An operation that turned into a nightmare
By Danell Swim
February 24, 2008
I was 10 days overdue when the doctors decided to induce me. I wasn’t booked in for a caesarean – if I’d been having elective surgery, it would all have been different. But everything happened so fast. The drugs they use make your contractions incredibly intense, so they gave me pethidine to ease the pain. That was at 9pm. The baby immediately went into distress. Five minutes later, they rushed me to theatre for a crash section, and he was born 12 minutes after that. That’s how quick it was. There wasn’t time to be scared.
She goes on to describe how her first child was born by cesarean, but this time she wasn’t given enough anesthetic to make her go to sleep. So she was aware of everything happening in the OR.
So, I’m lying there on the table, desperately trying to show the anaesthetist that I’m awake, as all this totally mundane chat goes on around me. I heard the telephone go, and someone said to the surgeon: “You’ve got a burst ovarian cyst in A&E.” She said: “Give me 20 minutes and I’ll be down to see it.” Then she started talking about her holiday: she, her husband and her little boy were going to Portugal the following day. And all the while, I’m trying to move my arms and shoulders, twitch the blood-pressure cuff, shake the drip, but nothing. I was told later there was no change in my heart rate or my breathing pattern; no twitches, no muscle contractions, nothing.
When my son was delivered, I heard them say: “It’s a little boy.” Then: “Get the paediatrician – he’s very flat. We might have to ventilate him.” I felt powerless. I could hear he wasn’t crying and the midwife’s voice was becoming more and more anxious. I knew I was in an awful situation, but my problems could be put aside. I wasn’t in any pain. I was just concerned that my baby was in trouble. When the paediatrician arrived, he sounded like a junior doctor. He and the midwife were desperately trying to resuscitate the baby, without success. I was so anxious that I would have leapt off the table, but I couldn’t lift a finger. I heard the midwife say: “What should I tell the father?” and the doctor replied: “Don’t tell him anything yet. The baby may not survive.”
So they induce someone with a previous cesarean because they’re 10 days overdue. And it ends like this. Well it’s a good thing her anesthetic didn’t work, or we’d never be hearing about this at all.
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