2023 Author: Anita Thornton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-05-22 03:30
At the dawn of my 30th birthday, my life took a new turn… I had just learned that I was pregnant for the first time. I was ready for this adventure and I knew the stages and the constraints that I was going to go through – or not!
Heartache? I haven't had any. Fatigue? A little, in the beginning. My pregnancy was going wonderfully, everything was fine and without warning, my water broke in the middle of my living room at 31 weeks and 4 days pregnant. I gave birth twelve hours later.
It's my fault
The pain of contractions intensifies. The more time goes by, the more I have the certainty that the meeting of the little being is imminent and this, in a very short period of time. The problem? I am not ready. By the way, the development of the fetus is not normally 39 weeks long? So why now?
A whole question arises in my head at this precise moment. Everything falls apart. I don't have time to think. The hospital staff go wild around me and explain the next steps, the risks. I'm not listening anymore, I'm dizzy, I'm in contractions, I'm in pain. Why am I causing my baby to be born way before her time? Will he blame me? Will there be consequences for his development?
It's my fault. I feel guilty. All my relatives will blame me…
At the same time, my boyfriend looks at me with a serene and calm air and he says to me: “Do you realize, it is tonight that we will meet our beautiful Antoine?! ". I smile at him, but deep inside I'm freaking out, I'm scared, I'm worried sick.
It is at this precise moment that I realize that my role as a mom begins now and that it will be with me for life. In four pushes, Antoine was born. He weighed 3 lbs 10 oz.
“I lost control”
Obviously, before the hasty birth of my son, I hadn't had my shower. The baby's room was not ready, not decorated… We had no clothes, no diapers, no monitor, no stroller, not even his shell for the car, let alone a birth plan. Would I breastfeed or bottle-feed?
Losing control of yourself and what is happening, doing what you are asked to do and above all breathing and living in the present moment have become my mottos and my reason for living at this precise moment in my life.
I waited two years to the day before even considering having a second child. When this second pregnancy was announced, I did some visualization, I remained zen, I took preventive medication, in addition to following all the advice I had been given.
To30 weeks, a week earlier than my first child, the same scenario occurs. Strong contractions started causing the loss of the mucous plug right in my workplace. At this point in my second pregnancy, my baby was not head down. So I had an emergency caesarean section. Amélie weighed 3 lbs 6 oz.
“Why congratulate me? »
After any childbirth comes congratulations. Phew. This word. I apprehended it, I avoided it and I hated it. He made me uncomfortable. I found it very difficult to accept. Why should I be congratulated for giving birth prematurely?
Despite their 33 and 50 days of hospitalization, their breathing aids, their force-feeding, the thousand and one tests carried out on their mini bodies, the too long hours without the presence of mom or dad, today, Antoine, 4 years old and Amélie, 2 years old are doing wonderfully! They have no sequelae of their premature births. They evolve like all the other children, with their "terrible-two" and their "fucking-four"!
All this adventure, punctuated with challenges, ups and downs, is far from me now. Thanks to Antoine and Amélie, I am recovering little by little. I see them grow, blossom – and their evolution heals this pain and this guilt of my premature deliveries.
