Hoping for a miracle

Ok, I'm sorry there are lots of puns out there using my new daughters names and I can't help but want to use them.

I thought that I would tell you a bit about her arrival into the world. 

If I am honest, I can't remember much about Isaac's birth other than the pain caused by the ventouse tearing me and the fact that the epidural was not overly successful.

I remember a lot more about Imogen's birth but still cannot remember pushing at all (& I only had Gas and Air and Pethidine for her birth).

Although being induced into labour is not fun and is very time consuming I felt a lot more in control with Hope's birth and hope (ha ha) that by writing it down it will help me appreciate just what I have been through.

When the induction was booked on the Monday I was told I needed to phone the antenatal ward on Thursday to check that I was able to go in. So at 7am I was on the phone and desperate to go in. 

Yep, no problem, come in for 9am. 

So children dressed & breakfasted and bags in the car, off we went. The family dropped me off at the hospital and Tony took the children over to Horsham while I made my way up to the antenatal ward via the new WHSmiths (a newspaper is an essential purchase).

Then began the show. All my observations were done and I was placed on the monitor to check that the baby was ok and I was ok. 

Monitoring done, I was examined and the pessary put in place. 

Then the waiting began. 

When Tony got back to the hospital after dropping the children off we wandered around and tried to get things moving. Then we went back to the ward and had a sleep, then we wandered around the hospital some more (at this point I wondered whether antenatal wards should have treadmills in them to make this slightly easier). By now Tony was bored. I don't blame him I was bored and looking for anything that might be a sign that the baby was on its way. But there was nothing, so I sent him home. Honestly I love my husband, but I know he hates hospitals and sitting doing nothing so him being there was just pointless. It must have been about 5pm by now and I was getting frustrated with a lack of progress. 
I know that this has been less than 24 hours but labour with Isaac was under 12 hours and labour with Imogen was less than 5 hours so having been in hospital for 12 hours and having no visible or even invisible progress was really frustrating me. 

I spent the evening wandering about the hospital and bouncing on a birthing ball trying to get things moving. I wanted to try and get some sleep but my back was not cooperating on that front, although I had been able to have some much stronger cocodamol while admitted so every cloud has a silver lining etc etc.

Later that evening the midwife who was on duty over night hooked me up to the monitor again and we could see baby moving but nothing appeared to be happening with me. 

As the night wore on and the night time wanderings and bouncings continued things started to happen. I was definitely starting to have some contractions, but they were not showing on the monitor. In hindsight I think that there was probably a problem with the monitor not picking up my contractions as once I moved into the delivery suite the contractions were being picked up. 

Around 5.30am I asked to be examined and was over the moon to hear that I had got to 4cm dilated and would be able to be moved across to the delivery suite. 

I phoned Tony and told him to come back in, probably to the delivery suite as things were starting to move. If I had known it would still be another 12 hours I don't think I would have been so chipper!!

I moved across into the delivery suite and was allocated the room with the pool. I was really happy about this as I was keen to try water as a pain relief option. The midwives were just in the process of changing shifts and so I had a midwife for about 20 minutes and then my 'new' midwife came in. 

I had honestly never been so happy to see someone familiar. I had spoken to this midwife previously about my concerns about coming into hospital and about being in control during labour and here she was, my angel - Jennie Hatton, supervisor of midwives. 

I asked Jennie if I could get in the pool yet as the previous Midwife had said I had to wait until I was 5cm, she told me to get in and make the most of it. 

The pool was lovely, once the temperature and depth was right it did feel really relaxing and did help with my back ache and pain control. However as time went on I found that I needed the gas and air as well.

I stayed in the pool until 09.30ish but by this point I was starting to get annoyed that it wasn't quite long enough for me to stretch out and move where I wanted and I also wanted to be examined.With both my other labours by this point I was already 8 or 9 cm. 

I got out of the pool and Jennie examined me. To my disappointment I was only 6cm and things were tailing off. There were 2 options now to get things moving onwards, both of them were going to involve more intervention and not being able to get back in the pool, but I really wasn't bothered. 

