she was carried out of the house, still being resuscitated, I had no idea how long it would be until I saw her again.  I was told to gather my hospital bag, but as I looked around at the carnage in the living room I felt completely helpless.  The outfit that I’d intended to be the first thing Madelyn would wear was still hanging on the radiator so it was nice and warm for her.  I didn’t know whether to pack it in my bag as I didn’t know if she’d need any clothes.  We decided to take it anyway and we made our way out to the third ambulance for the longest, most silent journey of our lives.  I just stared blankly at nothing for most of the time, every so often looking at Adam and shaking my head in disbelief.  I couldn’t speak and I couldn’t cry; it was just an awful numbness.

When we arrived at the hospital, there were midwives waiting for us.  As we were taken through the doors, I saw the paramedics that had cared for Madelyn.  They all looked upset and I felt like they couldn’t look at me.  That’s when I remember the tears starting to fall and I thought “she must be dead”.  We met my Mum and were taken to a room on the labour ward where a midwife came in to check on me.  I could hardly look her in the eye as I was afraid of what she was going to say.  I told her I didn’t want her to tell me anything as I couldn’t take it, but she said she didn’t have anything to tell me yet as she didn’t know how Madelyn was.  However, after what felt like a life-time another midwife came in to tell us that a consultant would come and see us soon.  I daren’t look up at her, but she rubbed my hand and said “they’ve got a heartbeat”.  She couldn’t tell us much more, but those were the best words I had ever heard.