Thursday 26 May 2016

The Disobedient Mum-to-Be

The inception of this post

I'm writing this post in the 7th month and I will publish when I am holding what I hope will be a healthy baby. It'd be foolish to publish now, because if there's one other thing I learned by reading and listening to others experiences, it's that the unexpected is called that for a good reason and can occur in pregnancy and birth.

Post natal update

It was a terrible birth experience, I won't lie. I won't do detail but here are the numbers:

Hours in labour: 34
Midwives : 4 Doctors:4
Types of opiate administered: 2
Emergency C sections under General : 1
Apgar score at birth: 2
Hours til mother and baby met: 10
Amazing fathers : 1

Apgar score 5 mins after birth was thankfully 7, and 9 after 10 minutes. Fox Paul Scholefield is a fighter. He removed his own breathing tube in anger and went straight for the food when I finally met him.


My take on Risk control in pregnancy


There is a lot of 'advice' knocking around as I am sure you will be aware. There are also many sensible people, both your friends and family, and in the media, who tell you to ignore the advice. What I found interesting is that the advice which comes from the care givers in the NHS would appear be taken as absolute fact by the majority of pregnant women. I love the NHS and I support and applaud the fact that they are doing their best to ensure that the outcomes of as many pregnancies as possible are successful for mother, baby and family. I am however a questioner, and I got some funny reactions from NHS people on asking questions, or on stating my preferred way of doing things. I call it the 'eyebrow'. Example: "are you taking supplements?"  "No, I have a good diet" ".. eyebrow". I started just nodding and yessing after a while, to avoid the disapproving eyebrow.

Books. Oh books. I have formed the opinion that pregnancy books have been written based on evidence collected mainly from people who reported negative experiences. Open any chapter on 'what will happen during this month/trimester' and you will be faced with a long list of uncomfortable or unpleasant things. I accept that morning sickness, aching joints, heartburn etc, can all occur due to perfectly understandable biological changes. They don't happen to every person though, and maybe it's just the books and websites I have looked at, but some more 'mights' , 'maybes' and 'some womens' would be handy to avoid panicking apprehensive first-timers. Pregnancy as a natural state of being rather than a series of symptoms, if you will.

'Bad' things I did during my pregnancy

Ate sushi

Yum, sushi. A healthy dish of rice, seaweed and fish. The advice is 'stay away from raw fish' on account of the (size of risk not mentioned) risk of catching a horrid wriggly parasite or a food bug which will harm both you and the foetus. I've been eating sushi for ten years or so and have to my knowledge never got sick from eating it, so my evidence suggests that it's a low risk activity where the risk is outweighed by the benefit of getting more fish into me. Eating sushi is also a big part of my relationship with some dear friends.

Didn't get a flu jab

I was warned about the dangers of not having a flu jab by a very well meaning midwife who quoted me the statistic that "2 pregnant women died of flu during the Swine Flu epidemic". I expect more died in car accidents during that period, and I haven't been advised not to sit in a motor vehicle. I also understand that the current flu vaccination is not a guarantee against catching the flu, and that catching the flu wouldn't harm my baby, rather it'd just be very horrible for me. It would be horrible, pregnancy or no pregnancy. 

Ran quite a bit, sometimes on the fells

No need to justify or explain this other than to repeat the advice midwives give, which is continue to exercise as you have been doing, and listen to your body. If you feel rough, slow down. If it hurts, seek advice and consider stopping. 
A small number of people asked me 'but is that safe' when I mentioned I was still fellrunning. I tried to politely educate them.

At the Auld Lang Syne race 31 Dec 2016, three months pregnant. Photo courtesy Woodentops. 

Didn't go to NCT classes

The National Childbirth Trust offer a course to prepare parents for birth and the early stages of a child's life. Antenatal classes are offered by your NHS team, and oddly, finding out about them did seem a little difficult to me - no info exists online, you are advised to call or email if you want to know about when and where they take place. 
The middle class way seems to be to go to NCT, I don't know why, perhaps their advice is seen as being better , and I do know they advocate breast-feeding, which to me is a bit of a no-brainer. A course costs somewhere in the region of £300. Yes,you read that right. People who have attended NCT classes say that it gives them a great network of other parents to share experiences and learn from and I don't doubt that if I knew no other new or recent parents in my local area, this would be a factor pushing me towards NCT classes. We decided we had better things to spend our money on. 
After asking a colleague at work, whose baby was born at the same hospital we are going to use, how their antenatal classes were, and learning that he didn't think they were worth going to, we also decided not to do those either. 

Ate some brie and some rare steak

This advice is given so that pregnant mothers are not at risk of exposure to Listeriosis or E Coli food illnesses. Listeriosis is a very rare kind of food poisoning and the list of foods which could harbour the microbe responsible is vast and includes cold cuts of meat and boxed salads - so basically your lunch. However the chance the bug will be there is infitessimally low, I don't know the cases per annum of listeria but this piece by Zoe Williams convinced me its super rare. So in the spirit of risk management I had a few bits of soft cheese when they were about. I'm not a big brie fan , blue cheese yep. 
E coli lives on the surface of beef meat. If you sear the surface well then the risk of that microbe making you ill is reduced greatly. If you eat a raw mice burger your risk is increased. I ate a couple of lovely rare steaks which had of course been well seared. I chose to eat them in well-run, trustworthy establishments whose food hygiene protocol was likely to be very high. Minimal risk. Yummy meat. 

Had a wine or a beer from time to time




MINEFIELD. The research on how alcohol use affects foetuses is also listed in Ms Williams article. A good friend had studied alcohol abuse a few years ago and concluded that a mother needs to be a full blown alcoholic to damage her baby. There is limited evidence that binge drinking in the first trimester may lead to damage, but we all know mums who didn't know they were pregnant and got hammered and mortal..and baby fine.I'm not a mad drinker so I had a few ales and a few wines and didn't get drunk . I never really do.

Didn't take supplements

We live in the first world and I am shocked that the first thing the GP told me when I presented as pregnant was 'get some Pregnacare' . I eat a varied and healthy diet and I believe I get what I need. I know that babies add a demand on your system. So I upped the greens, reds oranges, purples and nuts. I upped the meats and fishes. I upped the dairy for calcium and by heck i went outside for the Vit D. Healthy living is all you need IMHO. I bought some pills and took them on my proper off days, for the Vit Bs. I still have half the pack if anyone wants them. 

So , what did I learn?

I learned that the worst risks are the ones that you just can't control. I could do NOTHING about the predicament of my child during and after the birth. I am glad I enjoyed a little of what I fancied during his baking and I don't blame the birth experience on anything I have done. He's very healthy now, feeding well and gazing at the world with his wise eyes. They've seen some bad times and I feel I can see the strength behind his gaze , the determination to succeed and then go out and take risks of his own.