The birth

As you all know by now we've had a little baby girl and I thought I should share with you how it all happened. It is quite fascinating how similar it all was to Elias' birth, only a lot faster.

On Monday morning I woke up at 6.30 because my waters broke. It seemed to be more water this time than last. Immediately I woke David up and he called the hospital while I had a quick shower. Unfortunately the line to the hospital was engaged so it took maybe 10 minutes before we could get through. Once we did she told me that they were full and she would find out where we could go instead and call me back. At about 6.50 she called me back and told me we should go to Södertälje hospital. By now I had had 2 contractions but they weren't very bad. At 7 o'clock we were in the car and started driving. Now the contractions started to come quite often but they weren't too painful. By the time we got closer to the hospital it was starting to be quite hard work though and I had to focus on "breathing through" the contractions. We got there at 7.25 and David went in to ask where we should go while I was trying to get out of the car. A nurse showed me the way while Dave parked the car. Now it was really starting to be quite intense.

I went up in the lift to the maternity ward where a nurse received me and showed me to an examination room. I was starting to feel quite overwhelmed by now by how intense the contractions where and sort of lost my ability to communicate very well. After a little while the midwife came in and asked me a few questions but I think she could tell by my actions and the way I looked that it was the real thing and she decided it was time to go in to the delivery room. They had to wheel me on the bed there because by now it was impossible to stand up and walk. In the delivery room she wanted to examine me to see how far the labour had gone but soon realised that I was ready to push. I did sort of realise that my self too, but just couldn't believe it and therefore didn't say anything. I was pretty shocked at the speed of the development and before I knew it I was lying there pushing the baby out. At 7.46 she came out, only 20 minutes after arriving to the hospital.

After it was all done I was in a state of happiness mixed with shock. I couldn't help but think what a close call it had been. We really couldn't have been any earlier at the hospital and if there had been any traffic problems on the way we wouldn't have made it. Had we been 5 minutes later I don't know if I could have made it in without help... Oh well, no use in thinking about all the things that could have gone wrong when it all went well.

One thing is for sure though, there won't be a number 3. The first delivery took us 3.5 hrs and this one 1 hr 15 mins, so next time I guess the baby would come out when the waters break!