"Hey, Ash is 8cm dilated. Come on out to Redlands!!" - 7.31am
I've just sat down to a huge mug of Milo, not a drink I have very often, and which now seems like a sign that my Milo-loving bestie was going in to labour.
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Some backstory. Ash and I have been friends for a really long time now. What seems like forever actually, I can't, and don't care to remember a time before she came in to my life. Introduced by one of my mates who was dating her at the time, I was straight away on edge and defensive because of my extremely low self esteem. She is beautiful, successful, down to earth, everything I felt I was not. Somewhere along the line though, we found a mutual point of something we bonded over. Sarcastic sense of humor maybe? I don't even know.
I remember one of our first outings with just us two girls was a scary movie. Paranormal Activity I think. Going into it, I knew Ash was a little bit of a scaredy cat, who just happened to LOVE being scared by a good movie. At some jump scare I had my arm grabbed, and suddenly through giggles and "Grab my arm if you need to, it's okay" she was huddled basically on my lap for the rest of the movie. We were good then, and have been good ever since.
If you told me back then that I would be present not only at this chicks wedding, and then her LABOR, I would've probably laughed and said "You're dreaming". But lo' and behold, there I was, on the business end of a good old baby havin'.
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I jump off my bed, thinking to myself "Shit, I have to straighten my hair". I'd had a bag packed for going to the hospital since Ash was 26 weeks pregnant and had her first scare of a potential early birth. I decided that day that my camera would live in my car, with 2 charged batteries, charger, and roughly 6 SD cards. On goes the months-ago selected outfit: trusty jeans and comfy long sleeved but light sweat-shirt, flats I brought in Japan, and just my one Pandora ring. After the worlds fastest hair straighten, I gathered what little I had in the house that I needed ("the cube") and dashed out to my awaiting pink steed (Suzuki Swift).
I haven't received a speeding fine (yet) but had my cry/hysterical "MY BEST FRIEND IS IN LABOR" routine in my head, ready for any unfortunate policeman that happened to pull me over. I don't remember the speed limit most of the time, but I can comfortably say I did at LEAST 20km's over most of the way. Don't get me wrong, I'm the worlds best driver, so I was responsible when I had to be, like when I stopped on a winery road because a Roo almost jumped in front of me (SEE MUM! I make sure I check my surroundings!) Following the GPS with no bloody clue on where I was going, the little shred of doubt telling me that this wasn't even the right hospital popped into my head. I just turned up Blink 182 a little louder and sang my heart out with the excitement of a little kid about to go to a theme park or whatever shit little kids enjoy.
I pull up to this hospital that didn't really look like a hospital, free parking? Oh my lord jesus it's a miracle, 'cause this bitch is broke. I pull up closest to the Women and Children's wing, that seemed like a good bet. I load up all my gear, hardly able to walk because I have no idea what I'm about to walk in to, but knowing that the currently-dwarf-planet-sized human called Ash was in pain, and either was going to hate me, or need me at that moment. I walk in to the wing that I correctly assumed was where I was meant to go. I had called Jake a couple of times, no answer. Call Chris (Ashs' mum) no answer. Okay cool, I'll just ask this nurse who has watched me wander back and forward for a couple of minutes where I have to go. "Oh just back that way and through the doors you walked right past" Alright, those doors that said "automatic" but didn't open when I went to go through them the first time? Oh okay, not-so-automatic apparently.
I go through the doors and follow the short corridor and see "Birthing Suites" thank christ. I get to one end and hear a very familiar vomiting/hacking noise, and like a meerkat, I shit you not, I looked around knowing that she was near. I hunted down a nurse/desk person and asked which room Ash was in. Accidentally saying "Campbell" because I'm a dumbass, and they looked at me like I was a dumbass. Once I corrected myself they asked me to wait in the tea room "because the doctor is just taking care of some things" Alarm bells. I calmly go to the tea room and just sit there, legs shaking like I'm about to run a marathon, when I hear Chris looking for me. She find me in the waiting room, she's crying. "Oh shit" I say internally, but I don't let it show that I had a million bad situations running through my head. "HEY!" is what comes out. Chris tells me that Ash is okay, but that her epidural (which apparently Ash had SCREAMED for prior to my arrival) had gone too high and made her chest numb, which I know first-hand is an awful feeling. but Ash has some pretty bad anxiety, and so this mixed with the whole "can't feel yourself breathing" thing had set her off on a wild panic attack, which is what she was currently recovering from. Telling me she just needed to get out of there because she couldn't see Ash in pain and panicking, Chris calms down and assures me that everything is okay otherwise. She heads back to the room to see if I can come in, and FINALLY, I get the okay to go on in.