It was decided to break my waters and see if that had any effect on the baby making an appearance. If that was unsuccessful then I would have to have the syntocin drip which would ramp up the contractions. 

I moved into another room in the delivery suite and settled down for another nap, while Tony napped in the chair and on a bean bag I seem to recall. 

After lunch Jennie decided that we needed to focus on getting the baby out and so set about organising the drip.

This was definitely the most stressful part of the whole experience. Pre chemo I had good veins and was quite easy to cannulate and take blood from.You may remember that when I had my bowel surgery the anaesthetist could not get a cannula into my arm for the General Anaesthetic and had to put a central line in while I was still concious. We had a similar dilemma while trying to cannulate me this time. After 4 attempts in my hands and wrists the anaesthetist admitted defeat and cannulated me in my foot.

Looking at the trace while this was all going on was pretty interesting and if I hadn't had Gas and Air I don't think I would have coped very well. 

These are some of the bruises that I incurred as a result of crappy veins and the final cannula in my foot.

It took just over an hour to finally get the cannula in and the I was connected to the drip and again waited for things to happen.

The drip was increased every 30 minutes and things really started to get going as it got higher and higher. 

Prior to being in labour I had been quite keen not to have an epidural as I had had bad experiences with them both times I had had them previously. But I am also not an idiot (this might come as a surprise to some of you). I had read about induced labours and knew that it would be more painful and that I was more likely to need interventions and an epidural. 

I had chatted about my epidural worries with Alan (the lovely anaesthetist who cannulated me) and he had allayed a lot of my fears so when it was obvious to Jennie & Tony that I wasn't going to be able to cope for much longer we made the decision to get one in. 

I would like to tell you all about how long this took, but to be honest I don't know. 

When I had been in the pool earlier I had been obsessing with the clock and to prevent the same thing happening again Tony & Jennie had taken the clock out of my eye line so I had no idea of timings of anything. 

Back to the epidural, it was wonderful. It dulled the pain enough that I was able to relax and concentrate on getting to the final stages of labour. 

The epidural seemed to wear off and I remember that I needed to push. 4 pushes later and Hope Kathryn Hayllar arrived into the world at 17:12pm on 12/04/2013

This was a long, drawn out experience which is very different from both my other birth experiences. 

However I cannot fault the excellent care I received from both Jennie & Alan (?) the anaesthetist. I really felt in control with them both and that I was making informed decisions rather than being railroaded. 

& here is another beautiful photo of Hope at minutes old.

Everyone needs to have Hope

So, you all know I was due to have a baby.

Well, I did, 

Hope Kathryn Hayllar arrived at 17:12pm on Friday 12th April 2013, weighing a tiny 6lb 2oz (or 2.78kg) and is amazing. 

I will post more about her induced arrival in a couple of days, there is something I need to get off my chest first.

Although my pregnancy started off fairly easy with far less sickness and general 'feeling crapness' than the other 2, as it progressed I felt worse and worse. There was the permanent backache that I was discharged from physio for as the physio could do 'nothing else'. I ended up taking cocodamol & tramadol to try and control it (unsuccessfully) and sleeping for no more than 4 to 5 hours a night as the pain would wake me up.
I also had a chest infection at about 30 weeks which led to me coughing so much I would be sick. During the last few weeks, some days, I was bringing up breakfast, lunch & dinner and was feeling so run down it was unbelievable.
Then the piece de resistance. At my 35 week midwife appointment I had glucose & protein in my urine. There had been some traces of glucose in my urine before but this seemed to send my midwife into a panic. Off the back of this appointment she booked me an extra scan to check the size of the baby, despite the fact that I was measuring fine for my dates & an appointment with a consultant.

The scan was lovely. Its always nice to have an excuse to look at your baby. At 35 weeks the baby was guestimated to weigh 5lb, so based on the common assumption that foetus' put on about 1/2lb a week I thought I would be having a baby smaller than my previous 2 (Isaac was 8lb & Imogen was 8lb 7oz). The consultant appointment was another matter all together.

