The Beauty in my Traumatic Birth Story

 My birth story has been far from easy to navigate and has left me feeling a huge spectrum of emotions from overjoyed and excited to do it all again to traumatised and terrified of childbirth. It has been complex to process the events that led to the birth of my gorgeous firstborn son, Jedidiah-Jones David Eganda, but first and foremost I am so thankful to God for it all; from conception and the beautiful experience of pregnancy to giving birth to a healthy and happy little boy. Going forwards I still have a long road ahead of healing mentally and emotionally, but I know that Gods plan is better than any plan I could have made for labour and delivery. I prayed for His perfect Will to be done so I find peace in accepting that this was the story He had wrote out for me to experience and it is all for a higher purpose to glorify His name and draw me closer to Him. At the end of the day, we are commanded in 1 Thessalonians 5:18 to “give thanks in all circumstances”, not just some, so whether a good experience or a bad experience we must thank God. I thank God too for his faithfulness of bringing a healthy boy into our lives.

It’s amazing to think that this time last year I had no plans of becoming a mother any time soon and now this time this year I am living in Gods beautiful purpose for my life by walking in motherhood, what I believe to be one of the greatest callings a woman can have in this life. When I found out I was pregnant I was filled with so much joy and gratitude to the Lord for favouring me. Being young and in general good health I entered pregnancy thinking that I would have a standard low risk pregnancy and be able to have the unmedicated waterbirth with as little intervention as possible that I had always dreamed of. Turns out I was very wrong, and the reality of my birth story was far from this ideology. I found out early on in my pregnancy that I would need to take medication due to an issue with the functioning of the placenta and because of the risks associated with this condition would need to have an early induced labour rather than allowing my body to go into a natural labour at the gestational due date. This devastated me. When I questioned the consultant if I could still have certain elements of my original birth plan incorporated, I seemed to always be faced with a big “no, not an option for you sorry.” I wasn’t upset with the consultants as me and my husband had prayed regarding the healthcare professionals involved in the delivery of our son and the Lord blessed us by sending us the most amazing midwives, consultants and Doctors. I can’t fault the quality of the NHS staff at the hospital one bit. They did a fantastic job to ensure me, and my baby were safe and healthy, and if that meant not being able to fulfil my wishes for childbirth to ensure me and my son were safe than so be it. I had seen a lot of backlash online about induced labours as they tend to be longer, more painful, and have an increased risk of emergency intervention associated – all of which I can confirm for my own personal story, however I have no regrets in the choice I made to follow medical advice. I much prefer natural methods, and I don’t like the idea of hormonal intervention at all, but when I weigh up the risks to a baby’s health if interventions such as inductions aren’t followed for certain circumstances, then saying no to an induction isn’t an option. It was time to be a doer of the Word and not merely a hearer and apply the scripture in Philippians 2:4 (MSG) that states “Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand. Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of Himself.” At my 36 week growth scan we discovered my baby was measuring small due to his growth dropping off compared to previous scans and I would need to be induced as soon as possible at 37 weeks. This gave me about 6 days to mentally and physically prepare to give birth when I felt far from ready. I have learnt that many times in life you won’t be ready for what you are about to go through but if you were ready, you’d have no reason to rely on the greatest helper of all, The Holy Spirit. It is in these moments that we can rely heavily on the Lord and be drawn closer to Him.

In the lead up to going to the hospital for my appointed time of induction I decided to dive into reading an incredible and eye-opening book called ‘Supernatural Childbirth’ by a great lady called Jackie Mize. Now that my dream of having a natural childbirth had seemed to be taken away this book really encouraged me that all would be well because why have a natural childbirth when you can have a supernatural childbirth? Although the book focused on being able to go through labour without pain (which unfortunately did not happen for me) I still believe that my childbirth was supernatural despite experiencing pain and interventions because what makes childbirth supernatural is the element of divine intervention, not having a labour with no pain relief or going through a vaginal birth rather than a c-section. I had prayed for Gods Will in this situation just as Jesus had prayed in the garden of Gethsemane in Luke 22:42 (NKJV), “saying, ‘Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.” The whole aim of this life on earth is to know Jesus and if that means I have to also go through suffering to know Him deeper than that is much better than not going through suffering and not get any closer to my Lord and Saviour. Gods Will was delivered and not my own making it a supernatural childbirth, despite the pain, anguish, and traumatic events. As I had previously stated the events were traumatising and unpleasant to experience, however I really believe God has taught me some beauty in these moments I wanted to share.

