Birth stories and testimonies. Are you pregnant? Planning to get pregnant? Expectant mother or father? These weird, scary, real, funny, deep and suspense filled birth stories may help you prepare. Every woman has a peculiar birth story. Please feel free to share yours with us when you give birth.
These are compilations of crazy birth testimonies from different Nigerian women.
1. Make Up Kit-LOL
#strolling_down_memory_lane.. so on d d-day i was to deliver my first child, i packed my baby bag & included my make up kit. my mum laughed @ me when she saw me adding my makeup kit & i told her that i av to look gud after putting to bed so that whoever that come to the hospital to visit me after childbirth will meet me looking sweet. Wowww; shouted the nurses when they saw me stolling in with trousers. i was told that when labour come i will 4get abt looking young &swit. i laughed at their old school style of reasoning.#chaii!!! my labour was very slow so i had to be induced #ehhhhhhhwalah!!! i practized madness 4 d duration it lasted & was very weak after child birth that the Nurses had to pour glucose in my mouth. #guess_what:… the pple that came to see me met me lying down with a piece of wrapper thrown over me with glucose on my face. hahahhahhaha!
2.Cord Around The Neck!
“I’m a mother of 2, when i entered the labour ward and see the performance i was shocked, women and their display, different type of shouting and i told myself that i will not cry. the first one I was induced after 3cm and they left me for 18hrs with so much pain I can’t sit, sleep or stand I endure till end without food or water without nobody but nurses and doctors who comes time to time to check how the women are progressing and at the end i was tired and was taken to theater that is another story but my baby and I came out safe and sound and she was big. The 2nd one I promised myself I will not eat much so that the baby will be small but still 4.4 that one the last date that was giving to me , I went for antenatal was book for CS but was already in labour the were like telling me to stay back I said no that I will come backs 2morrow that I did not prepare my home , my baby and did not come come with my bag of which they husband should go and get it, when they were even checking me water burst and was in a lot of pain that I started crying confused and the next day when they checked the baby’s head was coming out but surprise when they were rushing telling me to kneel down so that the baby will go back then I was rushed theater again all to God the was brought out fine a cord was around her neck.”
The next birth story from the mother below is quite deep, scary and philosophical. It is not just one of the birth stories, it is also an advocacy for women rights to safe delivery.
3. “I Was Lucky to Survive Childbirth In Nigeria, My Labor Was The Most Horrific Experience of My Life”- Olutosin
When the time came for me to deliver my first daughter, my maternal grandmother took me aside and told me to sit down. “There is no pain like that of childbirth,” she said. “It is indescribable. Delivery can only be done by God. Put your faith in him. As for the doctors — forget them.” Her words made me deeply afraid for what I was to experience next, and my mother only confirmed my fears. “Has she explained everything to you?” she said. “It will be painful.”
True to their predictions, my labor was the most horrific experience of my life — but it shouldn’t have been. My relatives prepared me for the physical pain, but I was not alerted to the conditions I would meet in Nigeria’s health care facilities.
I went to the hospital to deliver my daughter on April 25, 2002. Pain gushed out of me like the flow of a river.
I screamed, expecting soothing medications to reduce my pain, or at least soothing words to help me through. Instead, one of the nurses shouted at me to “Shut up!”
At the hospital, there was not a single doctor. The room was crowded with women in various stages of delivery. We were forced to labor on benches, as there was only one bed. When the baby crowned at the birth canal, women would be transferred to the only available bed.
A nurse sternly warned me not to push, despite my baby’s insistence on coming into this world. When I could not take it any further, I screamed and the nurse almost hit me. “I told you not to push! No space for you to deliver!” The pain of attempting to stop my labor made me cry out in more pain.
When my baby was finally delivered, she could not breathe. The nurse looked at me and said, “You have killed your daughter.” She handed the baby to my husband and said, “She is a still birth. Your wife killed your child.”
I began to cry as my husband wrapped a scarf around the baby to prepare her for burial. Miraculously, a doctor who arrived just in time took the baby from his arms. I don’t know how, but he was able to revive my daughter. Relieved, I fell asleep. I woke in a pool of blood — the nurses had forgotten to stitch me from the episiotomy. I recovered after eight days in intensive care.
These experiences happened in one of the largest hospitals in Lagos. I was lucky to survive. My daughter, whom we named Oluwatobiloba (we call her Tobi) was equally lucky to survive. Every day, women are sacrificed at the altars of medical negligence and lack of resources.
I could quote statistics of maternal deaths in my country, but they would be useless: Official numbers do not represent the actual quantity of casualties we see daily.
It is time we all come together to reduce the number of women and infants buried in the graveyards of improper funding, administration and lack of resources.
