Birth Story- Hannah
First a little bit of history. In 2014 I had a laparoscopy and had a clean out of endometriosis. After this procedure I was made aware a small ‘nick’ happened on my left uterine wall and there was nothing to be concerned about.
Fast forward to 2018 I was diagnosed with PCOS and amenorrhea. I hadn’t ovulated in 18months and was told by specialist I wouldn’t be able to conceive naturally and should think about IVF. January 2019, I went in for a second opinion with a new gynaecologist and found out instead I had fallen pregnant.
I was living in Darwin at the time and pregnancy felt like a breeze, everything was going smoothly. Aug 2019, we had to move to Wagga which meant a last-minute change in obstetrician, this is when. We found out baby boy was in a breech position and my new obstetrician was going to book me in for a c-section. At 36 weeks pregnant and the night of the 15th of Sep 2019 my waters broke and we were straight of to hospital. My contractions were about 5 minutes apart and I had an Emergency C-section at 0631 on the 16 th of Sep. During the c-section, baby boys head got stuck and as his head came out the Left side of my uterus ruptured and tore my left fallopian tube and ovary clean off. I was stitched up and told minimal information.
It wasn’t until my 6 month check up when I was still getting a lot of left sided pain I was explained the full extent of what happened. The fallopian tube and ovary remained inside though were no longer attached. There were many risks involved of having another child and was told it would be an automatic c-section and early birth. It turns out the initial ‘nick’ from a laparoscopy wasn’t just a nick and has had a huge impact on further children. I was lucky baby boy got out when he did, the scar tissue was a few cms long and was going to rupture regardless as each contraction was tearing it further and further apart.
Feb 2021 I found out I was pregnant with our baby girl. Living in Sydney now we found a new obstetrician and went private health again. My obstetrician dealt with high-risk pregnancies and births but had never seen a rupture like mine before. He said I was in the 0.1% of this type of pregnancy.
I had a check-up almost monthly; I was no longer allowed to do high impact exercise or heavy weight lifting however maintained low resistance exercise up until about 30 weeks when I had to cease this. Throughout the whole pregnancy my obstetrician was very honest and open about when he wanted to deliver baby girl and honestly, he wasn’t sure himself. He consulted in several of his friends and health professionals on which pathway to take. I had multiple internal ultrasounds ensuring the uterus wall was still 100% intact trying to avoid it rupturing again. The biggest risk was if I was to go into spontaneous labour and contract the uterine wall would rupture again and possibly not be so lucky this time.
At 32 weeks I caught Covid and got quite unwell. I was on high-risk monitoring though luckily able to stay in my own home – thankfully for being a nurse myself so my obstetrician trusted I knew my symptoms and could read my own observations, but he also rang daily.
At 34 weeks pregnant I had the steroid injections in preparation for baby girl to make her lungs as strong as possible. It was at this time the OB decided we would deliver at 35 weeks. Booked in I thought it would be such a nicer experience. Baby girl came the morning of the 22nd Oct 21, My partner got to cut the cord, we got to hold her for a couple of seconds then she was taken away to special care nursery. Weighing at 2000g, her oxygen levels and blood sugar levels were low. She had to get fed by nasogastric tube and was on oxygen. I didn’t get to see her again for 24 hours although after successfully breastfeeding my son, my colostrum came in straight away and I was determined to express like clockwork and give it to baby girl to get her as strong as possible. This was fed through her nasogastric tube, and I was able to see her on and off the second day, she couldn’t stay long as she wasn’t strong enough yet. Day 3 we were successfully breastfeeding, and she stayed with me for longer stints. Day 4 she was strong enough to come off oxygen and all was going well. Day 5 we went home, and she could meet her brother and start her journey of taking on the world.
To finish this up, my obstetrician said if I wanted to have another child, I could potentially have another 35 weeker. At 6 months post-partum I went and had a tubal litigation of my remaining fallopian tube as our family of 4 is complete- Hannah x
