3-time Father

This day marks the final day of delivering babies for my Obstetrics and Gynaecology rotation.

If there's anything to take away from this rotation, it's probably the experience of "catching" babies that makes it so unique.

For the first 2 "catches", they reminded me of Genesis 3:16 where God declared that henceforth, mothers-to-be had to bear with the manifold-increased labour pain. Every scream of pain with each contraction, every tear shed, and the sweat drops on their forehead is testament to that. They have to pull through with the hours of pain which often times leave them v exhausted. Yet, they still continued "pushing", hoping that the next would be the last. How great a mother's love for thee. Now, I understand better how much my mother loves me so!

The final catch today was something worth mention. This mummy had an Antepartum (third trimester) bleed last night at 2am and was admitted to the Obstetrics Review Centre cos a bleed is usually abnormal, though at this late stage of pregnancy. At 11am, her "waters" broke. Yay! got baby to catch... And she was sent to the Birth suite, ready for delivery...

Well, not quite.

I arrived at 10am from tute, and stayed with mummy for a good 11 hours before little "Junhao" was born. In the 11 hours, we had to monitor the fetal heart rate and contractions, for any abnormality. Poor baby had quite a few late decelerations which require further investigations such as fetal scalp lactate and continual change in mummy's lying position to make the baby "heart-beat" happily.

Intially, mummy was very very brave, declining epidurals or morphine to relieve the pain. But soon enough, the pain became unbearable and an epidural anaesthetic had to be given. And that did WONDERS for her. She managed to take naps. :)

Long-story-short, mummy's contractions at the 10th hour were not good enough for the baby's head to be delivered. She must have been exhausted much. 'Cause further delays in delivering the baby could pose a risk to the baby, a plan for vacuum suction delivery was made. Thankful there weren't much complications and baby J soon arrived.

The greatest gift for any new and first-time mothers was to hear their babies' first cries.

Happy Mother's Day, Mummy C!      

And I'm a proud 3-Time Daddy!! =D