WARNING THIS MAY NOW BECOME RANTY, I DO NOT APOLOGISE FOR THIS, I NEED TO HAVE A RANT!!!

Before I rant, I would like to say this.

If you miss, or turn up late to an NHS appointment you know that there will be consequences. I think that it is disgusting that in this day and age you can book in for your appointment and not be told that the clinic is running 60 minutes late and when you finally get in to see your consultant you are offered no apology for the clinic running late. Not even a polite 'Sorry you were kept waiting.'

So, I drove to East Surrey Hospital for my consultant appointment, which was at 10.30. I arrived about 10.15. The midwife took my blood pressure & sent me off to produce a urine sample and then I waited. Now with the lower back pain I had been having, sitting for a long period of time was really quite painful, but you can't walk around a waiting room too much as their isn't much space for that kind of thing.

I was finally called in to see the registrar at 11.40. So 70 minutes after my appointment time. She told me to sit down, I quite politely said that I would prefer to stand as after so long sitting in the waiting room my back was really quite sore and I needed to be able to mobilize and stretch. At that point she could have apologised for the wait that I had had. No, not this women. Instead she launched into an attack about how she would be unable to examine me if I refused to sit down. I said that I wasn't refusing to sit down, I was uncomfortable sitting down and would be able to lie on the bed to be examined. She told me to get up there then. She offered me no help to lie down or after she had finished examining me to sit back up again.
She then asked me if I had doing my BM pricks. I had no idea what she was talking about and told her this and also told her that I didn't know why I was at this clinic. At this point I'll admit I was quite upset, I was hormonal (& pregnant) but also genuinely confused as to why I was at this clinic and why she hadn't looked at the blood test results that I had had 3 goes to try and get (a whole other story there) and I ended up crying and asking her why was I here and what was she talking about, again. She kept repeating that I needed to be doing BM pricks (still no explanation) and why wasn't I. 
Then I lost it - I told her (again) I had no idea what she was talking about, that I did not appreciate being kept waiting with no apology, that her attitude towards me was quite appalling and (very rude I know) why was I 'only' seeing a registrar rather than a consultant. At this point she went and got the consultant.
I tried to calm down while she was out of the room, but all the pent up fear that this panic had generated was hard to ignore. I have a history of depression & although I tend not to google health symptoms I am a member of mumsnet and spend too much time reading pregnancy and childbirth threads and had panicked my self that I might have a problem with my fluid levels or something else. 
When the consultant came into the room she was not a people person. She called me a silly girl (!) and told me that if I had seen her at the start of my pregnancy rather than the consultant who had signed me off as low risk I would have been deemed high risk due to all my history. I was furious. The women had not even spoken to me and was now making me feel even worse, like I was putting my unborn baby at risk. I told her that I did not appreciate this kind of panic at such a late stage in my pregnancy and that I still did not know why I was here, I told her that I thought it was unacceptable to talk to me like that, to not apologise for keeping me waiting for so long. I also told her that I would have appreciated someone actually looking at my blood results and telling me what I was doing here. 
finally, I got an explanation. There seemed to be some assumption that the glucose in my urine demonstrated that I had gestational diabetes. However this was not backed up by my blood results, from my Glucose Tolerance Test at 28 weeks or the BM prick test they did next or the scan that I had had on Tuesday (& I now know what a BM prick is). But they wanted me to see the diabetes nurse & consultant again.


So, we had Easter, mine involved 2 false labour scares and an Easter Egg hunt with an Easter Bunny and a Butterfly at Standen, a gorgeous National Trust property near East Grinstead.

So, the diabetes nurse. 

Well, she was 30 minutes late, but apologised as she had been called to deal with an emergency. Not a problem, SHE APOLOGISED. Then she had a look at my results. Shock Horror, she thought that it was all a bit of an over reaction. All my blood results were normal, the glucose in my urine was not a concern as it might be that that is the way that my body processes it. There was no reason for me to see her again and she wished me all the best with my pregnancy.

