It was eight o’clock when my waters broke. I was reading my son his bedtime story, ‘The Snail and the Whale’.
Appropriate for me at nearly two weeks overdue. I dutifully and calmly rang Dorchester hospital and they said ‘come in when you have been having contractions less than every five minutes apart for an hour. Remember it is your second though, so things can be a little speedier than with your first. Where do you live? Swanage? Don’t leave it too late, come in soon’.
Oh, how right they were.
What followed can only be described as a scene from a film. A really painful film playing on the fast forward button. I started getting painful contractions and by 9.30 we decided to leave for Dorchester. My husband drove calmly out of Swanage. By Corfe, the speedometer was reading 70 mph. By Wareham, the leather interior of our Honda had nail marks in it. 80 mph. By the Monkey World roundabout, an ape had climbed into the passenger seat. 90 mph. On the road from Monkey World to Dorchester my daughter decided she wanted to have a little look at the world. To see if she liked it. 100 mph. the renegade ape sitting next to my husband was emitting a series of guttural noises along the lines of ‘hurry the f*** up. I don’t care if there is a red light.’ I think there were a fair few ‘I can feel the heads’ thrown in for good measure. On Dorchester High Street, every red light was sped through at 120 mph. This is no exaggeration, we fully expected my husband to lose his licence.
In between contractions I called in to explain and at 9.58 we swung into Dorchester Maternity Unit car park to be greeted by 3 midwives, 2 doctors and a wheelchair. I couldn’t sit on the wheel chair or the top of my daughter’s head might have been squashed.
10.02, in the lift. I asked for some drugs. They laughed. 10.04, I begged for some drugs. They rubbed my back and smiled. At 10.06, she was born.
Somewhere between 10.04 and 10.06, my daughter had shoulder dystocia. Her shoulder was stuck with her head out. Somewhere between 10.04 and 10.06 we received expert and speedy care from a team of excellent NHS midwives and doctors to manoeuvre her out. At 10.07 we heard the wonderful sound of her crying loudly from the other side of the room.
To put the severity of the situation into context. If my husband hadn’t driven at 120 mph, if the hospital had been further away, if funding cuts had happened sooner and Dorchester Maternity were to have been closed my husband would have been put into a situation to attempt to successfully deliver her in the back of our car on a lay-by on the way to the other side of Bournemouth. This would not have been successful, I am sure. She would have been stuck in distress, on a layby half way to Bournemouth and the result just doesn’t bear thinking about. This campaign is so very important to our town, which is so very pretty but so cut off from expert medical care.”
The CCG plan to close Poole Maternity and Paediatrics.
The future of Dorset County Maternity and Paediatrics remains in question.