"Hey man" As if she wasn't sitting there in a hospital bed, in a birthing suite, with a tiny human trying to break out of her body. Ash is calm, but I can tell, extremely tired and anxious. Natural I suppose, given her current predicament. She's shaking like she's cold but I know this is from the anxiety and probably the drugs in her system. I say hey and try to assess the situation and the mood of the room, everyone seemed pretty okay, and now given that the epidural was too high, there wasn't much happening baby wise, and the next few hours were spent watching Ash wince in pain, chewing on ice, listening to Jake snore, getting a last nap in. Frequently the midwife and midwife-in-training would come and check on things, namely running ice over the preggo body to see how far the anesthetic had come down. The goal was for the feeling to come back to around the bottom of the belly I think, and then Ash would have the drug to bring on contractions put in her IV.
I snap some photos in this time, not a lot because there wasn't much to see, but I got enough to help tell the story. Chris called one of Ash's brothers, Lance, who was already in tears on the other end, telling Ash to "DIG IN!" this was a lovely moment I was glad to capture. At some point the doctor, who was absolutely fantastic and gorgeous in every way, came in to do exams to see the extent of dilation. I think it was when she was right at 10cm + 2 that he got Chris and Jake to have a look because the "babies head is right there!" The doctor then turns to me and says "Would the bestie like a look too?" to which Ash says, looking kind of sheepishly at me "Oh I don't think Lana would want to see that" and I thought to myself at that second, RIGHT, I'm just gonna go for it, if she doesn't care, then neither do I, and I don't want to not look and then wish I had. I say "Bitch, I wanna see!" ....sorry Mr. Doctor, and midwives.... I head down and have a look, and was greeted full frontal by my best friends not-so-secret-anymore garden. The doctor gets his fingers up in there and tries to show me what is apparently the babies head, all I see is black, which now we know was her hair.
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Let me put this in context. I'm not a prude. But because I'm so bloody down on my own body, I cringe at the thought seeing the naked body of someone I care about. Don't ask me why, I have no logic alright. Before this, I had seen MAYBE an accidental nipple, and some side-boob after surgery which required assistance re-dressing. So this was all new territory for both of us, walls down, resistance gone, I was in. This was no longer the glorious naked body of my best friend, this was a baby dispenser, and it was about to pop. I'm not squeamish, I've had more surgery than anyone my age ought to have, and I know that's vastly different to a natural function of the body, but nonetheless, this didn't bother me, but I think everyone in the room expected it to. HAH! I showed you guys!
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"Oh yeah, I see it!" I say, while internally thinking, it was just black, I have no fucking idea what you were actually showing me but thumbs up!
This is when things started to get intense. The drugs to bring on the contractions had kicked in and while she still had the epidural numbing most of her lower region, Ash was starting to feel the pressure and pains that she was meant to. Once our nudie-walls came down, so did her clothes. Ash, no longer giving any fucks, just went au naturale for the rest of the experience. There was much heavy breathing, a lot of sucking on gas, and then, when the time was right, came the pushing.
Ash went from on her back, to her side (baby was aiming off center, this helped straighten out her path of exit) up to all fours (which everyone was amazed at how adeptly Ash moved to this position given how numb her body was, especially one leg!) This was a pretty confronting sight, just butt-up in the air. I didn't really take many photos at this stage because while things were happening baby-in-the-birth-canal wise, it didn't really translate in to photos. By this time it had been a good hour or so of pushing. One of the midwives had previously let us know that a pediatrician would be in the room when baby was born, just in case she needed help breathing (Charli had done a poo in the womb, and was at risk of meconium aspiration). But the doctor came back in and I heard him mention that he's probably going to have to cut.
