This text was first published on the blog whatiwant.se

JULY 20, 2012

We bought food from our local sushi place and went home to eat. Once inside the door, the contractions felt more and more and I had a hard time eating the food we bought.

I downloaded the app Labor Contraction Timer in appstore to keep track of how often the contractions came. The app costs SEK 7 ( $1) and is very simple, you can also use their web timer if you rather use that. When I downloaded the Labor Contraction Timer it was still not completely obvious for me if I had “real” contractions, I timed myself and reset the timer several times because I did not really think it was clear when a contraction started and ended. Was it the same pain? Is this a new contraction?

But after both me and my husband clocked the contractions several times, they came about 7 minutes apart and held for about 30 seconds. Each time it hurt very much and my sweetest soldier became a little worried and wanted to call the maternity hospital to see when it would be time to get ready to go in. The midwife who responded announced that the hospital was completely full at the moment and that my contractions came so infrequently that I could probably come in the day after, like they decided earlier. If I had to come in now they would have to refer me to another hospital so it was best to wait until I had three contractions in 10 min and that each contraction would then last for about 1 min.

I held out for as long as I could, but in the end it felt like the contractions were coming all the time. In the picture here you can see my last entries before I gave up the timer and started preparing to get to the taxi.

Even though I understood that the baby was on the way and that we probably would not come back until after she was born, we still did not bring the baby carriage that we had planned.
I was probably in total denial that the birth started and we just brought the maternity bag with things for the baby, our computers and a change of clothes. My boyfriend was probably also in some form of shock, after he had talked to the maternity hospital and got a clear sign that we should come in soon, but that we should try to hold out for another hour. So he called and booked a taxi to pick us up at 02:15 am. On the way out the door, he unpacked a “Mora knife” (correction: an American combat knife, he corrected me). I happened to see the combat knife at the hospital a few days later and was told that my sweetheart had felt obliged to protect his future family and pregnant partner and that he did not feel safe in the middle of the night in Stockholm. (He’s from a small town). I asked him if he thought anyone would attack us on the 100 meters we walked to the taxi and he probably thought it was as hilarious as I did afterwards.

We got into the taxi that took us to Danderyds Hospital and the maternity ward BB Stockholm. The taxi driver was very uncomfortable with the situation and repeatedly asked me if I was feeling nauseous and needed to vomit, he was rushing to the hospital and probably pulled a sigh of relief when he let us out of the hospital.