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Friday 15th July 2005
Looks like the contractions are calming down now (well, during the afternoon, perhaps). Maybe the window of opportunity has passed. We've still no idea whether abduction/induction will be needed or not. I'll keep yer posted. A few hours of sleep snatched here and there. I think that was cafetiere (sp.?!) number two up there (or maybe to the left . . . somewhere anyway). There's probably no sense of scale, but it's a mini cafetiere so it only holds a single mug.
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M**** didn't get much (if any) sleep last night due to the pain and discomfort caused by the contractions. TENS machine was set as high as M**** could cope with, but M**** found it necessary to switch from pulse mode to continuous mode when the contractions peaked (still roughly every five minutes); hence, she had to stay awake to operate the TENS machine.
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The labour had now entered day two (well, as far as M**** and I were concerned; medical staff would insist 'established labour' had not yet begun) and, during the evening, the contractions now getting ever more painful and uncomfortable (frequency and duration still pretty much the same . . . we kept timing them . . . sometimes three minutes apart, sometime six . . . sometimes lasting 30 seconds, sometimes lasting a minute), we made a trip to the hospital, to see what was going on. Naturally, this involved an internal examination. I think M**** was still 3cm dilated at this point. The delivery rooms were all occupied so even if something had happened that night, the delivery would have had to take place there and then, rather than in a private room designed for such things. I felt sorry for the girl opposite: obviously in a lot of pain (I think I heard 5cm dilation mentioned), but facing the option of giving birth in a busy hospital ward. We were seriously considering going over to St. James's Hospital, but this would involve taking a mid-wife from the Clarendon Wing. As time went by that night, it became obvious that nothing was going to happen for a long time yet. All the mid-wives could think of doing for M**** was to offer her pethidine (sp.?!), as the labour wasn't established enough to allow for an epidural. The pethidine, I think, would have meant staying on the ward all night (for observation, possibly). M**** refused the pethidine and we went home . . . I may have slept for an hour or two, but I don't think M**** was able to sleep at all.
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