Out Came the Prince!

They said every child is unique, and so is their birth stories. I couldn't agree more! With Aydein, my labor started with periodic contraction. With Adeena, it was blood show. With Aahil.. well, here's how it went down with Aahil.

A day before I gave birth, Aien asked me to accompany him jalan-jalan at Shah Alam's newly opened Aeon Mall. I was reluctant at first, but dragged my heavy bum out anyway, at the thought of having lunch at Manhattan Fish Market (gotta love that place!). To be honest, at this point, I was reluctant to go anywhere due to my backpain. There were many times when I had to miss a few events due to this, like baby expos, warehouse sales, gatherings etc. Backpain is no joke ok! Tapi naseb kau lah suami dapat kawen dengan pelahap, sakit pinggang pun jalan jugak lah bila terbayang the flamed grilled lobsterssss hehe.

On our way back from lunch, I told my SIL, the backpain was not only my concern, the baby's weight too! During the 35th week scan, the doctor said the doctor expected Aahil to come out big, because he was already weighing 2.5kgs at the point. I've never had a baby above 2.8kgs, before so this was quite a concern. I was so worried that he'd be too big for normal delivery and that I'd have to go for caesarian! I guess Aahil heard and didn't want me to worry that he decided to help mommy that very same night!

That midnight at about 1am, I woke up to calm the crying Adeena who got awaken from a dream. After she was settled, I moved slightly on the bed, and at that moment, I felt a slight trickling of liquid coming out from down there. I thought it was just discharge, so I ignored it. But when it happened again after I shifted my body, I got quite curious.

I woke up, went into the toilet to wash my face and looked into the mirror. Suddenly, I felt yet another trickling of liquid coming out from down there. It didn't smell like urine or discharge, so I knew instantly I was leaking of amniotic fluid. The realization of it hit me like cold water in my face - my water bag just broke, I'm giving birth - at 36 weeks!

My heart pumped fast, I felt blood rushed to my head. How can it be? It's too early! Can we hold the labor for one more week? If I give birth now, my baby would be premature! All sorts of thoughts were in my head - images of my unborn baby with ventilator, tubes, and all. (Yeah, I can be very imaginative sometimes :P) I was freaking out inside, but I knew I had to keep cool. So as calmly as I could, I called out to Aien who was sleeping. He rushed to the toilet and asked what was wrong. I told him, "I think it's time,". He took a deep breath and kissed my forehead, telling me that it's going to be okay. I was comforted by his calmness... but not for long!

You see, since I didn't expect to give birth that early, I hadn't packed anything. There is no hospital bag, so let's just say, Aien lost his cool when he couldn't find the things I was asking him to pack. Can you imagine, after 8 years of being married to me, he suddenly didn't know where I kept my jubah or even undies! LOL. And I thought I'm the one with poor stress management! :P After a lot of grumbling, we somehow managed to get the super necessary stuffs, and he decided to come home again later to get more things. But first thing first - get me admitted to hospital.

On the way to the hospital, I could feel more liquid gushing out. By the time I reached the hospital and stepped out of the car, the pad I wore was completely soaked and I was dripping wet! After we did the admission, the nurse put me on a wheelchair and pushed me to the labor room.

The nurse checked my cervix and told me I was 1cm dilated but baby's head was still high. This was confirmed by my obygyn, Dr Tang Boon Nee, who came a few hours later to check on me. The moment she said that, I blurted out the only one thing that was worrying me - Can I still deliver normally? Dr Tang, being the calm and chirpy her, just smiled and reassured me that it's very possible, because the baby's head is already down. However, since my contraction were not very strong, I will need to be induced to get the labor started, so I can deliver faster and avoid infection since my waterbag has broken. I was put on drip at 10am and the induction begun.

Then, all I needed to do was pray so that the contraction is powerful enough for the baby to be pushed down. At first, the contractions were mild, and it just felt like the normal Braxton Hicks I was used to. So I started to worry. What if the contractions remain like these? They won't be strong enough to push the baby down! What if I have to go c-zer? Soooo many what ifs this and what ifs that were playing in my mind. So in order to calm me down, I turned to the only one thing I knew could help ease the worry - the Quran. I started reciting surah Al-Maryam that was said to help make delivery easier for moms. Believe it or not, I didn't just recite it once, but thrice just because I was so nervous, and wanted so badly for this delivery to be smooth and normal! Hehe.

Alhamdulillah, after a while, I started feeling the contraction getting more and more intense. In fact, the pain was never like I've experienced before. Instead of having a steady 2-3 minutes intervals, this one comes every 1 min, sometimes less than a minute! Let's just say, I wasn't prepared for it!

The good thing is, with induce, the labor seems to be faster. The doctor came in at about 12pm, and told me I was already 5cm dilated! But when she saw me in so much pain, she told the nurse to bring down the drug dose so that the contraction would be a bit more bearable for me.

Now here’s the thing. If the past 2 deliveries, I needed Aien to be by my side, holding me and cheering me on, THIS time however, I wanted Aien to be quiet. HAHAHAHAH. I didn’t want anyone touching me, I didn’t want any loud noise. So when Aien tried to be funny and crack jokes in hopes to make me feel better in between the contractions, he actually got a “Stop it, it’s very annoying” from me instead. Hahaha God bless his kind soul. I know he was only trying to make me feel better, but wrong timing dude, wrong timing! :P

And then, when I was finally 10cm, the midwife told me to push whenever I was ready to push. I pushed twice, but I wasn’t giving it all because I wanted the doctor to deliver my baby, not the midwife! I even asked the midwife mid-pushing “Doctor dah sampai?” Haha. Boleh pulak macam tu kan.

So when the doctor finally arrived, 10 minutes later, with just 2-3 pushes more, out came the prince, filling the room with his beautiful, loud cry at 2.31pm, weighing 2.92kg (not bad for a premature!), via normal delivery. :) No injection, no epidural, not even gas to help me this time, just strong will to get me through the 5-hour labor this time, alhamdulillah. :)

And that's, my friends, how I got the prince, my prince, who we named “Aahil”, which literally means “Prince” in Arabic. Welcome to the little family, handsome boy!