Our first days at home

"Is so impressed, my little girl has come on leaps and bounds and gaining weight by the minute! Day 6.. Let's hope today is the day!"

...and it was, on September the 1st we were finally home, and loving it.  I'll never forget that feeling of freedom as we walked out the doors of the Princess Royal clutching our new arrival in her car seat, it was magical.  Hubby was very excited to have his girls home, I can't imagine how strange it was to have be alone every night for a week without your new family, but at least one of us had been getting some sleep... and boy did he need it!

Our first day home was brilliant, we visited the neighbours, tried Nieve out in her pram in the garden, and had a few visitors.

Nieve's first shot in her pram

Our first night wasn't so great. I warned Hubby about how different our little angel was at night to the Nieve he had seen during the day, but he didn't quite believe just how bad! Whatever we thought of these early days though was nothing compared to what we were about to experience.

"Thank you again for everyone's lovely comments, I'm trying to keep up with them but baby Nieve thinks her mum is a milk parlour and won't let me get on with things! we really really appreciate all the well wishes, cards and gifts and hope to get round to thanking you all personally very soon x" 

Breastfeeding was still a challenge to say the least, the first night home was horrid, plenty of tears and lots of pain.  In the early days it would take 1-2 hours for her to feed, every 3 hours and that's if she would latch properly.  I was of course still using the nipple shields, but after a day or so of this, she was using the nipple shields like a bottle teat and it was far too painful to continue.  Poor hubby was distraught listening to his daughter crying through the night with me screaming out in agony and frustration trying to get her to feed.  


Every day I had a midwife or health visitor visit us, offer advice and check Nieve's weight, which of course was always 'of concern' adding to my woes.  I reached rock bottom after the 3rd night and phoned mum sobbing, she won't sleep, she keeps crying and she won't feed properly. In desperation I sent hubby out for some formula in the hope it would fill her up and send her to sleep, at least I would know she was full.


I sat there reading the back of the box of formula, I had no idea what to do with it, and truthfully didn't want to know, with all the advice ringing in my ears, 'one formula feed could ruin any progress with breastfeeding and could be the beginning of the end'.  I couldn't let all my hard work go to waste, most would have given up after the first few days but through sheer determination I had got this far, and I wasn't about to give up, I just didn't know what to do.  Thankfully I had an idea, I remembered a number of the front of my maternity notes, the breastfeeding helpline.  After staring at the number for a good while I summoned up the courage to pick up the phone.


After a few long rings, I was through to what sounded like a busy family household.  The women apologised and said she would go through to the next room, as the sound of noisy kids faded into the background and she asked how she could help me, I couldn't speak, I just cried.


She was calming, understanding, patient and sympathetic and eventually once I was able to string some words together I told her my story so far.  At this point it really felt like we had tried everything to get her to feed, this lovely lady turned me around and restored some confidence in me.  She advised that it was up to me of course but she wouldn't give Nieve formula, for fear that it would cause us more problems with the breastfeeding, and instead offered me some new advice, go back to basics, and try something new again, somehow I ended the call with restored faith in our abilities, we can do this.  I firmly believe this anonymous women is the reason I'm still breastfeeding today.


So armed with my new advice, I stripped Nieve down to her nappy and I stripped down to my waist to give her some skin to skin, lied back and placed her little body on top of mine and let her find her own way to the nipple, eh voila!! she latched straight away, it was a magical, amazing moment and most certainly brought a smile to my face.


Despite our feeding worries, life at home was relatively relaxed, after being cooped up in hospital for so long we were dying to get out and about, and in our first couple of weeks at home were zooping about here and there in the pram, in the car, out shopping, visiting and taking walks.  All quite something when your breastfeeding on demand with a baby that only feeds lying down! 

If only we knew this was the calm before the storm!

Week one, our hospital stay

So there we were, not two but three!

After some lovely skin to skin with my little darling, I tried to breastfeed her, but I wasn't able to get her latched on, I was disappointed but didn't worry as I was sure she would pick it up. Then came the slightly annoying task of producing the placenta... thankfully some of my birth plan was followed and I was given 1/2 an hour to have a physiolocical 3rd stage (birthing the placenta on my own) which thankfully went well - yippee! Daddy enjoyed some cuddles with our newborn whilst I updated everyone on Nieve's arrival, all whilst the midwife set about repairing a small tear with a couple of stitches! Soon after I was cleaned up, polished off my tea n' toast and we made our way up to the recovery ward.

