The good twin birth

On 3 August 2019, we attended a friend’s wedding. For the past two months, I had been mainly bedridden due to a mixture of pain, exhaustion and after talking to my midwife. I could feel my body telling me to be careful and to take it easy, so I did.

On our friends’ wedding day I was 34+3 weeks pregnant, I stuffed my body into a loose fitting dress and tried to make my face look human again. At the church, I stood up when the bride came in, but tried to sit as much as possible as I could feel in my stomach that it was disturbing.

But after lying down for so long and not having the best social life, it was nice to get out and talk to other people again. Although few of them understood how hard it can be to carry two babies in your belly. And at the same time, I was now 34 weeks pregnant, a big milestone for anyone pregnant with multiples.

After church, we headed out to the most beautiful estate where the reception started. I had promised that I wouldn’t give birth in the church and I had kept my promise. We had a delicious meal and then we ate at the front. I sat so badly and couldn’t quite find peace.

After the starter, I went to the toilet. I had put on a thick sanitary towel just in case. It was soaking wet.

I put on a new one, but it quickly got wet.

I got hold of a friend who was also at the wedding. She’s a nurse and definitely recommended I contact the labour ward, so I did. They didn’t think it was a problem and thought it was probably nothing, but they still thought I should come round.

I got hold of my husband – who was having a party and enjoying being out. He had had a few drinks, not a lot, but enough to stop him driving. I told him the situation and we got our stuff together and then we drove to the hospital. Well, I drove 😉

After arriving at the hospital we got a room, I was examined and she didn’t think my water had broken, yet she took a test that showed positive for water breaking. However, it was only very slow.

She left and I could hardly bear to wear my dress, everything was tight and uncomfortable. When I tried to take it off and raised both my arms above my head it said *PLASH* and clothes, bed and floor were flooded with water – so now there was no longer any doubt about what was going to happen.

I was scanned and both girls were fine, so we were told to relax and try to get some sleep.

Around 6am the next morning – ON MY HUSBAND’S BIRTHDAY – the contractions started to arrive. After hours in the ward, we were moved to the large delivery room. The one used when it’s twins.

I had manageable contractions all morning, they picked up around midday and got stronger and stronger as more and more people came into the room. They all greeted me, but I barely registered them. Two teams of neonatal nurses and doctors, 3 midwives and probably a few more I can’t keep track of turned up.

The contractions started again and I was given some laughing gas to help me focus on my breathing, it did absolutely nothing and just made me throw up. My husband brought me cold cloths at shuttle speed, and that was the most useful thing I got.

I have a strange tendency to laugh when I’m in pain. In my journal after the birth I read a comment from my midwife saying “Hard to judge the strength of contractions – she laughs” and “says she laughs when she’s in pain”… the strangest coping mechanism, but I do!

I get a huge urge to push and after half an hour Sophia is born at 3.41pm – week 34+4 weighing 2138 grams and 43 cm long. I don’t have time to see her before the neonatal team has got her under control, but I can hear her crying and I’m happy and confused because I’m not finished. It feels really weird to have delivered a baby and not be done?

Sophia is fine and I bring her to me briefly before she goes to her father.

It was only Sophia’s water that had broken and they take Naya’s water, but my contractions have stopped. My body has finished giving birth and we spend the next 20 minutes trying to get my contractions going again. Meanwhile, all these people are watching me and waiting… waiting for me to have another baby and for them to do their job.

But my contractions don’t start again. I focus so much on my body that I don’t notice much around me. However, I can hear small talk and mumbling, I can hear that she has to come out soon and that we’ll have to find another solution if I can’t get her out.

NO, I thought, “I haven’t been lying here all day giving birth and then having a caesarean section on top of that!”. Everything went fast and without informing anyone, I gathered the last bit of energy I had and out came Naya.

No one was ready and Naya flew out, she crashed into the midwife’s legs, she stood at the end of the bed and seemed slightly shocked as she literally grabbed a baby. Naya was born at 16.20 – week 34+4, 2065 grams and 43 cm.

Naya cried too, but I only got to see her briefly and then both girls were taken to the NICU and their father came with them.

It took some effort to get the placentas out, they were a bit stuck and I’ve never felt anything as strange as when a midwife pulls a placenta that is still stuck INSIDE! But they came out and I got stitched up. I was quite chapped, both when Sophia came, but also because Naya had to come out with so much force and came so fast that my skin couldn’t keep up. So I got stitches, on both sides and at the back.

During the process, their father kept me updated on the phone and everything was fine. They were small and needed help, they were given alarms and put on a heating mattress while I was being stitched.

At 6.59pm I arrived in the NICU and saw and held my little miracles for real for the first time. The time between labour and there was both short and long, the adrenaline was pumping, everything hurt and my babies were being wheeled away, I knew they were okay because I was told so, so I was okay. At the same time, both the placentas had to come out and I needed stitches and everything takes time.

I was happy, confused, in pain and completely euphoric at the same time.

I ended up spending almost 3 weeks in the neonatal unit, where they had to learn how to keep warm and eat.

All in all, I had a dream of a birth. It went exactly as it should have, yes I was stitched and it has given me a lot of challenges for a long period afterwards. There were also some things I wish I had done differently, but everything felt like it went fast, even though it took most of a day.

If I could change anything, I would have asked to have Sophia on my chest while I gave birth to Naya. But who knows how it all would have turned out? And I think it was a long time between giving birth and being in the room with them, which I would have liked to be different.

But… it went well, and I have healthy, sensitive, feeling and absolutely perfect 5-year-old children now.

Thank you for reading – I hope you have the birth you want, but most of all that you are doing well. <3