The world I dream of in 2030 is one where women are respected and cared for in pregnancy and childbirth. It’s a world where women’s voices are heard and where we have equality between men and women.
Women worldwide are awakening from a slumber and insisting on better choices, better treatment. This fight is a witness that the battle can be won, because there are more passionate women joining the stream of our cause. The battle is not replacing patriarchy with matriarchy; it is giving equal rights, access, control and opportunity for both men and women.
I no longer weep when I am afraid; I confront my fears and walk over them. I have become strong, no longer a victim of domestic violence, and no longer silenced by cruelty. My story is the story that fuels hope, it strengthens and encourages.
Despite the great ocean that separates sisters around the world, this distance can be crossed through online connections that break every divide. When we connect with each other and tell our stories, when we wake up and help to wake each other, the dream will become real and we can truly connect with each other as mothers to mothers, sisters to sisters.
Our voices are growing louder every day. No longer will we allow mothers and babies to die in childbirth.
4. Mrs. Fafiyebi, a mother of 4, shares her first time birth story
I wasn’t expecting to go into labour the day my first baby came as my due date was less than 3 weeks away. I went for my antenatal appointment that morning and my gynaecologist and I had gone over the signs that I would use to determine the onset of labour. A few minutes to 11 pm that night, I was sitting on the sofa when I felt water gushing out of me.
My husband got my things into the car and we were off to the hospital. I felt so excited that I was going to have my baby. Inside the car, the water was still coming out but by the time we got to the hospital, it had stopped.
After about an hour, I was moved to another room where my husband and I slept that night. By 3am the following morning as I finished urinating, I felt the ‘plug’ fall into the toilet and I informed the nurse on duty. Shortly after that, I started feeling light menstrual cramps and my excitement grew. By 7am that morning, my gynaecologist arrived and I was moved into the delivery room. By then, the pain was getting more intense and the contractions were coming at intervals.
READ ALSO: Couples share there IVF stories.
My husband was with me all through, at first I felt relieved when he was helping me to massage my waist but as time went on and the intensity of the pain increased, I felt irritated by his touch and told him to stop. I told the midwife and nurses too to stop talking and coming to listen to the baby’s heartbeat or check how many cm I had dilated because it felt so uncomfortable!
A drip was fixed for me and the doctor said it was to make the contractions come stronger. All this while I was shouting instead of using the breathing techniques I had been taught; all those flew out the window when the pain came. I told my husband to come closer as I needed to hold his trousers for support.
In the afternoon, when the doctor said I was ready, I was told to push only when I was instructed to, I tried, later, I felt such pressure on my buttocks as if I was going to poo, and I mentioned it. The doctor said that it was the baby that made me feel that way and I should go ahead and poo on the bed if I felt the urge. It happened again and when I pushed, I was tired, but my husband encouraged me and told me he was already seeing the baby’s head.
The next time I pushed, I felt the doctor’s scissors cut me but it was painless and this funny looking creature, all wet and white, covered with fine hair with a head that was a little elongated and a cord on its tummy, came out. Our (my husband and I’s) first reaction was, what is this? I thought I was mentally prepared, but when I saw the real thing, I knew I wasn’t.
I asked for the sex of the baby and was told it’s a girl. My husband went out with the nurses to get her cleaned up after all the necessary documentation while the placenta came out and the doctor stitched me up.
They came back with my beautiful princess who weighed 2.9kg, born on the 2nd of December, 2006.
The time between labour and delivery got shorter as I had more children. My first baby’s was about 12 hours. For my last baby, it was about 3 hours. Thankfully, I had normal deliveries for all of them. I know some women have totally different birth stories. I give God the glory.
Are you pregnant with twins? I know pregnancy is not easy at all let alone carrying twins or triplets. Perhaps the testimony below will encourage and inspire you.
5. One of the amazing birth stories from a mother with triplets
In order to fully understand a story, one should know the beginning.
“I was 25 years old when I found out I was pregnant. My stomach literally just started to swell one day, I assumed I was constipated so I just let it be. A few days later, my husband was like “ahah why is your stomach so big”. It felt hard and I was extremely comfortable and in pain. We went to the hospital that evening and as soon as the doctor saw me he ordered a pregnancy test. Of-course it came out positive..but I was just about a week pregnant. My doctor told me I would be fine and my stomach was probably just swelling because my ovaries were reacting late to pregnancy and secreting fluid.
When I was 6 weeks pregnant, I went for my first ultrasound. At this point the pregnancy was already hitting me hard. I was literally always hungry or sleepy. The doctor put the probe in and when he looked at the monitor, I could see the sheer shock on his face. I remember actually asking him ahah what is it. He said “there are 3 babies in there”. I immediately started to cry.
