The waiting game, in pregnancy, and in life.

Our first child, Alesia, was born on her exact due date. I read that only 4% of ALL babies are born on their due dates. She also came fairly fast. I was ‘in’ labour for about 24 hours, but only any real hard labour for the last 4 hours.

When our second child was born, our only son Joshua, he surprisingly came 10 days early! That was a real nice surprise because I was far enough along in my pregnancy that he wasn’t “too” early, and he was born at a nice healthy size. My labour this time was about 12 hours, with 2 hours of hard labour..

When I was pregnant with our third child, Elisabeth (Elsa), everyone and their uncle, would ask me if I went on time, early, or late with my first two. So I’d always tell them I was right on time with Alesia, and 10 days early with Josh. EVERYONE and their uncle would always reply with, “Oh, then you’ll DEFINITELY go early with this one!”

Don’t ever, EVER, tell a pregnant woman that she will deliver her baby early.

Ever.

I mean it, don’t EVER do it.

By week 40 I was not just due, but I was due with a BREECH baby.

By week 41, my doctor was putting on a lot of pressure to book a c-section. I did NOT want a c-section. I knew birthing a breech baby was going to be difficult, but I was still hoping against all hope, that maybe, just maybe, she would do a sudden last minute flip flop and I’d be delivering her as easily, and as naturally, as I had delivered my first two children.

My doctor also made me sign a waiver not holding him responsible for my pregnancy going past 40 weeks. I was fine with that. I was completely fine with being completely responsible for MY baby, and MY body, thank you very much!

He also booked me in for a c-section scheduled at week 42 and 1 day. End of discussion. If I did not deliver by then, if I did not go into labour on my own by the end of my 42nd week, he was NOT going to allow me to go any further. I was agreeable to that. As much as I was determined to give my baby, and my body, the chance to do this, I was also not into pushing things past certain limits. I agreed that if I had not gone into labour by the time I was 42 weeks and 1 day, yes, we would go ahead and do things his way.

An induction and possible subsequent c-section was booked for January 12th, 1998.

If you live anywhere in the vacinity of Ontario, Canada, whether it be IN Ontario, or across the US border in New York State, etc., you may just remember Januaury 1998.

If you do not remember January 1998, let me refresh your memory, because I’m quite sure even if you do not, or did not, live in those areas of Canada and the US, you did indeed hear some news about January 1998.

http://archives.cbc.ca/environment/extreme_weather/topics/258-1447/

It was called The Great Ice Storm of 1998.
Canadians had never before endured a natural disaster like the ice storm of 1998. A difficult morning of car scraping quickly turned into a state of emergency … 

The ice storm, happened the week/days before my scheduled c-section.

At that time we lived in the fairly rural, small town of Athens Ontario. Being 20-25 minutes away from the nearest hospital doesn’t seem so far away, until you go into labour, with a breech baby, in the middle of The Great Ice Storm.

This post is getting MUCH too long. I shall continue tomorrow!

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