Branna shook her head. “Nope, usually contractions happen for a few hours, then your waters break, they intensify and bam, you’re a mammy.”
I blinked as fear suddenly filled me. “Why didn’t I get the hours of contractions first? Why did my waters go first?”
Branna chuckled and the brothers moved me out of the puddle I had created to a dry patch of floor. “Every labour is different, babe. You might a have a really quick labour, or you might be in labour until tomorrow or the next day. It all depends on how fast this little one wants to come out.”
“You swear this is normal?” I asked, suddenly shaking. “I still have two weeks to go. Can I not have a home birth anymore, do I have to go to the hospital?”
“Calm down, you don’t need to go anywhere unless I say so.” Branna placed her hands on my cheeks and smiled into my face. “Honey, you and the baby are fine. For about three in one hundred women their waters will break before they’re thirty-seven weeks along, and you’re at the thirty-eight week mark. Like I said, every pregnancy is different; there is no by-the-book way to have a baby. All of what I do is simply checkin’ on you and the baby throughout your labour. I follow the guidelines your body sets. This is perfectly normal and nothing to worry about, I promise you.”
I nodded my head, and took a few breaths to try and calm myself.
“I’m going to switch into midwife mode now, okay?” Branna smiled.
I nodded and found myself smiling when Nico and Alec kissed my head in unison, followed by Damien who kissed my nose.
“Let’s do this, Ado,” Alec said excitedly.
I chuckled. “Can you call Kane and have him come home?”
Alec kissed me once more. “I’m on it.”
He moved away from me and jogged out of the room with his phone pressed to his ear. I looked at Branna when she moved over to the large bag she left here a few weeks ago. Since she was my assigned midwife, it made sense for her to leave it here since I rarely left my apartment.
“Your liquid has a slight yellow tinge to it which is completely normal,” Branna informed me. “I can see you’re still leakin’, but not by much. That puddle over there was an obvious gush so there won’t be much left to leak out of you, but just to be safe I’ll bring you inside to change. I want to put a pad on you to keep track of the colour of the water, okay? I’m going to be jottin’ down notes on your form as I go along.”
I nodded. “Okay, then what?”
“Then I’ll check the baby’s heartbeat and we can have a chat.”
Check the baby’s heartbeat and have a chat.
“Got it.”
Branna and Nico both held onto me as I left the sitting room and entered my bedroom. Nico and Damien left and shut the door so I could undress and change.
“Can I shower?” I asked Branna.
She shook her head. “Wait another hour. I just want to watch your water to make sure there is no colour change.”
I nodded my head. “Can you go wet a cloth then so I can wash down my legs, please?”
Branna bobbed her head up and down and then headed out of my room and into the bathroom. She returned with a warm, wet washcloth. She helped me strip naked and took the cloth and washed the lower half of my body.
I flushed. “I’m sorry you have to do this, I’m so embarrassed.”
Branna snorted as she washed my thighs. “Babe, I help strangers do this on a daily basis at work. I’m happy to help you, you’re one of me best friends.”
I got emotional. “I’m so happy you’re going to be deliverin’ her.”
Branna stood up when she was finished and leaned in, wrapping her arms around me. “Me too, sweetie. It is an honour.”
When she separated, she got me a knee-length baby-blue nightie. She got a pair of granny knickers from one of the many new packets I bought for after the baby was born. She also grabbed one of my large pads and placed it onto the knickers then helped me slip them on.
I sighed. “I feel better knowing it will catch the water. It felt so weird when it just came out with no warnin’.”
Branna smiled as we sat down on my bed. She asked me a few questions about my water breaking then she laid me back on my bed and went to get the little portable Doppler she had so she could check the baby’s heartbeat.
When she returned to my room, Nico, Alec and Damien were hovering by the bedroom door looking in. I smiled at them and waved them in.
“Come in. I’m decent.”