Dory's due date was 10th September. There were loads of Braxton Hicks contractions during that week and the following week. On the antenatal clinic on 11th September, my obstetrician booked me induction of labour on 19th if Dory is not born yet by then.

Since I had a high blood pressure history during my first pregnancy with Brenda, the obstetrician asked that my blood pressure had to be checked twice a week from then. On 15th September, the community midwife visited my home to check my blood pressure and found that it was 140/100. She measured again and it was same. Then she rang the antenatal clinic to make an appointment for me on the same day.

Jim collected Brenda from her nursery and the three of us went to the City Hospital at 4 o'clock. Having monitoring the baby's heart beat and my blood pressure for a hour, the registrar decided to keep me in that night and bring forward the date of induction to the next day (16th).

I stayed in the antenatal ward that night and was quite relaxed. I had a nice shower and read some magazine before went to bed. I was told that the induction would be in the morning of the following day.

However, nothing happened until the lunch time in the next day when a male obstetrician inserted a tablet to help ripen my cervix. I was under continuous baby monitoring almost for the whole afternoon. There was no contractions at all in that afternoon. When I was expecting somebody giving me a second dose of that tablet, a woman obstetrician who introduced herself as Doctor Ashwood (whom I saw quite a lot in later complications) came to examine me and decided to break my waters.

The long stick for breaking waters looked very scary. When it was done Dr. Ashwood told me my water was grey-greenish and obviously Dory had passed her first stool inside my womb.

We then moved into the induction unit of the labour ward. It was about 7-8ish at night. I was given syntocinon through a drip in the arm to help my womb to contract. When the pain started to come, I told the midwife that I would like to use epidural but want to delay the use of it until I couldn't cope with the pain since I knew that epidural may delay the process of labour.

The midwife suggested to use the gas to cope with pain before I decide to move on to epidural. I agreed it. When the next stronger pain wave comes, I cried for epidural. Unfortunately, when I most needed him the anesthetist was busy in the operation theatre and couldn't come immediately. I relied on the gas while waiting for him desperately.

Finally the anesthetist came. When he started to read some sort of risks of epidural for my consent, the midwife decided to do an internal examine and see how far I had progressed. Then she found I was ready for the second stage of labour and it was too late for epidural. The anesthetist's nagging was interrupted and I had to give birth without epidural and rely on gas solely!

It was quite fast actually. I remembered that Jim called me to push, he said that he could see the baby's head already. Then I pushed. It was out! Just like pushing a big poo in a terrible constipation. It was 22:31 on 16th September 2008. Only 2-3 hours after the first stage of labour kicked off.

I was very relieved to hear the baby cry. Dory was lifted to my chest for a while and taken away before I could watch her carefully.

Then I was told that the placeta was delivered. The midwife started working on stitching my tear. I heard her murmuring that why my bleeding wasn't stopped while she was stitching. Once she finished stitching, she decided to call the midwife in charge because I was still bleeding and she couldn't find any reason why it wouldn't stop. The next moment I was surrounded by a group of people, midwives and obstetricians. They decided to send me to the theatre and do an emergency operation to see what happened inside.

I was going to undergo an operation although my baby was born naturally through vagina. I was very upset. The anesthetist came back again. The same one whose reading was interrupted some while ago. I had to use anesthesia anyway, this time for the operation. It was quite funny when I heard him start reading that stuff for my consent again. I laughed and said, 'You can skip this paragraph now. You've read it last time. I'm all right with that.' But wait! Here's more stuff for the operation. I was shown a piece of paper. Somebody read it aloud. It was something like in the event of emerency, they might need to remove my womb in order to save my life, blablabla.

Under the effect of the gas, I signed the paper with my shaking hand and had a premonition of some sort of complications.

They changed a garment for use in the operating theatre and moved me to another bed. I was wheeled to the theatre. My first impression of the operating theatre was that it was too cold and noisy. I was expected coldness in an operating theatre but never thought that they would play rock music as background music, and moreover, it was very loud! Too loud for me, a person who dislikes all sorts of music, especially rock music. I was thinking to ask them to turn down the volumn a bit but I didn't.

I was asked to curl up for the anesthetist to do his job. He then used ice to test if the anesthesia took effects. Then they lifted my legs in a stirrups. I didn't know what they do on my lower part of the body because my view was blocked. After a while, I felt that it was hard to breath. Then I told one doctor. He asked me why. I found that I can hardly speak. I pointed my chest using my shaky finger and told him with great efforts, "I fell pressure here."

Then I didn't know anything until the next afternoon. Occasionally, I was conscious of being surrounded by many doctors and somebody talking to me. I remembered the familiar face of the anethetist (he was familiar to me by then) asking me if I had any blood clogging problem, do I bleed easily, do I bleed when I brush teeth, the funniest questions was 'Do you have any false teeth?' I still can't think of any relationship between bleeding and false teeth.

