Simply Emma: Almost 4 years ago..

Looking at the calendar today, I realised that in two days time, it will be 4 years since Gaby was conceived!!! It seems like a whole other lifetime ago, and I guess in some ways it is... I can't believe my precious little girl has been with me for close to 4 years! I often wonder what my life would be like if I didn't have Gaby... I might be in a better place financially - but I struggle to imagine how my life would have any meaning! Of course I wouldn't know any better, and my life would probably seem great to me... but knowing what I do.. from my 4 years of having Gaby in my life... I wouldn't change any of it!

I've been reminiscing about my pregnancy with her, a lot! I started experiencing symptoms at what would have been about 5DPO, very early - and by the time I was 10DPO, I knew that I was pregnant - just hadn't had the test to confirm it. My midwife stopped by at 13DPO, I took the test - and bingo! PREGNANT! I wasn't shocked by any means, it was more I was happy to have the confirmation - and of course I was VERRRRRY excited!

positive hpt @ 13DPO - Feb 7, 2006

Because of my history of losses (had had 2 prior to my pregnancy with Gaby), I was very anxious and nervous - and scared for the entire 1st trimester, but slowly the weeks passed me by - I passed both of my loss stages - 5w4d & 10w4d - and after the 10w4d mark, it felt like I was in unchartered territory - I had never made it that far in a pregnancy, and it was all very new to me! I had lots of symptoms with Gaby, which provided a lot of reassurance for me, but it wasn't until I had my 12w u/s that I really started to feel good about the pregnancy.

12w1d u/s - 4 April, 2006

The pregnancy progressed well - I still had a tonne of anxiety and paranoia - everyday wondering if it was going to be the last day of my pregnancy... deep down I knew that everything was going to be okay, but I am obviously a pessimist, and half expected something to go wrong. I started feeling movement at 14w3d, which was another piece of reassurance, my m/w appointments were always good, we always found the heartbeat easily, and it was always nice and steady - it was a very happy time! I still had in the back of my mind that something might be wrong with the baby, and imagined going to my 20w u/s, and coming out with bad news.... My 20w u/s arrived, and not only was I told my baby was healthy, I was told that I was pregnant with a little girl! I had presumed from day one that she was a girl, and it was cool to find out I was right!

19w1d u/s - 19 May, 2006

The remainder of my pregnancy flew by, and at 39 weeks I went for another u/s to get an indicator of how big Gaby was - my midwife was worried she was going to be too big for my pelvis (being that I'm 5'0, and she was measuring large for dates)... I didn't mind the ultrasound - was lovely to have an excuse to see my little girl again! She looked just as beautiful as I'd remembered, and it hit me during that u/s, that I was going to be meeting her - in person, very soon!!!!

26 October 2006 @ 1.01am - Gabrielle Jayda-Leigh Oakden, was born @ 42w0d- weighing 8lb4oz. I ended up having an emergency c/s with her, because 2 days of induction failed to dilate me to even 1cm, then my waters broke & there was lots of meconium present, so my I freaked out and requested a c/s - and my m/w agreed it was the best course of action... So it wasn't an emergency in the sense that it was life & death... just an 'emergency' in the way that it wasn't scheduled. My baby girl was gorgeous and it was love at first sight.