Source : the age
I’ve never been a big Christmas person, largely because my family didn’t celebrate it when I was growing up. Because of this, I didn’t have any “core Christmas memories” – or at least, I didn’t until last year.
They do say Christmas is about the kids – the joy of gift giving, the merriment of Christmas food and special treats, it’s all made better when you have little ones around to truly revel in the magic of it all. I just didn’t expect my own little one to choose to show up six weeks early, with a mission to be born as close to Christmas as possible.
Zoya Patel went into labour on Christmas morning, six weeks early. Credit:
I was eight months’ pregnant when I went to bed on Christmas Eve, 2023, uncomfortably large but determined to enjoy the holidays. My husband and I had made our annual Christmas trip from Canberra to the South Coast – a tradition that, much to the chagrin of locals, half of Canberra shares. And after 11 beach Christmases, I was glad to be spending my last Yuletide sans children in our familiar sandy paradise.
I had spent the day in the ocean, letting the waves lift the weight of my baby and making me feel light and mobile for the first time in ages. My due date was January 31, 2024, and I was dreading the idea of being nine months’ pregnant in the worst of the summer heat. But at least I wouldn’t have to worry about a vulnerable newborn in a Canberra winter, I reasoned.
I struggled to get to sleep, overheated and in that awful stage of late pregnancy when everything aches and no position – sitting, standing or lying down – is comfortable. Fast forward to 3am, when after tossing and turning non-stop, I finally dragged myself out of bed to try to distract myself.
Walking from one room to another, I felt a sudden rush of fluid. Expecting to see clear fluid when I got to the bathroom, I looked down and instead saw blood. A lot of blood.
Instead of panicking, I felt a wave of calmness. Something bad was happening, but the most important thing was to focus on what we needed to do to keep the baby safe. Was this the “mum mode” I had heard so much about?
I woke my partner, who was bewildered but equally quick to step into gear. Then, we woke up my sister-in-law, giving instructions for our dog, before packing the necessities and heading to the nearest hospital.
Unsurprisingly, over Christmas in a coastal town, the emergency department was very light on staff, so I found myself filling in forms while they called the doctor in. Within half an hour of arriving, though, it was clear that I’d need to return to Canberra – where there were more facilities for pre-term births – albeit in the back of an ambulance.
And so, I spent the early hours of Christmas morning strapped to a gurney in the back of an ambulance, sharing biscuits with a delightful midwife who had stepped up to work on Christmas Day. Between her, the paramedics, and the doctors and nurses, the Christmas spirit was truly alive in the generosity and capabilities of these frontline workers who were keeping us safe while others enjoyed the festivities.
After I arrived back at home, it was a whirlwind. Once we were sure the baby was OK, there was some confusion about what was causing the bleeding. I had been to hospital a few weeks earlier, where doctors had given me steroid injections to help speed up the baby’s lung development just in case he did come early. This turned out to be a major blessing because after tests confirmed that my waters had broken, it was just a case of deciding when to have the caesarean we had already planned on.
A few days later, our son was delivered six weeks premature, but thriving. His lungs were operating well, and we were lucky that (aside from weighing just 2.1 kilograms) he didn’t need any breathing support or interventions other than tube feeding.
I was exhausted and still a little bamboozled by the sudden change in schedule, but grateful that the early arrival was just one of those random things with no sinister cause. We never did find out why the bleeding happened – the miracle of life remains a mystery sometimes!
Maybe I have applied this lens retrospectively, but it did feel like the plot of a Christmas movie. All we needed was a love triangle and some confusion over who the father of my child was to round out the drama (the reality is less interesting when it’s a happy, long-term relationship).
Instead, we had our own “Christmas miracle” and have spent the past year in the throes of new parenthood. While we did spend Christmas (and New Year’s Eve) in the hospital, at least our dog got the beach holiday he deserved.
Zoya Patel is a freelance writer.
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