At home - 25th June

Mum with a dosey monkey
Dad with a little cherub we picked up the other day

Hospital Pics - 20th June

Jake in his cot
Mum finally holding her baby boy in recovery
Dad gets a hold outside theatre

Week 38 - and he couldn't wait!

JAKE IAN CASSIDY HUGHES

20th June 2006

5.45pm

7lb 4oz

Hello everyone.

Funny what things happen when you don't keep on top of them - I know, I know, I didn't update anything on here for nearly 2 months but isn't this something to make up for it?!

To start, I'll stop any confusion with his name. He doesn't have a double-barrelled surname, he'll just be lucky having 2 middle names and one of them is Cassidy. So, to every other person he'll be known as Jake Hughes.

So, labour, birth and all things like that. Mmmmm. Well, it all started on Monday night, 19th June. Ian and I were talking about how the heck we could hurry him along, etc etc but I was resigning myself to the fact that he'd be another few weeks. After eating a very spicy Thai stir-fry (Ian conveniently placed EXTRA chillies in there), we propped ourselves up in bed watching another rivetting episode of Big Brother. Thought, better go to the loo whilst the ads are on....'hang on, why am I still peeing when I stand up'?.......'Ian! My waters have gone'......'what do you mean'.......'my waters have gone, I'm sure I'm sure'......'where's the number then, he better come tonight coz England are playing tomorrow'.......

.....and so the story goes. I had no pain nothing. The hospital wanted me to come in for a check. It was about 11.30pm. Got there, examined by an Aussie midwife. I still felt fine but my waters were still coming. Very strange feeling that. Anyhow, I was hoping that we'd be there then for good but she told us to go home and just wait and see what happens.

Deflated, went home. Funnily enough, started cramping and keeling over in pain once we got back in the car. It was cool I thought. Just concentrate on breathing, try and get some sleep and maybe have a bath. Got home and geez Louise! So this is what a contraction feels like - where's my mum!! Ian like a good husband went back to sleep. I decided to stand around in the bathroom for a few hours latching on to the sink or top of the toilet for dear life. Somehow I managed to run a bath and sit in that for a wee while. Well the pains were coming pretty fast now and lasting quite a while longer so I thought bugger this.....I called the hospital myself. Thank god I was contracting when I was trying to speak to them so she said come back in, but take your time - TAKE MY TIME! Yeah ok, I might stop off and get some breakfast and watch some tele.....hello, woman wanting drugs please.

Finally at around 5am we were back at the hospital....Ian was pretty calm but seemed pretty miserable that his sleep was broken. 'They better not send us back home'......'they won't be, coz I'll have something to f$£*ing say about it'.

So, first drug of choice was Equinox (gas and air)......it was ok. Didn't really enjoy it and made me feel pretty funny but then it helped me to concentrate a bit. Midwife then offered me Pethidine....did bugger all for me I'm afraid. I thought, why wait, let's get an epidural. It felt like ages for it to kick in....oh, that's because it wasn't working properly. This was the start of things to come really now that I think about it. It had only worked on one half of my body so I was still sucking the gas & air, which they thought was kind of strange. Anyway, they finally fixed that and then I was ok. Ian spent most of the day discussing chemistry and drugs with the midwife and she was going on about something or other. I was either spaced out or just snoozing (kind of). They brought in a tele for us and we had a watch of the Germany vs Ecuador game.

4pm - finally they could check to see how far away I was. Unfortunately not far enough. I'd only gone another centimetre in 4 hours, so they decided to give me a syntocin drip to speed things up. To cut a long story short, little Jake didn't handle this very well and his heart rate dropped to 50 b/m. They decided to take me off the drip and see how he was. He was fine once I was off the drip. They put me back on again and he did it again. So, consultants, everyone appeared and they did what was called a fetal blood sample. Don't or can't remember why but it felt like they were there forever (hence Jakey has some cuts on his head from them trying to get some samples). This is when Ian started getting very upset with the staff.

Next thing, midwife comes in with her scrubs on and some woman hands me a consent for surgery form and we're told we're off to have a c-section. Ian lost it and had a few expletives with the midwife. From this point I can't really remember much BUT remember the surgery. Ian was sitting next to me in theatre and they put the screen up - which we both thought was very small?! From there the anaethetist was checking that my epidural was working. She topped it up maybe 3 or 4 times with at least an extra 60ml of epidural within a matter of minutes - not enough time we now both think. A quick check to see if it was working, which I thought it was and then they began cutting.

'Ouch, ouch'....'what's wrong darl'.......'ow, ow ow! stop, stop stop!'.........'she's not meant to be feeling anything is she?'.......

Yep, I felt everything. Ian was whisked away and they administered an emergency general anaesthetic.

Ian spent nearly 2 hours with Jakey before I eventually came round after being stitched up etc and then I got a little cuddle.

Spent 4 days in hospital but now home and he is lovely. Makes us laugh all the time. He's just as grumpy as both of us and pulls the faces that go with it....he's the king of dirty looks but I'm sure he'll break some hearts when he's older. Loves his food and sleeps like no tomorrow - glad he's got the Cassidy appetite though. Good boy!

Will update more frequently now as you can imagine we'll have too many photos to take.

I still can't walk very well and am constantly drugged up......I have tablets coming out of my ears! Can't wait to feel normal again......so I sincerely apologise to people that I haven't spoken to yet as it's just been a very rough week.....will begin to feel like myself hopefully within the next week.

Thank you all for so many lovely words, I've been in tears for every text message, email and card.

Talk soon,

Love Sez, Ian & Jakey

xxx