My name is Militza, I’m 32 years old and this is a brief version of the story around my daughter’s birth.
During the night of the 21st(going for 22nd) February 2008 is when the first symptoms showed that the time for my daughter to be born has arrived. Over the next 24 hours, I gradually started feeling more frequent and stronger pains, but I didn’t even think of going to the hospital as I didn’t have regular contractions yet. I kept looking for things do to pass the time, and bit by bit I started feeling the contractions. The pain was quite bearable, I assume due to the fact that I didn’t stop moving. During the night of the 22nd, the contractions became quite close, 1, 2 or 5 minutes apart. Family members were asking if we should be heading for the hospital already, but I was quite calm and preferred to spend time with them, rather than in the hospital, where I would be surrounded by strangers. Despite that, around 3am on February 23rd, I decided that it’s time to head for the hospital, since it was an hour drive away.
I was admitted into First OB/GYN Hospital “St. Sofia” (previously Tina Kirkova) at 4am. On admission, I was told I was 5cm dilated, my husband (as per regulations in Bulgarian hospitals) stayed outside, since I hadn’t engaged a particular team of doctors for the birth. I was given the form for Informed Consent to sign. While I read it (since that was the first time I saw it) the admitting nurse told me it’s not a good idea to decline it – there had been recently one such woman, who thought she knew a lot about birth and didn’t sign it, and then they had to save her life. As it goes, I signed it and I was given an enema, even though I thought my body had already cleansed itself.
Following all the admittance procedures, I was taken to the pre-birthing unit, I was placed into a bed and tied up with the belts used to monitor the baby’s heart rate – that meant I couldn’t move at all. I’d like to note that up until this moment, my labour was quite easy with very bearable pain. However I was constantly moving, I’d get into any position that was comfortable for me and I was surrounded by people close to me. I was about to find out what a classic hospital birth was all about. Right after the belts, I was given an IV with oxytocin, my waters were artificially broken and of course the effect of those procedures didn’t delay – the labour became extremely painful. The worse part was that I wasn’t allowed to move – I tried to sit up and the doctor in charge immediately told me that if I wanted to deliver, I must lay back down. A few hours after admission, I asked that I was untied, so I can go to the bathroom. I was asked if I needed to urinate, they brought the bedpan in bed because I wasn’t allowed to get up. The bedpan of course, stayed unused – there was no chance for me to use it in a room with 4 more women in labour and a few other people. While I was laying down, waiting for the legendary 10cm, the doctor in charge gave me a number of extremely painful dilation examinations, accompanied by a few rude remarks from him, since the first time I didn’t expect it to be that painful and I almost jumped.
Around lunch time I was at the end of my strength, agonizing with pain, unable to move due to the belts and with no chance to even have a sip of water as it wasn’t allowed. Around 1pm another female doctor came over, who examined me for dilation again but at least she did it more humanely and without causing me the terrible pain from the earlier exams. She asked me if I had any urges to push and I said no, however she said I was 10cm dilated and to try to push in the bed. I started pushing and she said it would be better if I move to the stirrups bed instead. I moved, I had a catheter placed since my bladder was full and that’s when the big pushing started. A few people were screaming at me to push, I was pushing (I have haemorrhoids as a reminder of it), but how can you push when you have no urges. Following are remarks that I’m not doing anything and one addressed to the doctor from the morning “Doctor, it won’t happen without you”. The doctor came over, I had no idea what was in store for me. I was told to push and at this point the doctor jumped on me, I screamed like I never thought I could, the pain is unbelievable. Only the baby’s head had come out… After I got back to my senses a little, I started begging them not to jump on my abdomen again, that I will push with everything I can, and I did but again nothing happened. So that was followed by another jump on my abdomen. Then I just remember hearing “Hey, what a beautiful girl”. I remember almost nothing from the next few minutes. I only started coming to when they brought my baby, dressed, they showed her to me for a few seconds and took her away. They started stitching me up, and since I wasn’t even making a bleep there were remarks “That’s better, but what were those screams earlier, how could I scream that way”. While I was being stitched up, I started shaking from the cold, but that was no reason to later on be left in a corridor for half an hour while they find a bed for me. Two women from the staff helped me get into the bed and changed me with the following comment “What’s this slaughter here”, as I was covered in blood all over. I lay down on the bed, planning to go look for my baby as soon as I could, but I decided to lay there for a bit since I was afraid I’d fall. I must have fallen asleep and at one point I became aware that I was screaming at the top of my lungs – I was just dreaming of the birth, I got startled and saw that the other three women in the room were looking at me with fear. I decided I feel better, I got up and went to look for my baby. Fortunately, they gave her to me – I was so afraid that when they saw what I looked like, they would refuse to give her to me. I took her and so we were united at last.
Regrettably, there are two things which make me sad even now. One is that because of the unearthly pain I felt following the jumping on my abdomen, I can hardly remember the first few minutes of my child’s life – it felt like I wasn’t conscious. The other thing is that before my admission into the hospital, I wasn’t afraid of birth and wanted to have two kids. After the birth, however, I’m afraid to even think about it. The good thing is that time heals, at least to an extent.
