The previous post was the happy part of the labour process. After Dr Chan stitched me up, I was all ready to retreat back into the room, just us, our little family of three. After some skin to skin time with Julianne, the nurses brought her back to the nursery for a complete routine check. I was told my parents and sister were waiting excitedly outside - it was comforting to know that as I was tirelessly pushing, family was cheering me on from outside.
I stayed on in the delivery suite for observation as I was running a mild temperature. Dr Chan takes his leave and we thanked him for all the assistance. Told him to also bring Dr Liang the good news of Julianne's arrival.
11.15pm: Before sending me back to the ward, the nurses attempted to drain my bladder only to find that my uterus wasn't contracting as it should. Nurse Yang examines me and tells me she needed to check me further and it may cause some discomfort.
11.30pm: 1st Pain: She performs what has got to be the most excruciating pain ever experience in my life. I'm dead serious. By this time, my happidural wasn't so happy anymore as it had started to wear off. So when the nurse examines me with her bare hands, I really screamed murder! She tells us that I had blood clots in my uterus which explains why it wasn't contracting and that they had to ensure that the clots were removed before sending me back to the ward.
12mn: 2nd Pain - she returns to perform yet another check. I really hated it. She suggested I used the laughing gas to distraught me from the pain so we did. There she went again, 2nd examination. The laughing gas was rubbish and did nothing to help. I screamed like I never did before and was really to rip dearie's arm off. There were still clots and I could sense some serious concern in Nurse Yang's voice and she explained what was happening. My BP was also starting to drop. In my state of pain and bluriness, I heard them saying "Call Dr Chan" and that got me really worried. In the meantime, she left us, asking dearie to massage my tummy to help rid the clots. The nurse from the nursery also ask for permission to give Julianne some formula since I was not in the right state of breastfeed. As much as I had wanted to exclusively breastfeed her, it was what was best for her at that point.
2nd November
12.15am: 3rd Pain - Every time I see her back in the room, my heart will tremble. When she says she is going to check me, trust me, I gave her poor puppy looking face and literally beg her not to. No prizes for guessing who wins. So there we go again, with that useless laughing gas.
12.30am: At this point, I thought I was in some severe condition. Dr Chan returns and repeats that horrendous act of clearing my clots with his bare hands just like what Nurse Yang had done but longer and 10 folds more painful. My scream could bring the hospital down but I couldn't care less. I probably also scratched the nurse and the husband who was holding onto me. After what was like an eternity of pain, Dr Chan explained what was happening but I wasn't in the right state of mind to understand anything.
1am: Dr Chan leaves and I continue to be kept behind for observation. Dearie was instructed to massage me to help the uterus contract.
1am - 3am: I think I went through two more rounds of checks being told each time things looked better and hoping that that meant no more checks.
4am: Finally at 4am, after being in the delivery suite for some 22 hours, thirsty, hungry, in pain and running a temperature, Nurse Yang does one last check and allows me to return to the ward. I was just glad my ordeal was over. I apologised to Nurse Yang and thank her for putting up with my screams and struggles over the last few hours. I felt bad cos I know my struggling didn't make her job easier but the pain was truly beyond unbearable and I have *never* in my life felt gone through anything close to this.
The post delivery trauma rated 100 on a pain score of 10 and made the actual labour seem like an absolute painless experience.
I now have new found respect for nurses who had to put up with all my crap, clean me up and make sure I was in the right condition to be discharged from the labour ward. And thank God for our gynae who returned to check on my condition or I would have probably bled to death.
Looking at Julianne the next day more than made up for what I had gone through. How truly precious was our daughter and I couldn't be more thankful to God placing her safely in my arms.
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