I woke up in the afternoon of the next day (the 17th), coughing up with blood and phlegm. Jim told me later that they used some sort of medical device to suck the phlegm and help keep my airway clear. I didn't realise how serious the operation was and how close to death I was in the past 15 hours. I could see that Jim was quite relieved when I was conscious. I asked him what happened. He told me in a strange gentle manner that I lost a lot of blood. I thought of the consent form and jokely asked that if I lost my womb too. He replied vaguely that it was not important and the important thing is that I live. Then I realised how acute it was.

I was in the Intensive Care Unit where one midwife only takes care of one patient. Patients in this unit seems critically ill and bed bound like myself. I was literally 'bound' to my bed through many tubes on the back of hands, wrists, arms, and even the neck! where different kinds of fluid, drugs, blood transfusion were dripping to my body.

I asked my dedicated midwife, an Indian girl, what happened to me. She replied cautiously that she was not allowed to tell me anything and I should wait for the doctor to explain things to me. Then she added, 'Did your husband tell you anything?' I said, 'He said he didn't know anything.'

Only then I realised that Jim was lying.

Next time when I asked he told me that I did lose my womb. The situation described on the consent form became the fact! When the doctor Ashwood came, I was told that I had massive haemorrhage and received 10 units (4.5 litre) blood transfusions (the litres of blood in a human body is about 4 litre). I lost all my blood and some of transfused blood too because I kept bleeding. They couldn't find out the reason. Finally they had to remove my uterus and cervix to stop bleeding and save my life. Blablabla

I realised two things. Firstly, I can't have any more children. My dream of 'raising a gardenful of kids' would never come true. Secondly, all the blood in my body was exchanged by somebody else's. I was so close to the death.

I weeped, for my unborn future babies.

I was healing gradually from then on, and transferred from the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) to the High Dependency Unit (HDU) where one midwife takes care of two patients, and from HDU to the postnatal ward (a single room with my baby in) where one midwife takes care of several patients and their babies, and finally was discharged home. That was 30th September, exactly two weeks since Dory's birthday.

I was aware of that I was very well-known in the hospital. It always happened that somebody whom I didn't know came to my bedside and told me how glad he/she was to see me getting well. Jim said to me later that in the difficult hours of waiting in the labour room with Dory, midwives reported to him in an hourly base to let him know that I was still bleeding and the best doctors and consultants in the hospital went to the theatre trying their best to save me.

I started to drink two days after the operation. The first two drinks caused vomitting badly. Then they controlled my liquid input and everytime I was only given 20ml of water to drink. My midwife said that I actually didn't need drink cause the drips was giving me all sort of fluids, medicine, nuitrition, everyting I need. But I was thirsty. Probably the most thirsty time in my life (up to now). I constantly begged the midwife to give me more water, whereas she said that I shouldn't drink more than 20 ml in an hour and when I drink I should sip instead of swallow it in one go to avoid more vomitting.

They registered my fluid input and output. Every time when I was given water to drink or my catheter was emptied, it was recorded on a big chart tacked on an easel. Finally, I was allowed to drink as much as I want, and on the following day Dr. Ashwood even suggests me to start eating, starting from soup and gradually increase to ordinary meal. It progressed well except one thing worried me. That was constipation.

I hadn't openned my bowel since THE DAY. I repeated my concern to doctors who visited me every morning and was prescribed at least three kinds of laxatives and fibre gels with no success. Then some externally used tablets inserted into anus and finally enemas. All of them didn't work. I felt that my belly was full of shit.

By the 9th day after the labour, I pulled the emergency bell string in the toilet after struggling for an hour after the second enema. This brought midwives and the registrar on call who already knew me from the operation. I told them that I hadn't passed stool for 8 days and was having cramp since the second dose of enema.

Five minutes later, I found that I was inhaling the gas again while the registrar removed the hard stool collections for me manually. It was like a second labour. Once I was off the gas, I felt much better and was told that loads of hard stool blockage was removed and a third dose of enema was inserted. The midwife looking after me said no wonder you struggled so much.

That night I had a fecal accident in my room in the postnatal ward due to the effect of the third dose of enema. I made a mess on the floor before I could rushed to the toilet to empty the bowel. But it was so great to be able to push waste out of me again and never worry about output when I'm taking input (eating :)

I was given about 20 tablets a time, with different shapes, colours, and tastes, four times a day, since the drips are gradually removed from me. The number of tablets reduced during the hospital stay, indicating my progress. By the time I left for home, only one medicine was given. It was iron tablets.

I am still on the mend and taking the iron tablets by the time I am writing this hub.