My TinyHuman was born following an induction. It’s no secret that I absolutely hated being pregnant– like with a fiery passion. Induction is a strange experience and different for everyone but here is our story.
TinyHuman was due on 5th January 2022, but by mid-december I was done. I couldn’t be pregnant anymore. My mental health had taken such a turn. My midwife referred me to a consultant who reluctantly agreed to induce me on Tuesday 28th December 2021, but it wasn’t soon enough. I sent an email to my midwife team explaining how extremely unhappy I was while pregnant, I’ve always been better at writing down my feelings than verbalising them. It was a long email, but the jist of it was basically “get this baby out of me, being pregnant makes me want to walk infront of a bus. I just need to hold my child”.
Eventually I was heard and they rescheduled my induction for Boxing Day 2021. Recently I found a blog style note in the notes section from my iPad that I wrote whilst sat on the maternity ward, so I thought I’d share. This was written by a very heavily pregnant Millie, just waiting impatiently for the arrival of TinyHuman.
So… here’s our story
I don’t think that anything could have prepared me for the induction of our baby. I requested to be induced earlier than the originally planned 39+1 because by the end, being pregnant made me yearn for death. So when I was offered the opportunity to be induced on Boxing Day, I jumped at the chance.
We walked into the labour ward at 09:00 ready to go, we were so excited. They hooked me up to all these monitors, they wanted to monitor the baby for a bit before we begun. Then came strolling in four doctors with the firm intention of sending me home. “We don’t usually do routine inductions on bank holidays” and “what’s a few more days of waiting when you can just take painkillers?”. All stood around me, like I’m that naughty schoolgirl being berated in the head teachers office.
I’ve suffered with SPD throughout my pregnancy, on my worst days I can’t even dress myself or even get out of bed… but hey, what’s a few more days? Just take some paracetamol and have a bath, hmm sounds familiar. Maybe I should’ve just rung the f*cking crisis team, nothing in the world that a cuppa and a bath can’t fix!
So we’ve angrily fought off the demon headteacher squad, we’re still going ahead with the induction. Eager and naive, we’re going ahead!
Next step: the propess…
First things first, The Man has to come topside. This pregnancy has stripped us of enough dignity that he don’t gotta witness that too.
So, we begin… feet together, bring them up to your bum, drop your knees to the side… exposed. Then in she goes with her freezing cold, jelly covered fingers, fumbling about like a teenage boy being given his first shot at a cheeky fingerbang. I mean, I know she knows what she’s fumbling for and where to go, but it definitely doesn’t feel that way.
Then she inserts the propess, which is like having someone else insert a sharp and solid tampon, painful and bizarre! She tells you that this part is over, and you’re thankful. Extremely thankful… until you turn to your partner.
He’s sat topside looking wide-eyed and horrified, he waits until the midwife has left and starts staring at me for a long pause. Then he starts looking back and forth between me and his forearm which he’s placed his other hand half way down, before I hit him with a very confused and short tempered “what!?“.
He pauses for a minute, pulling that face that I know means ‘I’m not sure if I should say that out loud.’ For f*cks sake. Out with it man.
How much of her arm was just inside you!?
Is this man for real!?
I’m sorry, what!?
Apparently from his angle it looked as though the midwife was almost elbow deep… no wonder the poor man looked so horrified. On a good day, my shitty sense of humour would have taken control and absolutely let him believe it, but on this day I just stared at him in disbelief.
Back to the maternity ward
Now we’re moved back up to the ward, where nothing happens… all day. The only other girl in the big six bed room that I’m in keeps watching television soaps out loud, her boyfriend’s trousers match his socks, and this b*tch is contracting. I don’t really hate her, but I feel like I do. I want this baby out!
The whole day passes- nothing happens… The whole night passes- nothing happens… The morning comes- still not a thing happens. Oh no, wait. That’s not true… this b*tch goes off down to the labour ward, comes back up and is placed in one of the other rooms because she’s had her f*cking baby!!!
I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for her… but I definitely hate her. Congratulations and f*ck you.
The wait feels like a lifetime
At midday, finally someone comes in and says they’re going to try one more thing. I wont lie I wasn’t even listening to what she said it was because all I heard was “then we’ll start moving things along”. Moving this baby the f*ck out of me!!!
It was a suppository of some kind, but again I didn’t even notice it. They’re going to get this baby out of me! Then we sat, eagerly and impatiently waiting for something to happen… buuuuuut, nothing did. Finally at 18:00, they decided to get things going.
They took me down to the labour ward, and my waters were broken.
Fourteen hours later, at 08:23 on December 28th 2021… he arrived.
