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The Very first picture of my little miracle

My little miracle will be 7 months old in a couple of weeks so I thought it was about time that I write about my experience of having my first baby in Spain.

I have spoken in my previous posts about my pregnancy which, until 30 weeks, was pretty much plain sailing. I tried to getting myself as organised as possible and, although I was pretty scared about the birth, I had a mental picture of the whole experience.

Unfortunately things didn’t quite go to plan. I was admitted into the Costa del Sol hospital,in Marbella, at 30 weeks with a water infection. As soon as I was settled into my room they started the treatment of antibiotics through a drip.

This was on the Wednesday and was told that the norm is to be admitted for 2 days and providing everything was ok I would be sent home on the Friday.

On the Thursday evening I sent my hubby home so he could get a decent nights sleep and go to work in the morning. That evening I set my laptop up and watched a couple of films. During the last film I started having some pains, which turned out to be contractions, it was around 11pm by then and I buzzed the nurses. When theycame they told me to buzz them again if they were 5 mins apart. I think it was around midnight when I got the nurses back and they wheeled me through to have the babies heartbeat monitored.

All in all it was a pretty scary night, I kept asking if I could call my husband but they said no need, and I ended up in a delivery suite, on my own, whilst the medication to stop the labour kicked in. I even got to hear a baby being born in the next room.

I was monitored and put on complete bedrest to make sure I didn’t go into labour again and as a precaution I was given 2 steroid injections to help develop the babies lungs. The following Monday the doctors were happy and I was discharged, with strict instructions to put my feet up.

I was so relieved to be out of hospital and back in my own bed and I spent the evening planning my extended maternity leave. Unfortunately someone had other plans and at midnight that night I started having contractions again so we grabbed my bag and rushed back to the hospital.

I then spent the next 35 hours being monitored, going into labour, having the labour stopped, scans, blood tests, examinations and so on until 10am on 17th December when the doctor came in to tell us that my latest blood test showed that there was a risk of the baby having an infection and it was best to get him out and because he was transverse it would be by emergency caesarean.

Although I had been pretty scared throughout the whole experience that moment was terrifying. At this point my baby was only 31 weeks + 5 days old and his estimated weight was 1.5 kilos. The hospital staff were fantastic and sent through an Irish Midwife to reassure us as best she could and talk us through the procedure.

Fifteen minutes later, after signing various consent forms, I was whisked through to the operating room. The midwife was there with me and explained that they were giving me an epidural and that I would be able to see him when he came out but the chances were I would not get a chance to hold him, as he would be taken straight to special care.

The next thing I knew I was being wheeled down to recovery and my hubby was telling me that he was ok,he weighed 2 kilos and they had to knock me out in the end because I couldn’t relax for the epidural.

I spent the best part of that day in recovery and was finally taken back to my room at teatime. I still hadn’t seen my beautiful boy yet and when I asked the nurses they said hopefully that evening or tomorrow, so all I had was a photograph that hubby had taken on his mobile phone.

As it happens it was the following morning that I got to see my son for the very first time. He was tiny but perfect.

Now 7 Months Old

7 Months later Charlie is doing fantastic, he weighs 6.3 kilos and is 66 cms long, he is also doing fantastic developmentally too.