On Monday, July 17 at 8:00pm I started feeling some contractions. They started off quite mildly, and I was able to continue carrying on normally with my evening. I didn't say anything to Dave right away because I wasn't sure if it was real labour, or just braxton-hicks (fake 'practice') contractions at that point. Dave and I made a snack and started watching some TV. I was distracted with the TV program, but slowly became aware that these contractions were increasing in intensity and frequency. At about 10:00pm, Dave's pager went off and he had to go to work. I told him how I was feeling, but I said that he should go into work because he wouldn't be long, and I thought that we would have a while to wait (I had moderate contractions for several hours with Megan). At 10:40 the contractions were ramping up, so I packed a bag and called Dave and said that he should phone someone else to come in to work because I thought that I should go to the hospital. Seth came over to the house to be here with Megan, who was in bed. Dave got home in record time, and we made our way to the hospital, arriving at about 11:30. The highway driving was OK, but once we got onto the side roads, I was asking him to slow down because I could feel every little bump! By the time we got there, I estimate that the contractions were no more than 1 minute apart, maybe less. I had 6 contractions from outside the front doors to the time I got to the admitting desk. The hospital staff was initially confused when they saw Dave because he was still dressed in his hospital greens from his work at the Jubilee Hospital. I was shown to a delivery room and all was OK for about 15 minutes. Then I began to have some more intense contractions. They manually broke my waters at a couple of minutes after midnight. Immediately after that, the contractions became quite severe. They offered me some gas (nitrous gas/laughing gas), which I readily accepted! There was very little time between contractions. I told them I had to push, and they said 'not yet'. After a minute or so, I said it again, and they said 'just a few more minutes'. The doctor examined me, and then they took the gas away from me. I protested, and they said that I couldn't have it because the baby was coming. The next time I stated 'I am pushing this baby out' and that was that. I pushed 4 or 5 times, and out came Emily at 12:19am! The doctor told me later that I was pushing for about 4 minutes. Dave cut the umbilical cord, and Emily was placed on my chest.
Since Emily was born so quickly, she did not have time to clear all of the mucus out of her airway and stomach. Over the next few days, she was sputtering and gagging as the mucus came up and was hard for her to clear it. On Wednesday evening, July 19, I was startled awake by Emily when she choked up a large amount of mucus into her nose and mouth. I immediately got up to help her clear it, but right away she went stiff and her lips went like a fish and she started to change to a bluish colour. I rang the emergency bell and about 6 nurses came in straight away. Emily started sputtering then, and they took her to the nursery to use a bulb syringe to suction the rest out. They brought Emily back right away and she was fine, but it was sure scary. At 9:00pm it happened again, but this time she cleared the mucus as the nurses were coming in. I did not sleep after that and was awake until about 1:30am until the nurse came in and offered to take Emily into the nursery so I could get some sleep.
On Thursday, July 20, we brought Emily home! We made a bed for her in a clear rubbermaid container so she could sleep by my bedside for a few nights until we were sure that she had cleared all of the mucus. Starting on July 24, she slept in her room in her crib at night.
Emily is so named because we liked the name Emily! Her middle name, Patricia, is the same as Sian's middle name, and is also for Dave's Grandfather, Patrick.
For more pictures of Emily and Megan, please select the links on The Lewis Family Webspace home page.