How!? I called out to my husband who was in the next room waiting…. He rushed in and so did 3 nurses. My husband took it really well, he was actually happy. I just kept crying…. the nurses tried to console me saying things like “it’s a blessing, don’t worry u will be fine”.
My pregnancy was certainly no walk in the park. At 11 weeks, my doctor said I have to have a procedure called a cerclage where they basically sew your cervix shut. They give you an epidural to numb you from the waist down and you’re awake. Thankfully the surgery went without a hitch. I couldn’t keep anything down for 7 months, everything I ate, drank came back up. I couldn’t even successfully take my prenatal vitamins.
Every two weeks, I would go to the hospital for ultrasounds, the would check the babies’ heartbeats and say “they are doing well”.
My mum and I traveled to Atlanta, Georgia when I was 29 weeks. Because of the nature of my pregnancy I was referred to a high risk specialist. They did a very thorough check on each of the babies one at at time (the whole process took atleast an hour and a half if not more).
The doctor told me that baby B was just in the 16th percentile of growth and the fluid in her sac was really small (the other two were 60th and 49th percentile). I did not see this coming at all, I thought they were all fine and growing well. I was extremely depressed and cried and cried, I couldn’t even bring myself to pray. I was emotionally, mentally and physically drained. We were told there wasn’t cause for alarm yet and that we should go home.
My mum simply said to me “my dear don’t worry, I told God that it’s 5 of us that will go back to Lagos and so shall it be”. Every night she would go to the basement and do vigil, praying for me and my children. I don’t know what I would have done without her. We went back to the hospital the next week and were told baby B’s fluid had increased a bit so we can still go. The next week (at 32 weeks 6 days) the doctor showed me their growth chart, my precious lil baby B had not grown an inch in two whole weeks.
they brought them out one by one. I was overjoyed. My mum went up to NICU with the babies so they could be admitted while I was in recovery.
I wasn’t allowed to see them till later the next day. The first time I saw them I was truly shocked. I had never seen tinier babies in my whole life. With their oxygen tubes and feeding tubes… they were hooked on to at least a dozen machines each. Baby A and C were small but baby B….. wow….I could literally see her ribs every time she breathed. Thinking back, I probably should have cried or something, but I just found an inner strength that can not describe. I knew I had to be strong for them, especially her.
I was discharged 3 days after my surgery and even though I was still recovering, I would go back forth to see them every other day.
My husband and I named our children:
Baby A: Tiwalola Leila
Baby B: Tiwadayo Liyana
Baby C: Tiwadire Rayyan.
One of their doctors told me they performed a test on Tiwadayo and there was something wrong with her legs. I freaked out!!! Again my mum said “ko si nkan nkan to se Omo mi”. (Nothing is wrong with my daughter)
I spoke to another doctor and she said the other doctor should not have told me that, babies that size hardly pass that test and she’s fine. I was relieved. Tiwadire was discharged two weeks later and Tiwalola followed shortly. Just before Tiwadayo was discharged, the doctor told me I would have to take her to an eye specialist because children born below 1.2kg might not be able to see.
Again, I freaked out, but I took her to the specialist and to God Be the Glory her eyes were perfectly fine. She had severe reflux as well, her food will just come out of her nose making it difficult for her to breathe…. with time she outgrew that as well. The child that I feared I might lose was the first of the three to sit, crawl and walk.
My journey to becoming a mom of triplets was not an easy one in any way but I am incredibly grateful that they chose me to be their mother. God has been with us and continues to be with us every step of the way.
My lil angels are 16 months old now. They are incredibly big for their age and they are hitting every milestone.
I am grateful to God for giving me the kind of mother that I have. She has been a huge support, from the beginning pregnancy till now. My siblings, especially my sisters who helped make those first few months a lot less overwhelming…. thank you.
To my babies……Tiwalola, Tiwadayo & Tiwadire Adebisi I love you so very much, thank you for choosing me to be you mummy. And to my Babyboy- Baba3 I love u!
This experience has changed me in every way… and I am grateful for every part of it, it’s made me a better and stronger person. I know I am capable so much more than I thought myself to be.”
The next of the birth stories is like a stroll in the park.
6. Like Menstrual Cramps
“Mine was easy no pain was only feeling menstrual cramp. Was busy eating n gisting with hubby.. Wen i. Was checked again i was fully dilated.. Was asked to push.. 1…2. Baby pooped out…. My bbb came out.. No tear nothing..dat same day i went home.. I didnt experience labour mayb cos i did enuf jogging.. Not all birth stories are this easy. “
Other wonderful birth stories are out there waiting to be shared. Let us help tell your story to inspire others.
You can also share your friend’s birth stories .
These birth stories were culled from:
1. Mamalette
2. Woman.ng
3. Motherhood in Style Magazine
4. DeedeesBlog