And then back to the consultant ( I was now almost 38 weeks). She was not happy with the diabetes nurse. I had to relate to her (the consultant) that there was nothing showing in my bloods that concerned the diabetes nurse and she was of the opinion that the glucose in my urine was how my body processed it. Again the consultant took her anger out on me. She said that it was not the nurses remit to be telling me that there was nothing to be concerned about and she should have been getting me to monitor my blood sugar (this is what a BM prick is all about) for a week to see if there were any indicators. At this point again I was unhappy. How was I supposed to know that this was what the consultant had expected? I am not a mind reader, and I told her that and maybe she needed to work on her communication with her colleagues (I really can be quite rude when upset and being blamed for things I have no understanding of or control over). She then told me that due to her not knowing whether I had gestational diabetes or not I would need to be induced at 38 weeks.
That turned out to be Thursday, so I had a date and knew that I would be meeting my baby soon.

This has turned out to be longer than I anticipated so I shall let you know about baby Hope's lengthy arrival in a new post very soon.

6 weeks to go

This post will contain irrational ranting and is probably best not read by anyone thinking of becoming pregnant for the first time.

Now that that is out of the way I can tell you a couple of things. 

Pregnancy and me do not get along. 

This time last year I had taken my last dose of capecitabine and my follow up appointment was about 6 weeks away. That was scary. I knew that they had removed all of my tumour and a large amount of lymph nodes around my bowel. I knew that the tests had confirmed that the cancer hadn't spread. I knew that the 6 months of hell I had been through in the form of chemotherapy were over and were only preventative rather than curative (?). But I was still scared. You can't help it. You're only human and however hard you try to focus on the positive the negative always creeps in.

In the same vein this pregnancy has been like this for me. I have seen the healthy baby twice on scans and, although scans are not infallible, know that there is very little likely to be wrong with this baby. I know that going into hospital to have a baby is very different to being refused an ambulance, having to wait 4 hours for an out of hours doctor who diagnoses appendicitis and calls you an ambulance to take you to hospital in the middle of the night. This doesn't stop me being terrified of the prospect of having to go into hospital again.

Childbirth represents a loss of control. You cannot predict when you are going to go into labour. I have had one child born at 40 weeks and 6 days and one born at 38 weeks and 6 days. This one could turn up at 36 weeks or 42 weeks. You genuinely live in the dark. When you have two other children to consider along with school and pre school runs this creates a dilemma. Add into that mix that your husband is starting a new job at the same time and you can see why there is a loss of control here.

For me at the moment though the main concern is getting through the next six weeks. Ever since I pee'd on a stick and it was positive I have had back ache. I have seen the physiotherapist, although to be frank she was very hands off and gave me a couple of stretches to do, which I could have worked out myself, advised me to sit on hard backed chairs and gave me a couple of massages. When I asked for some advice as to whether I would be better seeing a chiropractor or an osteopath she said she wasn't allowed to recommend either. 

The level of pain I was experiencing was getting so bad that paracetamol didn't cut the mustard any more so I dragged myself back to the GP and got a prescription for co codamol. I have now reached the stage where this is not even effective. 
I have just re read the dosage instructions. 

Take 2 tablets every 4-6 hours. Do not take more than 8 tablets in 24 hours.

I was coping on 2 tablets every 5 hours, but this meant that the pain relief was wearing off before I took more tablets and so had to wait for the next dose to kick in which involves spending at least an hour in pain. I cannot wait 6 hours between doses and need to take them every 4, but this means that I cannot sleep due to the pain. I am fighting a loosing battle. 

This has now culminated in me being awake since about 2am, as I took my last dose of tablets at 10pm. I finally succumbed to take more at 6am thinking foolishly I could try and get through to midday before I took some more. I probably got about 20 minutes more sleep before I was joined in bed by Isaac & Imogen. 

So I am writing off today. I may watch the Australian Grand Prix highlights later as I turned it off to let the children watch cbeebies while I dozed. I will also be making a GP appointment to discuss the pain management situation.