Papa cuddles

We sneaked a moment with my very excited dad in the corridor on the way up, he was thrilled to meet Nieve as strictly speaking it was out of visiting hours, and after a quick cuddle for mum & dad we said our goodbyes and continued up to our ward.  Unfortunately hubby had to leave shortly afterwards as it was just out of visiting hours - booh! but he was tired and so was I, so there we were, just me and Nieve!

Daddy cuddles

What a strange feeling, all of a sudden your a mum, I had no idea how to change a nappy, feed her, or even dress her, but I sure knew how to give her mummy cuddles! Nieve was bathed and changed by the nurse and wrapped up in her crib next to my bed.  Naturally I didn't sleep a wink that night, little Nieve was loving her mummy cuddles far too much and preferred me to her bed. I tried to feed her again but she didn't latch and I had no idea what to do! Not having done this before I didn't worry too much as I had no idea how often I needed to feed her, I was more concerned at the fact I thought she had a dirty nappy and I had no idea what to do...so I looked for someone to help me, god I felt like a plonker.  Eventually in the small hours a midwife came to see me, showed me how to do her nappy, watched me feed her and told me I was doing it all wrong, Thanks! I thought, great for my new mummy confidence, but of course she was right I had no idea what to do. Together we tried to get her latched on but had no luck, so we left her to sleep and someone would come and try again.

A clean Nieve

Morning came and we still had no luck with the breastfeeding, I'm a little fuzzy still on the details as the first few days were a blur of sheer exhaustion, pain and tears.  However some time afterwards the midwives decided that I had left her far too long without feeding, something which  I think could have been taken more seriously earlier on. Nieve had a lot of mucus that she wretched up for days, they thought this may have something to do with her not feeding, but who knows.

Nieve and Mum's Mum

Nieve and Gran Ann

The days that followed were a mix of joy, having friends and family to visit and sheer despair at my poor little starving daughter.  Nieve lost too much weight in the first few days and it was an uphill battle to get her weight up quickly.  In order to get some milk into her and to get my milk supply going I set about hand expressing the colostrum, this was an extremely frustrating process.   For about 20 minutes of hand expressing I would get about 1-2ml of fluid into this little cup, all whilst trying to console my very hungry little girl in one arm. She was then fed this precious fluid by sucking it from a syringe, very cute but heartbreaking at the same time.  On our 2nd night I was told to feed her every two hours, this involved trying to feed her on the breast, then if that failed (which it always did) hold her whilst hand expressing and feeding her by syringe. This process went on for another night until I was allowed the blissful hand pump! I've never been so pleased to see such a contraption! We had a brief glimmer of hope, a whole feed latched on! but it seemed to be a fluke as she wasn't up for it again.  Things moved on and soon enough my little hand pump wasn't cutting the mustard, it was time to call in the big guns.

My little Caterpillar

Smiling insanely after Nieve's first feed

So out came the industrial style milking machine, and my 3 hourly task of trying her at the breast followed by a milking session began, there were no longer syringes big enough, so was told to try bottles, but the next midwife on shift told us off for this, and showed us how to feed her by cup, possibly one of the most amazing things I've seen, she lapped it up like a kitten!  By this point I had been in hospital with Nieve for Nearly 4 days, and was one of my lowest points.  On this particular day 3 car seats had come in to the ward and gone away with babies in, most of which had come in after me, it started to feel like breastfeeding wasn't the easy option after all, and super unfair I was still here with my non-feeding breastfed baby, but I was determined to see this through, I can do this!!

To add to our woes, Nieve had a touch of Jaundice and had to get a heel prick test :0( to see if she needed treatment, thankfully she was 0.1 off needing treatment and we got away with it - phew! that would have been another week of treatments ontop of our feeding and weight problems.  The Jaundice took a while to go away and lingered for a week or so, but all was well.

Nieve giving me the finger!