Now to the actual story of my delivery. I went to the hospital on Tuesday 6^th May at 9pm and spent the first night being monitored on and off for babies heart rate. I didn’t realise here that this was the first night of having sleep deprivation for the next I don’t know how many years. The lady in the bay next to me was crying and vomiting all night and when I decided to take a nap on the day room sofa all I could hear was a lady giving birth in the bathroom opposite. The following day I tried to take a nap to make up for last nights awful sleep before I was abruptly woken up by the midwife on the ward that a space had opened up on the labour ward (where I would need to be induced due to the nature of my pregnancy) and that I had 5 minutes to pack my bags and be down there. Once I had settled in and been on the monitor for some time they started the induction process. Over the next three days from Wednesday to Friday I had to undergo five out of six possible rounds of prostaglandin gel insertions to help soften my cervix, dilate me, and begin contractions to start labour. The first round started working fairly quickly with the contractions and at this point they just felt like bad period cramps. I managed to keep up a lot of walking around the hospital grounds, some pregnancy workouts with the birthing ball, having warm showers and heat packs. When I was examined in the night I had begun dilating, my cervix had already softened, and baby’s head was sitting very low. But it wasn’t enough to break my waters yet and I had to continue with the hormone gels to progress things. The next day when one of the consultants came to examine me (who do a much more thorough internal examination than the midwives) blood vessels in my cervix ruptured and I began to bleed out along with parts of my mucus plug. During this process I screamed out in pain and the crying took me by surprise as I had coped so well so far. Little did I know that this was only the beginning. As the additional gel treatments continued my contractions progressed to be more intense and painful over the days and the methods I had used previously began to lose their effect. I tried using a TENS machine and began taking some oral pain relief. By the third day and after five rounds I was exhausted, and my contractions were beginning to become unbearable. My back had started to cramp up badly too and when the midwife checked babies positioning it was because he was laying back-to-back with me. To make things worse I had to lay on my back for five hours to be monitored as they were noticing dips in his heart rate. A consultant came around to inform me that an emergency c-section would be best due to this trend and after many tears and counsel from my husband I was ready to go ahead, until the consultant team returned to inform me that his heart rate had stabilised and that I was able to continue with a vaginal birth. When I was examined again, I was dilated enough to have my waters broken and transferred into a private delivery suite. It took several hours before they could come around to break my waters due to other deliveries needing prior attention and through these few hours, they were the hardest and most painful of my life. My contractions had become so intense and when I had previously been adamant about no gas and air, I had that mask strapped to my face like it was an extension of me. I was exhausted after three days of this process and couldn’t take the pain anymore, but I had no choice but to endure. As well as contractions I was having intense lower back cramps and feeling huge amounts of pressure bearing down on my pelvis from where baby boy was pressing down onto my cervix. When the Doctor finally broke my waters, I progressed into active labour very quickly and I was screaming out for the epidural. Again, another intervention that I had originally been so against but I realised quickly there is no heroes or special medals in this birthing process. If God has given man medical wisdom to help us go through these circumstances than I am going to take full advantage of this grace. The hardest part was sitting still to have the needle inserted into my spine and I had to be held by two people to keep me still whilst the gas and air mask was still strapped to my face. Finally the amazing anaesthetists finished getting the epidural set up and I was laid down to rest whilst the medications took effect to numb my lower half, and they inserted a catheter as I wouldn’t be able to move for a long while now. As I attempted to rest to gain strength through the next few hours I was constantly waking to the huge pressure and intensity of oncoming contractions induced by the hormone drip. I was under the impression that I wouldn’t be able to feel anything at all but due to the intensity of the hormone drip I could still feel every contraction despite not having the sharp agonising pain anymore. After a few hours I was feeling an overbearing sensation to push and reaching towards my husband to pass me the gas and air. I was reassured that as a first-time mother I would unlikely be fully dilated and so to rest for a few more hours and await Doctors examination. It wasn’t long before I woke again continuing needing to push and so the midwife called for the Doctor who confirm I was at full dilation of 10cm, and it was time to push baby out. Suddenly the medical team rushed in, and I was put onto my back reclined with my feet up in stirrups. I began to push down as each contraction came on and the brilliant midwives held my hands. He began to move down the birth canal however the monitor showed that with each contraction and push his heart rate was dropping. The Doctor informed me that we needed to have emergency intervention to birth him quickly which I agreed to. She firstly tried the suction cap, but it pinged off and smacked her in the face (probably not what she wanted on a Friday night shift, sorry). The last option was to give me an episiotomy (where they make an incision down below) and deliver him with forceps. I took a deep breath and before I knew it forceps were inserted and Jedidiah was born on Saturday the 10^th of May at 4:53am by the grace of God. He came out crying with strong lungs and the paediatric Doctor gave him the all clear as a perfectly healthy boy. The Doctor stitched me up as I lay covered in all sorts of fluid with a beautiful baby boy on my chest that God had gifted our love with. In that moment all the pain, trials, discomforts, and horrors were so worth it for the joy felt at the end, just as the Bible says, “A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world” (John 16:21, NIV).

Although at first, I was disappointed that I hadn’t experienced the natural and pain free childbirth that I was convinced I would experience I have learnt that the supernatural element was God drawing me closer to Him by teaching me that the absence of trials and tribulations doesn’t signal divine intervention. As Christians we are not promised a life without suffering because we are following in the sufferings of Jesus Christ. What the Lord does promise is that our suffering will be turned into joy at the end of the trial and that is the beauty that I experienced from giving birth to my wonderful son. It has taught me to submit to Gods Will and not my own plans. The heart of man plans his course but the Lord establishes his steps (Proverbs 16:9). It was a time to completely surrender to the Lord and trust His plan above all else, and I wouldn’t trade that beautiful experience of total surrender and trust in God for anything.

“Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials, know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.” – James 1:2-4 (HCSB).

“Looking onto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” – Hebrews 12:2 (NKJV).

The above beautiful scripture the Lord has given to me multiple times over the past year and now I feel as if I have walked in closeness to this verse that the Holy Spirit had been putting on my heart for a long while, and therefore the Lord has been glorified from this experience and for that I am thankful. I pray that as we continue to go through various trials that we look onto Jesus to receive the joy promised ahead of the suffering.