I thought nothing of it because my first two labours were completely different. Both those times my waters broke and nothing happened. I had to go to hospital, both were back to back labours and I only lasted to about 3cm before needing an epidural. Anyway, I had a shower, woke my partner up and told him things were happening and I needed to go to the hospital. He was busy moving my car out of the garage, putting the capsule and hospital bag in the car and also getting the boys ready to drop to my parents’ brothers. By that time I was back on the toilet, still feeling like I needed to poop and couldn’t move as it was too painful. Eventually, I managed to stand up and my waters broke.
Suddenly I had this urge to push; after a big push I stood up and felt my baby’s head there.
I screamed out to my partner and told him the baby was coming. Of course, he was freaking out so he turned the bath on!
By the time he put the plug in and got the water going, I had pushed my baby out on the toilet all by myself.
I caught my baby and my partner’s face was in complete shock, like, what do I do? Baby wasn’t crying and I started freaking out, but he came right in the end.
My partner phoned the midwife and she told him what to do.
We decided to phone the ambulance because baby had pooped himself in my stomach, so we wanted him and myself to get checked out.
We waited an hour for the ambulance, yup stuck on the toilet with baby still attached.
The ambulance arrived, a very lovely crew. The cord was cut in the ambulance and the placenta delivered in hospital. We were only in hospital for an hour. Manāki was born during lockdown at 7.00 am on 1 April 2020 weighing 8.9 pounds.
Denise Ives is a qualified breastfeeding counsellor, writer and advocate for mums. She founded The Breast Room® in Dunedin, a charity providing free one to one breastfeeding support and education, and can be contacted at denise@denisives.com or via her website www.deniseives.com.