Looking around the ward at my new neighbours depressed me, I kept thinking that soon they would be gone, and I would still be here, hooked up to the milking machine.  I was about to try and get to sleep with the chorus of new, newborn babies ringing in my ears when a sympathetic midwife came and asked me if I would like to move to my own room.

My feeding tools

Luxury, that's the only way to describe my suite at the hospital room 13, larger than most lounges with an en-suite to boot it was blissful, and so quiet.  Along with my room came a new friend, a lovely student midwife who took a shine to Nieve and her 'case' by this point I had met most the midwifes and they had tried everything to get Nieve to latch on, and my boobs had been handled daily in ways I'd never imagined! With each shift change came a new midwife and a new set of instructions and things to try, some would be off for a couple of days and come back dismayed at our lack of progress, but genuine in their concern. Eventually someone suggested trying nipple shields, as she had no problem taking a bottle and it might make my nipple easier to latch on to, luckily I had bought some so hubby brought them in on day 6 to try, eh voila! a latched on breastfeeding baby- woo hoo!!! It wasn't perfect but we did it, and by day 7 it was good enough to be freed from hospital YES!

So finally in came our car seat, to take our baby home, I was grinning from ear to ear. But hubby had left with my bags to put in the car and Nieve was a hungry horse! what should I do.. I tried to phone him but he didn't answer so I tried to feed her without and she did it, she latched on!! It was the perfect goodbye present for the midwifes, who had been such amazing support through my ordeal.

We did it!

One very excited Daddy, welcoming home our little Nieve.

How it all began

After nearly 6 months of venting my frustrations through my status updates I have finally come up with a plan, a blog. I need an outlet, some way of writing down all that is happened and seeing how far we have come, so here we are.

I never thought I would be able write enough about me and what I do for a blog, but when it comes to Nieve, my 23 week old daughter I could write a book.

Well lets start from the beginning... It all started October 2009 when I was jumping around the kitchen of our glasgow flat grinning from ear to ear, my husband had finally agreed to my demands and said we could try for a baby.  Much to my husband's disappointment delight within 6 weeks I was staring at my first response pregnancy test with amazement "thats a line, I'm sure it's a line" and on December the 19th 2009 we were officially expecting baby Campbell.

Ok so I didn't start with the nicest of pictures but this was a really big moment for me! Hubby couldn't quite believe what he was reading when he received the email at work telling him I was pregnant, in-fact is was something along the lines of "are you sure!!" bless him, he was a little shocked.  It wasn't the type of thing I thought I would ever by telling my loved one by email but he works off-shore and the only way to contact him.

So there it was in, pink n' white stripes, we were expecting.  For anyone who has experienced this moment I'm sure they will understand when i say it's the most exciting but worrying thing I've ever seen. From this moment on, I was a paranoid, nervous wreck! As the days and weeks dragged by till I approached the magic 12 week mark all I though about was wether my little jelly bean would make it, spending most of my days 'knicker checking' (as my mumsnet friends used to call it) or suffering from what can only be described as extreme exhaustion, along with the usual nausea. There were two things that saved my sanity in these early days, mumsnet and my 9 week scan!  We decided since hubby wasn't due to be here for my booked 12/13 wk scan (and to shut me up!) we would get a private 9 wk scan, it was worth every penny! What an amazing moment, to see your little miracle, so tiny yet already baby like - incredible!  This seemed to ease my mind, but I was still quietly worried about making it to that magic 12 weeks.  Anyway as you may have guessed we did make it, and the scan date was changed so hubby made it after all, and once again we snuck a peek at our little jelly bean, wriggling around on the monitor.

My husband would disagree, but apart form the usual complaints the rest of my pregnancy went pretty smoothly.  I let go somewhat as the weeks went by, particularly after 16 weeks, and we saw our then not so little jelly bean once more.

