Induction

Sal went into hospital yesterday to be induced. Supposed to be a quick in and out but the Doctor was AWOL. The Consultant Midwife hadn’t bothered her arse writing in the notes from her last appointment either. This meant the planned induction via a pessary was delayed. Sarah went in a 6pm but by the time the midwives managed to locate a doctor to prescribe said pessary, it was 4am. She was bedded in the Obstetrics Assessment Unit. She then had to stay an hour post induction for observation. The baby must have moved, lay on the umbilical or something as it dropped it’s heart rate briefly. I picked her up at 5am, she refused to say in. She was in a bay with two snorers.

The pessary is basically like a small tampon, which is inserted deep into the vagina in order to “ripen” the cervix. I believe by this they mean it helps the cervix to open and start labour, but I’m no expert. The pessary contains prostaglandins, a drug which behaves like the hormone to soften and shortens the cervix. It can take up to 24 hours to work. It might not work at all. It’s all a bit mad really.

So we’re waiting. Sal has had a few cramps and is currently in the bath, listening to some hypo-birthing jive. I’m sat with the unwell woofer, on standby.

Unwell woofer has kennel cough. I was a bit surprised by this diagnosis from the vet as he’s been vaccinated against it. She likened the vaccination to having the flu jab; it’s not fool proof. So he’s here, hacking up his lungs every now and then and sleeping a bit more than usual. He’s still eating and seems ok in himself so I’m not worried. It’s just bad timing. I means he can’t socialise with other dogs for 10 days so the dog walker has been cancelled. She normally comes on the days I’m at work and was going to dog sit him for a few days, once Sarah went into labour. Sal’s mother is here now anyway so it’s not the end of the world. We’ve been keeping the dog walker on during lockdown to help support her though this.

I was concerned, you read all sorts of shite online and in one article it stated that Kennel cough is the same virus as whooping cough. We’ve been reassured by the Vet that Kennel cough is no risk to our impending baby. It’s basically a viral infection of the woofers upper airway that’s very contagious to other dogs, hence the 10 day of Billy no doggy-mates.

I do wonder how the woofer will react when we return to this house with a newborn and he realises we did this without his consultation. I’m pretty convinced he thinks we work for him and that this is his house. I can just see him now being like:

“Errrr, excuse me. What and who is this?”

From the photo he looks like the proud father, but in truth he hasn’t even noticed that Sal is pregnant. Most dogs we meet in the park are very intuitive and gravitate towards Sal and her bump. Not this lad. Sal reckons he’ll pack his bag and put himself up for adoption when the Baby arrives as he’s no longer no.1.

He has as extensive but misinformed vocabulary you know, for a dog. He’s a mongrel, a designer one though. A Cockapoo. Although his mother was already a Cockapoo and is father was a miniature poodle. So he’s more poodle, which makes his pretty smart, in some aspects. I’ve seen Cockapoo’s going for £3000 now, which is massively ridiculous. Everyone wants a woofer for lockdown. I keep joking that I’m gonna sell him and go on holiday with the 3k. I am only joking though, you can’t fly anywhere at the minute.

Now when I say he has an extensive but misinformed vocabulary I mean he understands a lot of sounds. All the basics like sit, stay, wait heel (etc), he’s nailed. It’s more when I say ‘do you wanna go for a walk,’ he gets excited and runs to the front door. When I say to Sal, ‘do you wanna a cup of tea?’ He also gets excited runs to the front door. He’s associate the sound of ‘do you want’ with a walk, almost like the whole sentence is one long prefix to the word walk. You can just say ‘walk’ and he’ll run to the front door. He just doesn’t understand that as humans we’re not really monosyllabic creatures. We like to generate sentences, which is completely unnecessary when talking to a dog, but there you go.

So here I am, sat refreshing my knowledge on how to deliver a baby. Watching many a YouTube video, in other words. I have no intention on delivering our child, it’s just a precaution in case things move rapidly. I once delivered a baby outside of A&E, well over 10 years ago now. Well, it delivered itself. I opened the taxi door to find out what was going on and there sat a woman, screaming with a crowned baby popping out. I supported the head, out it came. There was a really awkward moment afterward when I’m just there holding the baby, thinking what do i do now? The mother staring at me in complete shock, the taxi driver intensely focused on looking anywhere but his rear view mirror. I was well out of my depth. Thankfully though, the rest of the A&E unit came out to take over. I went away to wash my hands. The charge nurse joked afterwards she’d be in for a £50 fine for soiling the taxi. Women often poo when they give birth. No one tells you this. I suppose it’s the least of their worries.

I do often catch myself thinking about that whole situation and how maybe we should do more training in A&E for such events, as rare as they are. However, the one thing I’d love to know, is whether or not the taxi driver called it night or wiped down and went onto his next fare.

“Mind that seat Sir… bit damp.”