Back on her back now, Ash is exhausted and feeling discouraged that this has gone on so long, with so little progress (from her perspective) when in reality, in the course of all of this pushing, I watched her body shift and change, and the bump that was the baby move lower and lower in her body, it was just incredible. I had to take a second every now and then to take stock of what was going on around me because I was so focused on getting good shots that I was letting the special moments get away from me. I'd throw Ash a little smile of encouragement every now and then, knowing that she probably wouldn't even remember, and letting Jake and her mum be the hand holders, as much as I wanted to be right there next to her, telling her how proud of her and how amazed by what she was doing I was. I wanted to tell her that she was badass and that she was doing so well, which I could just tell she was.
As the midwives, and at this point the pediatrician and her nurse piled on in to the room, seriously thinking about it there was like, 7 medical professionals in the room at this point, maybe 1 or 2 more. So there's people everywhere and I'm getting pissed because this training doctor (watching Dr Awesome do his thing) was RIGHT IN MY WAY. I had to keep moving so that I was going to get good shots, but also didn't want to be the one blocking their way to medical stuff. The trainee midwife was given the task of coaching Ash through her contractions, having to tell her when she was having one so that she could push. It was a little funny actually, Ash was so concerned with doing it right and worried that she was doing it wrong, she'd frantically look to the midwife and be like "is that one? Can I push? Should I go now?". The doctor is at the business end, getting ready to make the cut to accommodate baby to get her out, and with an unexpected push from Ash, little Charli's head sat right where it needed to for the doctor to get in there and guide her out. It was a little brutal watching the doctor rip Ash's body the way he did but hey, it was effective! I'm snapping frantically at this point, not wanting to miss a thing. I watched as Charli's head was all the way out, and the moment of panic when we saw that her umbilical cord was around her neck. It wasn't suffocating her, it was just there, once the midwife slipped it off I heard the most amazing sound I have ever heard in my life. 3.17pm, Charli's first cry. It was new life, relief, and joy all at once. The midwife and doctor placed Charli on Ashleighs chest and I witnessed pure love just spill from the new mum and dad. I watched Ash turn into a mum, and Jake in to a dad. And in that second, all of the pain and the scares and the anxiety that had come before just fell away when they realised that this little human that THEY MADE was finally here, in the world, and ready to be loved and cared for by only them. This little bundle of love just melted our hearts.
While Ash and Charli lay skin-to-skin, the doctors stopped the bleeding, and waited for the cord-blood to completely drain before getting the new dad to cut the umbilical cord and separate his wife from his daughter. Once the cord was cut, the doctor and his trainee got to work. They had to deliver the placenta, which was the only time I felt uneasy. Not from the sight, I was intrigued. But from the smell. I could just smell pure blood. It didn't last long, and the doctor and trainee were soon doing what they needed to stitch up Ash's tear. By this time, everyone else was really just focused on Charli and the new parents. I finally snuck in for a hello, after encouragement from Ash's mum. I stood next to Ash and was filled with such happiness that this beautiful thing had just happened to her. This woman who it seems was simply born to be a wife and mother, who had for so long wished for a baby, finally had her dreams blossoming around her. I stroked her cheek and said "You did it!" which garnered tears from her, still amazed at the fact that she had, in fact, done it. I don't cry much (in public. Sad/emotional movies, all the time) but this moment was far too special for a hard-ass even one such as myself to contain my emotions, and yes, I had a tear or two. Thanks to Dr Awesome for pointing it out to everyone, especially Chris, who now gets hugs on a semi-regular basis, and who will never let me live it down.
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I don't even care man, I watched a baby get born, and I cried. I took photos and watched a family be brought in to existence right in front of my eyes. No one can take this experience away from me, and I feel like my life has changed in a huge way having gone through it. What's more special is that I now get to see this same baby grow up and I'll be there every step of the way, annoying Aunty Lana always snapping away.
Charli Rose Brooks 24/07/2016 3.17pm 7lb 14oz
