Looking Beyond the Pain

Carol Gatehouse-Gehrmann had her baby aged 32. Her dream was to become a mother at 30, but this was not to happen as her husband passed on. She tells her story to Elizabeth Ombati.

I had always wanted to have a baby at 30. This lifelong desire was thwarted when my first husband. Gatehouse, passed away seven months onto my 30th birthday. I went into severe depression.

It took my 96 year old bedridden grandmother to tell me that there was still life ahead. Seeing her crying for me was enough to jerk me out of my shell of self pity.

After my husband’s death, I prayed for a caring, understanding man ready to start a family. And it is what I got—my partner. Gehrmann, is God’s gift to me. Even though my dream of ‘baby at thirty’ had died, I now wanted a baby more than ever. It did not take long before this happened.

I started attending Lamaze classes together with my partner immediately after I fell pregnant. As I came to discover, this is the most important thing any pregnant woman can do make herself ready for the delivery. I learnt about the process of labour and breastfeeding.

Painkillers
I wanted a normal delivery, never desiring to take anything to ease the labour pains: I wanted everything as natural as could be. I told my doctor that the only time we could go for another option was when there completely was no other way out!

The D-Day
My due dale was on 5th of August. I was ready for the day. My contractions started on Sunday, two days before. They came every 40 minutes, with a little accompanying pain. I knew this was false labour and I stayed put. On Monday the 4th. I woke up and did my breakfast as usual, with the day dragging.

The contractions were now coming after every half an hour, eventually lessening to 20 minutes. By evening the duration shortened and coming every ten minutes. I called my neighbour and soon we were on our way to the hospital. In hospital I was informed that I was 5cm dilated.

Cold, Double pain
My sister did not have consoling words for me. She informed me that the colder it gets, (it was a cold August) the more painful the labour pains get. Funny way to make me prepared!

But I was not going to let fear get to me. In the delivery room, I did not sleep or sit down; I walked about, doing my exercises. Besides my partner Gehrmann, Diola, a trained birth assistant was also by my side. Diola helped me with the breathing process, passing me a hot drink whenever I felt like one. Being surrounded by both of them, made my experience easier because I felt love around me.

Closing my eyes
I hate the sight of blood. When I lay on the bed ready for the moment, the first thing I did was shut my eyes, listening to my doctor and Diola who kept encouraging me to push and breath right. At 8.24 p.m Anna Marie finally kicked her way to the world, weighing 3.5kgs. And as I held my beauty in my hands, my eyes were still closed! I only opened them briefly to check if the baby was a boy or girl, see if it was healthy and count the fingers. I got to open them again when the room was cleaned.

No milk!
The first three days, Anna Marie had to take formula milk for I could not express milk from my breasts. But after three days, they started leaking. Milk was coming out in copious amounts: it was like it was making up for the lost three days. I intend to breastfeed my girl for the next six months exclusively.

END:PG16/55