It's A Boy! ... Oh Boy!

Everyone's been asking what's happening with the birth... on Tuesday the 24th of June, at 3:45am, Noah Orion Leopold was born.

It turned out to be a pretty long labour. Starting on Saturday the 21st, Frangipani's water broke in the afternoon, followed by some mild contractions. Seemed like labour was going to start, so we went out to keep active, and do some last minute shopping.

Frangipani was leaking gushes of amniotic fluids though a slow leak all evening, and by night she was starting to look like being in labour. I went to get a couple of hours sleep, and told her to do the same. Of course, not long after midnight I got up to find them awake, and timing contractions on this funny website; ContractionMaster.

Contractions were still quite mild and irregular, but coming every 5 minutes or so. At sunrise Frangipani decided to get into the birthing pool, but that slowed things down, and she ended up going to sleep for a bit.

All through Sunday, she was still losing water, but not really in active labour. I figured prodromal labour, but started suspecting asynclitism (when the baby's head is on a funny angle). Only I wasn't sure. Oh if only I had been more confident in what I felt!

A friend of Frangipany's came over to play with Littletree and keep her occupied, which was nice. By evening the contractions got stronger again, and we settled in to have a baby, with good contractions lasting more than a minute coming every 7 minutes or so, and getting closer.

Crazily, we passed the whole night that way, with no real change, and still irregular. Again, with the dawn, things slowed down a bit, and Frangipani got a chance to rest, but not really, with contractions waking her up every few minutes.

Monday, another friend came over to take Littletree to the Phuket Aquarium, and Jo had a sleep. I kept Frangipani active, but in the early afternoon we got a bit discouraged and decided to do a vaginal exam, though Frangipani had planned to be as intervention-free as possible.

She was at 9cm, with good descent! Thus encouraged, we decided to do some dancing to shift the baby out. It was great, to see Frangipany wriggling her way through contractions to funky reggae!

(ETA - I finally got the edited video uploaded, so i've put it in: note this isn't the same video that I posted earlier today, that one can still be seen on youtube if you search for sequoialittletree videos)
By evening, the contractions were getting pretty intense and closer together. Phew! Finally :)

Only by midnight, there was still no change. I still suspected that the head was deflexed (looking up rather than with the head tucked in) and asynclitic, so we did a bunch of postures and things to try shifting it, but no dice. I did another vaginal exam, only to find Frangipani was still dilated to 9cm, in the exact same position as 10 hours before! At least the baby's heart rate was fine throughout it all.

We tried a couple more measures to shift the baby, but in the end, suffering miserably from exhaustion, after missing two and a half nights' sleep, and trooping through such a long labour, Frangipani decided to transfer to the hospital.

We arrived into the ER at around 2am, and the doctor was called. The obstetrician came in and confirmed my diagnosis - baby deflexed and asynclitic, impacted at 9cm in a brow presentation. When I told him I'd checked her and she'd been at 9cm for over 12 hours, he called for a cesarean section, which Frangipani agreed to.

The nice thing was that the doctor and nurses were all very respectful, and totally accepted me as an authority. I managed to convince the doctor to let hospital policy slide and allow Jo into the operating room, and to take the baby as soon as it was delivered, rather than taking it off in a plastic box to the nursery, and also for no vaccinations, eye drops or vitamin K. They also agreed to let Frangipani have skin-to-skin contact and initiate breastfeeding as soon as possible. :)

It all went well, and Noah Orion Leopold was born, healthy and fine, 3.33kg and 54cm long. Though with his head dented in the shape of Frangipani's pelvis. The swelling went down really fast though. Now mama and baby are recovering well, bonding and breastfeeding like crazy :D