by Sarah Espigares

Created on: October 15, 2008   Last Updated: October 23, 2008

Why they call it labour.

Joaquin Raoul Espigares Fortin was born on December 15th, 2007 at 7:45 pm. I can't really compare having a baby in Spain to having one in Canada because I haven't had one in Canada, but I'd have to say that the experience here in Spain was a good one. A painful one, but everything went all right for the most part.

I woke up on Saturday, December 15th around 8:30 am. I was feeling pain lower down in my belly. This was not something new. I had been waking up for the last several weeks feeling pain because I had to go to the bathroom so badly. When you have to pee every 5 minutes all day long and then go to sleep for 8 hours with only one bathroom trip throughout the night, you're bound to feel pain first thing in the morning. Some mornings I was afraid to get up in fear that I might pee the bed right there with Miguel next to me. Nice way for him to wake up. Anyway, I went to the bathroom as I normally did and then went back to bed.

This was the first day that Miguel had been given to sleep in. He didn't have to work until 4 that day so we had both planned to sleep in. JR had other plans. Around 9:30 I woke up again with the same sort of pains. I thought maybe I had to go, well, you know. The other number. So I went to the bathroom and off to bed again. About 2 minutes later I had the pains again. I thought "Could it be? Am I in labour? Nah, first your water is supposed to break or your contractions are only supposed to be 30 minutes apart to start off with; not 2 minutes apart. Nah, can't be labour. But just in case it is labour I have to at least take a shower. I can't go to the hospital like this and have people looking around down there".

So I took a shower. An hour and a half in labour and I'm taking a shower. Contractions are fun while you're trying to take a shower. Finally I started to face the reality that I might actually be in labour. I went upstairs, woke Miguel up and told him we had to call the hospital because I might be in labour. I wanted to make sure (I just wasn't getting it) because I didn't want to have to drive all the way to Malaga and then come back if it wasn't labour. Apparently having contractions every 2 minutes wasn't enough to convince me.

We finally found the number for the hospital. This confusion all happened while my mother in law opened my Christmas presents for me so that I could have them for the hospital. I may be crazy, but I don't think labour is the best time to open someone else's Christmas presents

• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• Next Page >>