As the excitement of meeting my first child overcame me, a sharp pain ran across my tummy. I was not sure whether those were the contractions I had heard about millions of times so I ignored the pains as I felt they were actually lighter than what I was expecting [after the way all those who gave birth before had told me].

The following morning I went to the hospital. I actually went by bus as I could still manage the pains. As I arrived at the Rosie maternity unit in Cambridge [United Kingdom] I was put on a monitor to check if I was having contractions yet [by the way I was one week overdue]. The nurse who came to check the monitor rushed off without saying a word when she saw the zigzag lines the monitor was drawing. Confused and worried I tried to see if I could tell what was going on by reading every word written on the machine but, alas, all I could tell was it was drawing up and down lines.

After five minutes the nurse was back with one lady doctor and they both examined the machine silently for a minute ignoring my questions for an explanation. “You have been having contractions for at least eight hours now”, the doctor told me. “Eight good hours and I never knew”, I thought but it was then everything changed, I started to feel the pain more.

The doctor told me, “the problem is you have not dilated at all.

“And what is that and what does it mean?”, I shouted.

“Well, it simply means the baby is ready to come out and your body is not ready to release him”, she replied.

“That couldn’t be the case” I thought, “surely all I wanted to do was bring my child to the world, how could my body deny me that joy?”, I wondered.

The nurse was sent to call other doctors and I almost fainted when five doctors turned up, “surely I must be in a serious condition to be surrounded by six doctors”, I thought.

“I have to take blood samples from your baby now”, one short doctor announced. This was all getting too confusing for me. First of all the baby was not out yet and they were going to take blood from him, but how? I asked.

The biggest ever round ball I had never seen before in my life was brought in the room. Assisted by one of the doctors I rested one leg on top of the ball as the other doctor used a long something to get the blood.

“Your baby is very stressed and if he stays in your womb for ten minutes more he will be no more”, the doctor announced and that scared me to death. I quickly signed all the papers they gave me without reading a single word written on them. I was hurried to the theatre room with all the six doctors behind me.

In the theatre they still checked if I had started to dilate but no there was no sign I was going to at all. The only way that I was going to bring the child to the world was by Caesarean. So I was given my epidural and covered halfway so that I would not be seeing when they opened
my tummy.

Just as everything was ready and the doctors were about to begin their work, one of them shouted, “The head. The head. I can see the head!”. They all hurriedly looked and there he was, my little boy, fighting to come out. Everyone in the room were amazed and they kept talking about how they did not understand how I had managed to dilate in two minutes.

But, of course, because I was already given epidural by then I did not experience the pain associated with pushing as half of my body felt numb.
Even now as my son looks to celebrate his third birthday in June, I am always reminded of the miracle in the theatre as I like to call it every time I look at him.