Sunday Crafting

Sorry, things have been quiet on the crafting front here at Knitting Novice HQ recently.

This pregnancy seems to have really taken it out of me. 

Well before Christmas I started a Flower Fairies Cross Stitch. Its a tiny little thing, but I have not had any motivation to pick that up, so it is sitting neglected in a box. This was spurred on by the fact that I had a look at all the Flower Fairies Cross Stitch kits I had (9 or 10 I think) and thinking actually it would be really nice to get them all done so I could sew them into some sort of wall hanging.

You may remember my joy when I learnt to crochet. However that joy has been short lived. All I can seem to manage is flowers and things I can complete in one sitting. Anything that involves counting rows, decreasing or increasing is a massive fail. I have tried and tried and tried. I follow so many bloggers & twitterers that love crochet and rave about how easy and quick it is, and I know this must be true as I have managed to do flowers and Imogens huge Granny Square for her cushion. But to actually make something else - a toy or even a heart seems to be beyond me. I have you tubed, I have ravelry'd, I have followed tutorials for Attic 24 and Mollie Makes and have decided that I will stick to flowers.

So you can see why I have become quite lethargic and mojo less. 

But the last couple of weeks have given me a kick. I was sitting looking at the storage pouffe full of wool and the shelf full of knitting books and realised that at some point in the next 8 - 12 weeks I am going to have a new little life to clothe and care for. I know that when that happens my 'me time' will be severely curtailed and so I need to spend some time using up some of the wool I have. Added to that both of the other 2 have had hand knitted cardigans, hats, blankets and toys from mummy & grandma when they were born. I realised I needed to kick myself (not really obviously) and get knitting. 

I am currently knitting a lovely stripy diamond pattern blanket for bump, have taken 3 books out of the library which have some lovely ideas for using up some of my stash. I have also found the socks I made when we went away at October half term and the hat & mittens I knitted for Imogen after she was born and I was bored stupid in hospital.

And so my knitting mojo has returned. I will stick with crocheting flowers and the occasional ball and granny square and accept that I am far more skilled at intarsia, socks, knitting in the round and generally using 2 pointy sticks than I ever will be at using 1

Are we really responsible for the death of the British High Street?

Today I took delivery of this denim jacket from Next.co.uk.

Nothing wrong with that you might say, it's quite a nice jacket. 

I have to say I love it, it fits really nicely, I can do a button up over my pregnant boobs, and will probably be able to do the rest of the buttons up in a few months once this bump has gone. 

However, this morning I saw this report on the BBC Breakfast News and started to wonder whether there might be other reasons that the British high street is dying.

If you don't know me here are some of my vital statistics:

Height 6' (1.8m)
Inside Leg 35' (longer than standard long length trousers which is normally 33')
Everything else in proportion to being 6' tall.

I have accepted that I will never be able to buy something off the rack and always check out stores to see if they have a tall range. This didn't used to be a problem. New Look, Dorothy Perkins, Top Shop, Next et al all used to stock at least some of their Tall ranges in store. This meant that I could go into a store, browse, try stuff on and then purchase it there and then. Therefore I was contributing to the British High Street. 

Then, gradually, the Tall ranges disappeared. I can't comment on Top Shop as I haven't been able to shop there for a few years. But first Dorothy Perkins made their Tall range online only, shortly afterwards New Look & Next followed suit. 

And it isn't just these retailers a lot of stores do Long or even Extra Long length, but you have to order it online. 

As a tall person I had come to terms with the fact that according to most retailers TALL & PREGNANT were mutually exclusive terms. I got very cross when I was pregnant with Isaac that the only 2 pairs of maternity trousers that I could get to fit me well were both 2nd hand Long Tall Sally from Ebay (at that time Long Tall Sally had stopped doing maternity wear). I did manage to pick up 2 pairs of combat trousers from H&M's Mama range which are still going strong on pregnancy number 3, but whenever I looked at Maternity Clothes they were all designed for people under 5'10" or so. 