I was sure from the beginning of my pregnancy that I didn't want to rely on drugs (if possible) to deliver my little one, and since I had an allergy to local anaesthetics, I didn't really have much of a choice in the matter anyway.  I planned a hypno-birthing water-birth, and hired a Hypnobirthing tutor to come to the house to teach me how.  Suzy from babynyou was fab, from 6 months we did 4 sessions, teaching me to relax, breath and visualise.  I had a cd of affirmations to listen to daily along with a relaxation session, which I mostly listened to before bedtime.  My practicing and studying of the theory of hypnobirthing really helped me with my pregnancy and gave me a focus, neither me or my husband were worried about the birth and looked forward to the big day.

me at 38 weeks

One of our concerns with hubby working offshore was the timing of our little one, we had a window of opportunity when the little one ideally should be born, as we all know babies don't work this way so we were somewhat unsure of how it was all going to fit in.  I worked hard on my visualisations and encouraging baby along, letting baby know when was a good time to come and meet us.  It seemed to pay off August the 25th at 2am, 5 hours after picking up hubby from the train station my waters went.  Now I would love to say my lovely hypno-birthing water-birth went to plan, but well it didn't! The first 24 hrs were a breeze, breathing well through my surges (contractions) bouncing on my ball, taking baths, watching Avatar and many other films, even having a little glass of vino, my first since December 19th! Then it all went a little downhill, I had been to the hospital at 10am on the 25th to be examined as my waters had gone before being in active labour, I was sent home and as instructed duely phoned back when my contractions were 5 minutes apart.  By this point it had been 28 hours since my waters broke, and since I'd slept, so I was starting to get a little cabin fever.  I was told that I didn't sound like I was enough pain, and to phone back when I couldn't speak on the phone... I was more that a little disgruntled at this suggestion, this was let down no1 from the NHS, Hypnobirthing teaches you to stay calm, be in control, relax and breathe through your contractions, so in short how did she know I how far along I was by the fact I could talk to her!?  I was worried and fed up, so we decided to stick to my 8am induction appointment, even though I clearly didn't need induced.  The worst they could do was send me back home - HA! Well my contractions were still 4-5 minutes apart when I was in a tiny waiting room for the induction ward for 2 hours! With no updates and 1 visit to say they were getting round to me and then when I was eventually moved into the induction ward, which I still had no idea why I was there I sat on a bed with a curtain round, waiting again.  I waited and waited, some doctors asked me some questions but no one explained what was happening, I was truly uncomfortable by this stage and my breathing and relaxation were slowly going out the window.  I just wanted to know what was going on, how far along I was, when I would get to a room of my own, when I could soak in my beloved pool!

mid contraction, cooped up in the induction ward

Eventually late afternoon hubby decided i needed a walk, so we went down to the Canteen, by this point i think my body had given up waiting and all of a sudden my contractions jumped from 4 min apart to 1-2 min apart! OUCH!!! I was a mess by this point, it took a long time to climb the stairs back up to the joyous induction ward clinging hanging round my husbands neck for dear life! Surely by this point they would take me seriously, they got what they wanted I was in PAIN! nope, I was greeted by the words "I'll run you a bath" and quietly admitting to my husband that there was as yet no room for me!!!!  Really not what I was hoping for, I went along with this but after listening to the screams and splashes of me writhing around in agony in a tiny little bath (who's idea was that!?!) Finally they said, we have a room for you, AT LAST!! And finally after a very very long waddle, leaving a trail of bath water & labour waters behind me I made it to my OWN ROOM! 

I can't tell you the relief I felt when I got into this little room, it was more than a room it was a "it's ok we believe your in labour, and ready to give birth" room, with a midwife any everything!! My birth preferences were non-existent now, I was hooked up to an monitor, on my back with a cannula and antibiotic drip, the exact opposite of what I had so carefully planned, dismissed and discarded in a moment.  I 'had to' be on antibiotics as my waters went early, I knew otherwise but had to go along with it, I didn't argue once I was introduced to my good friend Gas & Air, which took the edge off, but it was most definitely having my own space and knowing I was safe and looked after that made the most difference. Then best of all, my mum walked through the door.  My poor hubby embraced her and asked to go out for some air, he was truly traumatised.  My mum was amazing and brought an air of calm and excitement to the room, but hubby had done so well, staying strong and trying to fight my corner about my birth preferences when I had no energy to, and being a great neck to hang from :) So 2 hours later with a little help from Mum, Hubby and a rather surprised midwife, a few held back pushes, just l minute after the minimum of 2 hours the antibiotic drip had to be in, my little Nieve was born.

Proud mummy

Very proud daddy

Proud mummies :)

My little Nieve Caitlin Campbell, born 26th August 2010 6:55pm, 6lbs 14oz.