Chapter 10 #2
‘Hopefully you won’t have to assist today either, but if you do, you’ll be brilliant.
I don’t doubt it for a second and I’ve done this lots of times before.
’ Hope smiled, silently praying that she sounded more confident than she felt.
She had done this lots of times before, but never on a beach.
‘Right now, it would be great if you could check Freya’s bag and see whether she’s got a towel or something to cover her up a bit.
It looks like she’s come straight out of the sea.
‘How are you doing?’ Hope turned towards Freya, who nodded weakly, as she got another break from the contractions.
‘I’m bloody glad you’re here.’ Freya managed a half smile.
‘I went in for a swim to ease my back and then the contractions started. I left my daughter with my mum, but when she was born it was so quick I had her in the car. I’ve got an appointment with the midwife tomorrow and they said they’d start monitoring me twice a week to check for any signs of early labour and I’m supposed to get induced at thirty-seven weeks either way. This wasn’t meant to happen.’
Suddenly Freya started to sob, and Hope took hold of her hand. ‘It’s going to be okay, try not to worry.’
‘We nearly lost Evie, she came so quickly and she couldn’t breathe properly. She only made it because we were so close to the hospital and I screamed at my boyfriend to just keep driving.’
‘That’s not going to happen this time.’ Hope squeezed her hand again, only releasing her grip as the expression on Freya’s face turned back into a grimace.
She was going to need to examine her and see how far along things were.
The trouble was there were other people on the beach and a small group had already gathered just a few feet away.
The onlookers could easily become a crowd if she and Annie didn’t do something about it.
‘Do you think if we help you, you might be able to get up?’ Hope was keeping everything crossed that Freya might be willing to try and move, but she vehemently shook her head.
‘No, no way. I can’t. It feels like my insides are coming out of me. It must be the head.’ Freya was crying again, her next words half strangled by a sob. ‘I don’t think I could move, even if my life depended on it.’
They couldn’t force her to attempt it, especially if she was right about how far the labour had progressed. It could well be the baby’s head she was feeling, and the gathering crowd needed to go. Right now.
‘Here you go.’ Annie passed Hope a large rainbow-coloured towel. It was a start, but they were going to need a lot more than that.
‘Thanks. Can you go and ask those people to move away and give Freya a bit of privacy?’ Hope looked up at her sister. ‘And see if you can find anyone on the beach who’ll lend us a windbreak, although two would be even better.’
‘I’m on it.’ Annie turned and spoke to the people watching the drama unfold in front of them, her tone more strident than Hope had ever heard it, as she instructed them in no uncertain terms to give Freya some space.
When one of them protested that they just wanted to see if they could help, Annie delegated the task of rounding up as many towels as they could find, before sprinting off in search of a windbreak.
She was a born leader and if anyone could create a makeshift hospital room, with the help of the similarly makeshift team she’d assembled, then it was Annie.
Either way, they couldn’t wait any longer.
As soon as the next contraction eased off, Hope was going to have to examine Freya and try to keep things as discreet as possible.
She needed to know whether they were going to be able to move her themselves, or whether the only hope of avoiding her baby being born on the beach was if the ambulance arrived in time, and the paramedics could safely move her instead.
‘Okay, Freya, I really think I need to examine you. The contractions are less than a minute apart now and I need to know what’s going on.’
‘Can you try and call my boyfriend? He’s in my phone under…
oh my God!’ Another contraction had already arrived, and this was a strong one.
Hope could do nothing but wait until it passed and just as she spread the towel over Freya’s lower half, Annie came hurtling back towards her, sending up a spray of sand.
‘I’ve got a windbreak, I’ll set it up to block the view as best I can.’
‘Thank you. The contractions are less than a minute apart and they’re lasting longer than the break in between, so I need to see what’s going on.
’ Hope didn’t hear what her sister said in response, as she carefully lifted the towel, having removed Freya’s bikini bottoms and positioned her body to shield Freya from prying eyes as much as she could.
Hope had intended to check how dilated her cervix was, but there was no need because the baby’s head was already crowning.
‘I’ve been trying not to push, but the baby’s coming anyway, isn’t it?’ Freya looked absolutely terrified and Hope was going to need to swallow her own fears and be the calm and collected one, even if she didn’t feel it.
‘Yes, it is, and it’s going to be absolutely fine.
You’re doing amazingly, you just need to carry on like you are, and with the next contraction I want you to breathe this baby out, slow and steady, no big pushes.
’ What Hope didn’t tell Freya was that if she delivered the baby too quickly, it would risk causing far more damage to the perineum and they were hardly in what anyone would call a sterile environment.
‘Someone’s just given me another windbreak,’ Annie announced, but there was no time for any of that now.
‘The baby’s crowning and I’m going to need your help.
’ Hope’s tone was urgent, but as another contraction took hold, she turned back to Freya.
‘Okay, you’ve done so well, now I want you to let your body do the work, just take short slow breaths, like you’re breathing through a straw for me, that’s it. ’
‘Aargh!’ The scream Freya suddenly let out sent a flock of seagulls soaring off the sand and into the sky, their own screeches almost enough to drown out her cry, but not quite.
‘That’s it, Freya, I know it’s hard, but you’re doing so brilliantly.
The baby’s head is out now.’ Hope felt for the umbilical cord, a shiver going up her spine that had nothing to do with the sun sliding behind the clouds.
The baby’s cord was wrapped around its neck and it was too tight for her to just loop it over.
If they’d been in the hospital, or even at the midwifery unit, she’d have clamped and cut the cord if they had to, in order to prevent the risk of it tearing away from the placenta, which could be incredibly dangerous.
Or wrapping so tightly around the baby’s neck that it could compromise its airway.
But they weren’t in a labour unit. That only left one option.
‘The baby’s cord is around its neck and it’s a little bit tight, so I need you to try really hard not to push with the next contraction either, Freya. You need to pant through it instead.’
‘Is it going to be okay?’ Freya’s eyes widened in alarm and she struggled for a moment, as if she might try to stand up, but Hope gently put a hand on her leg. They all needed to stay as calm as possible to get Freya and the baby through this safely.
‘It’s going to be fine, if you just listen to what I say. My sister, Annie, is going to help us too and she’s a doctor. So if you’re going to give birth on the beach, you’ve got a good team.’
‘Lucky I picked this spot for a swim then… Oh no, there’s another contraction coming.’
‘It’s okay, Freya. I want you to pant through it, just like I said. The baby is still going to come, we’re just going to keep it slow and steady. Like we’ve been doing.’