I don't know what the answer to this is. Obviously shops cannot stock everything in every store. But, there is a very large New Look & Next in Crawley, neither of which stock a tall range anymore and so I am forced to purchase things online which apparently is contributing to the death of the British High Street

Disappointment - a message to Lance Armstrong

I don't tend to hero worship people or have idols but the news today that Lance Armstrong has lied and doped has really hit me hard. 

I read his book in 2011 when I was about to start chemotherapy and I couldn't put it down. I remember being in tears at bits of the book and being really inspired by what he had been through and went on to do. I have since re read it several times and it has had the same effect and when I have been really down it has really inspired me.

Today when I woke and heard the news that Lance Armstrong had admitted doping and lying I was hurt. 

Yes, I think that is the right word. I was hurt. 

• Hurt that a person who has inspired probably millions of people with his books and his Live Strong Charity, has lied repeatedly, in print about the same thing over and over again.
• Hurt that he constantly denied it again and again, knowing that he had doped.
• Hurt by some of his comments in his interview that it was all about levelling the playing field.

I am also cross with myself for feeling like this. I have never met this man, surely what he chose to do with his personal and professional life is none of my business. But he had made money from selling his books and the ideal that cancer does not have to mean you are substandard.

Well, Lance Armstrong, some news for you. Cancer does not make you substandard. You do not need to dope and lie to prove to people that cancer does not change you.

Cancer does change you. It makes you stronger. It makes you live life to the absolute maximum. It does not mean you need to prove yourself repeatedly. You have done that by suffering through chemotherapy or radiotherapy or transplants or surgery or any of the other treatments that are available and given to millions of people on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.

If it was possible I would send my copy of your book back to you and demand a refund. As it is when I can find it, I will probably donate it to charity as it is a complete work of fiction & not a very good one at that.

Happy New Year

Wow, didn't realise it had been so long since I last posted. So Happy New Year and all that that entails. 
But anyway, growing a baby and recruiting for the preschool kind of got in the way. I have spent a lot of time with Google and it is not as all encompassing as it is supposed to be. 

Lets ignore the preschool thing & talk about the baby.

This time last year (January 2012) I had had 5 maybe 6 sessions of chemo and was feeling quite positive about the fact that it was coming to an end. I was also still feeling slightly like crap and dealing with some of the milder side effects.
Now (January 2013) I have 15 weeks (give or take) until I welcome baby Hayllar number 3. 

Since the moment I was diagnosed I have dreamt about this moment (well actually, since I am amazingly rubbish at being pregnant, the moment that the baby arrives). The moment that I can kick Cancers arse and prove that just because I have had cancer doesn't mean that you can't move on with your life and have new experiences. 

I have been doing a lot of comparing this pregnancy with my other two. I have to say that this has been the easiest in terms of sickness & nausea. When I was pregnant with Isaac I vomited A LOT. There were incidences in petrol stations, on Christmas Day and at almost every other opportunity. I threw up almost every day from the moment I got a positive pregnancy test to the morning after I gave birth. 
When I was pregnant with Imogen the vomiting started with the positive pregnancy test and there were first thing in the morning incidences, but there were also after I had dropped Isaac at the childminders by the side of the road incidents, in the loos at work throughout the day incidents. It did kind of tale off after about 30 weeks, but I still felt pretty rubbish. I can remember my last day at work, before I started maternity leave vomiting because a customers perfume was to strong. 
This time (baby number 3) maybe my sickness/nausea threshold is much higher as I have only been sick about 6 or 8 times. I have felt nauseous and am still suffering from the dreaded heartburn, but have actually thrown up very little. I can't tell you why - maybe my body is more receptive to being pregnant. Maybe the combination of antidepressants that I took through my first and second pregnancies contributed to the nausea. Or maybe having suffered the never ending nausea of chemo and oxaliplatin my body has decided there are definitely worse things to vomit over.

So there you go, If you suffer from terrible morning sickness during pregnancy, have cancer, then chemo & suddenly things won't be so bad anymore.