Musings from the Labour Room

It’s approximately 5:45am and in about 2 hours, I would be officially off-duty for the day. To be honest, I’ve never had a better on-call night than I did last night. It would be reasonable to say that it’s because of the Raya season that there are less local women in and around the area as most would have gone to their home state for the festive season. That being said, we have had our fair share of being busy since the afternoon. Anyhoo, I’m happy I got my fair share of sleep which I’ve never had before since working here in the labour room.

Many mishaps have happened since my team took over the ward for the month. I’m beginning to believe that I could actually be the Jonah one (as many of my colleagues have already speculated from the start) since a lot of these incidences happened when I’m around or that the night would be super busy when I’m on-call. Some maternal deaths, major fetal distresses and a cord prolapse INDIRECTLY (emphasis) caused by yours truly, just to name a few. Right now, I’m just looking ahead on to quickly finishing up my remaining days and heading out of the department. As quick as I can.

I think I should finish off now as a few of the staff nurses have been peeking and watching me since I started writing. Till then, ciao!

Allergic to O&G

Since working in labour room, I started to develop really painful rashes on the dorsal part of my hands. The pain would feel like it’s literally burning when I used the alcohol rub or had my hands near the baby warmers. It became so bad to a point that my hands were both quite swollen and red patches appeared all over up to my wrists (if you can see in the picture). I had no choice but to occasionally cool my hands with cold running tap water.

Thankfully, with good ol’ BVC, the swelling has much subsided but unfortunately is leaving behind a horrid layer of dry skin which made my hands look like those of an old woman – dry and wrinkly.

I’ve been told it’s likely that the constant use of the sterile gloves has caused an allergic reaction.. which is probably right, since the rash only appears in a glove-like distribution. However, one clever staff nurse said that maybe I’m allergic to O&G, which I could not agree 100% more. I like that label. Allergic to O&G. Giving off an allergic reaction. Can’t stay near for too long.. detrimental to me. hehe..

Raya season’s coming up in a few days.. to all my friends who celebrate this festival.. Have a happy Raya time with your family and friends. Will be working a little more to cover for the rest during the holiday time. Am really praying that it wouldn’t be as busy as a regular day.

There’s babies everywhere!

What a week it has been!

Seriously.

Surviving each day is like an adventure on its own. No. Wait. The adventure word gives it a fun-like connotation to it. It’s not. No way, sir. If anything, it’s the total opposite of fun. UN-fun. lol.

From dirtying my good pants with placenta blood…
…to a maternal death from uterine rupture
…to the most-distressed-of-fetal-distresses-that-I’ve-seen-until-I-couldn’t-believe-how-fast-the-staff-were-at-getting-the-patient-into-OT-that-stat,
…to hyper-hormonal staff nurses where to a point it’s getting REAAAALLLYYY annoying at how I feel they’re ordering us around…
…to…to.. can’t think of more at this late hour but I’m sure I will when I remember them…the list is definitely longer than this.

Of course not all is well and dandy in the labour room where expecting parents are overjoyed to receive their newborn babies. I’ve had the privileged of working in the high dependency ward inside the labour room and came across a case which has gripped my heart.

(I do realize that I usually blog about all the sad stories I come across… )

A young mother halfway though her pregnancy started experiencing symptoms suggestive of a deadly disease, which after many long days of investigations, the horrifying nightmare of the diagnosis was finally confirmed. The next difficult step was to decide what was the best solution for her and the baby given the terminal situation. It didn’t look good at all. It seems to appear that she might possibly have to give her life up for the sake of her baby. Really sad.

Sigh. Still counting down the days to when this posting will be over. In fact, everyday I keep wishing that time would pass by quicker.

36 days more (I think… not counting well in the middle of the night). lol.