9th November 2024

Ava's entry into the world.

This story begins the day before I went into labour, a week before I was due,
with me insisting that my husband, Ricki, goes to join his friends at a bachelor party weekend in Betty’s Bay, about an hour and a half from where we live in Cape Town.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, as he was about to head out the door.
“Like I’m not going to go into labour this weekend”, I replied.

I was 39 weeks pregnant, and I was sure I wasn’t going to give birth until at least 41 weeks (the average for most first-time mums).

He journeyed off to Betty’s Bay, to what ended up being a very eventful bachelor party - most notably (and with relevance to this story, later) on the Saturday night, one of the friends had his finger chopped off when it got caught in a door that was unexpectedly slammed closed by a gust of wind.

That’s right, top of his finger, clean off.

A party-ruining moment for poor Jeff, and a worst-case scenario for his wife who had just had their second baby and was now down a pair of hands to change nappies….
…But a great story for everyone else.

Sunday morning rolled around, and I woke up at home, on my own, at about 7:45am with a cramping sensation in my womb. When you go into labour for the first time, it’s surprisingly hard to know if you’re in labour. You haven’t done this before. There are so many new sensations that come with pregnancy, it’s tricky to differentiate between actual labour and just another weird pregnancy symptom.

I thought it was probably best to let Ricki know, and to suggest that he doesn’t hang around too much, just in case.

It had been my idea for him to go to the bachelor party, and it had also been my idea that he get a lift with someone else so that I could keep the car for the weekend (there was a second-hand baby sale happening in Pinelands that I wanted to go to…)

I sent him a message saying,

Ricki puts his phone on flight mode while he’s asleep, which he had done instinctively at 3 am when he got into bed, not thinking that his heavily pregnant wife at home might need to contact him…

After 30 minutes of seeing my messages to him were still on a single tick, I messaged another friend who was at the bachelor party:

Ricki finally gets the message, but there he is, in Betty’s Bay, at 9:30am on Sunday morning, after a big night, with no vehicle to get home… Thankfully, Trent realised what I was probably messaging about and offered to drive Ricki back to town asap.

While I waited for Ricki to arrive, I made myself some eggs (3 eggs - I knew I would need the energy), and started trying to do all the tasks I hadn’t gotten around to yet, since I was so sure the baby wouldn’t be coming until 41 weeks… I did a Checkers order for all the labour snacks I wanted (most difficult Checkers order of my life), I got all the ‘homebirth prep essentials’ together, I did a load of washing, I contemplated making the ‘post-birth’ lemon drizzle cake I had been dreaming about … but at this stage the surges were strong and about 5 minutes apart. There was nothing I wanted to do less than try baking a cake. So I bailed on that idea.

Ricki arrived back at around 11am, I felt my labour shift gears as I relaxed a little more, knowing he was home. But the reunion was short-lived. Ricki, like me, was not expecting the baby to come for another few weeks, so there were a few things on his items on ‘birth prep’ list still to buy - namely, the hosepipe and tap fitting for the birth pool. As soon as he had checked I was okay, he headed straight back out to the hardware store.

About 15 minutes later, Ricki comes bursting back through the front door.
“Have you got the attachments?” I asked.
“I forgot my wallet”, he replied.
Grabs his wallet, and back out the door he goes…

By 12pm my surges were 3 minutes apart, my midwife, Sue, and doula, Bridget, decided to hear over.

Once Ricki was home, and my birth team had arrived, I felt myself fully relax, and before I knew it, I was at 10cm.

Ricki started filling the birth pool - but due to me progressing quicker than expected, the gentle stream coming from the hosepipe wasn’t getting us there fast enough, and Ricki had to run back and forth with two buckets trying to fill it as quickly as possible.

Once it was finally ready, I jumped in, and wow- did that feel good. The ‘home birth epidural’ indeed!

I was on my hands and knees in the pool, Bridget had an ice-cold flannel for my face as I was sweating a lot by then. I could feel something starting to come out and I assumed it was the head… Sue had placed a mirror on the floor of the pool so she could see what was happening. She told me I could put my hand down and feel. Turns out what had come out was the top of the amniotic sac, not her head - she was coming out en caul (“in the sac”)!

Bridget reminded me to come back to my breath and I focused on the breathing practices I’d been doing through the pregnancy to help slow me down and take things easy. I focused really hard on not letting myself rush and slowly I felt her head begin to emerge. I had one hand holding her head and with each pushing sensation I could feel her head progressing, then the pushing sensation would end and I would feel her head retract slightly back inside again. I took all my mental strength not to get disheartened when I felt her head moving back inside and I had to remind myself not to panic or stress when I felt her head retracting, that this is absolutely part of the process and nothing to worry about. She would eventually come out. I just kept breathing calmly and waiting for the next push.

Just before another pushing sensation, Ricki asked me, “would you like some biltong”, I answered him with a deep guttural “uuurrrrgggghhhhhh” as the pushing sensation took hold, and her head was born! I couldn’t believe it, I waited patiently, holding her head, for the next pushing sensation. It was probably a few minutes, but that period of time seemed to stretch forever. It finally came, and with that push I felt the rest of her body shoot out.

I was able to catch her as she came out.

I sat back in the pool, Ava on my chest, she gave a big cry. I was laughing, crying. Ricki was kneeling behind me, outside the pool. He was gazing at Ava, I had been dreaming of this moment for months, finally being able to share this beautiful baby I had growing, with him. He looked down at her, gently stroking her. “Look at her little hands”, he said, “she’s got more fingers than Jeff”.