Not one but three!

I made my way to the hospital last night feeling quite excited about the prospect of getting my first catch. I met with mentor and she asked where I was at with my training and I was quick to tell her that I'd made all my witnesses and was itching to get my first delivery. Funnily enough she also wanted to know about what else I'd done. 

We began the shift with a very quiet ward. We made sure the rooms were equipped, checked equipment, tidied up....found things to do. We soon had a couple come in from triage, whom we settled into a room and did the necessary checks that needed to be done, before encouraging the woman to mobilise. She was very comfortable so other than the regular checks on baby's heartbeat and how Mum was coping, we left them to it. When she was next checked, she'd not really progressed so my mentor broke her waters and her contractions soon became more intense so I began to spend longer with her to help her cope.  The next couple of  hours passed fairly quickly and my lady was having some early urges to push, so I spent a long time helping her to breathe through the pains instead. After a short while, it was apparent that she was really struggling not to push, so we encouraged her to use some pain relief, so she opted to use the entonox

At 5.00 my mentor returned from her break early, and told me to go to another room quickly. So I dashed off guessing that it meant a delivery was imminent. Sure enough, I entered the room and could already see the head beginning to appear. I quickly gloved up and put an apron on. Supported by the midwife, I caught my first ever delivery of a baby boy at 5.05.  I checked over the placenta with the midwife, cleaned myself up and then returned to my lady who following a dose a pethidine, was dozing between contractions. After a short while, she was still pushing with the contractions, so I popped out to see if my mentor had returned, as I knew she was due another examination shortly. At which point I was hurried into another delivery room, to quickly glove up and catch my second delivery. The lady was very controlled and very quickly delivered a baby girl at 5.25. Again I checked over the placenta with the midwife, and got cleaned up before returning to my lady. 

On my return to her, I felt that she was now really struggling to breathe through the pains and she just sounded like birth might be imminent. So I popped out to check on the whereabouts of my mentor, who'd got caught on the phone and reported what I'd observed. She returned to the room with me, ready to perform a vaginal examination to check how she was doing. At which point, we discovered there was no need to perform an examination, as we could see the head beginning to appear. Unlike the other two deliveries, this was a first baby so we could expect the second stage to take a bit longer. The lady was very well controlled and pushed really well, so that in actual fact, the baby was delivered within 10 minutes of us being able to see the head. So at 6.15 I had my third delivery, this time another baby boy. As with before, we checked over the placenta but this time I didn't need to rush off anywhere else. 

Of the three, the one that obviously meant the most, was the couple I'd been supporting throughout my shift. I got a much better experience of the progress, signs to watch out for and how to encourage and support women. When I finally sat down, I had a complete head rush and needed 5 minutes just to gather my thoughts a bit. It was a complete adrenaline rush and with three more nights to go...I am feeling slightly tired at the thought if they are to be like last night. However I loved it! I am hoping tonight that I get to have the journey of support through labour, as well as the delivery again. And perhaps slightly less running from room to room....and maybe even a break at some point.