Sarah’s Journey

For my first pregnancy, I tried to get into RDH homebirth team but my BMI was over by 1 and ruled me out. I fought to get into MGP for continuity of midwifery care, but, well that’s another story!

I was working FIFO as a remote nurse and flying in and out of upto 2 communities a week. I completely forgot my OGTT was coming up. I flew out to community for a day and had no toilet accessible to use so purposefully dehydrated myself. It was a 6am – 8pm work day and we were on the go all day! The only food I managed that day was a bag of snakes (lollies), which we shared as a team, then when I got home, I had pasta for dinner. Woke up next morning to alarm reminding me to go do OGTT. I should have rescheduled. Work was too busy to fit in another day, so I did it.

Fasting result was 5.2. The other readings both normal. I was diagnosed with GDM!

My first obs/gyn I saw post diagnosis asked if I wanted a retest OGTT or offered that I could check my BGL (blood glucose levels via fingerprick) for 4 weeks and keep records then come for review. She didn’t think I had GDM and wanted to get rid of diagnosis. YAY I thought! I chose option 2 and came back for a review 4 weeks later. It was a different doctor. I had all of my BGL for the 4 weeks and they were all completely normal and within normal limits despite not changing my diet or workload. She agreed it was not likely GDM and then checked with a consultant who very firmly said NO WAY!. Once it’s diagnosed at OGTT it’s GDM and you CAN NOT remove that label!

So……my GDM stuck!
I pricked my fingers 4 times every single day for the remaining of my pregnancy (41 weeks) and not a single reading was out of range (even with all the chocolate and ice cream snacks and stress of work!)

I got to 40 weeks and bubs was still very comfy, that’s when I started to get all the scare tactics talk at ever single visit and it was horrible. I was ruled out of ever trying to have the birth pool for labour at the hospital as I was ‘high risk’ due to my “GDM”.

I had about 4 extra ultrasounds as they were worried about a “big baby”. One of the Ultrasounds showed bubs was on the smaller side and then a few weeks later apparently on 98% of growth and too big.

Any who, my healthy son, Bodhi, was born at 41 weeks and was 3.82 kg. I was healthy and he was healthy and he passed all his sugar checks I was told he needed to have due to my GDM. So I’ll leave it up to you to decide if it was GDM or not…

For my second pregnancy, I chose to do things very differently and we were lucky enough to be able to afford to have Claire’s midwifery care and support for this journey with Midwives in Darwin.

Claire supported us holistically and spoke a lot about nourishment and movement. At 2 separate periods during the pregnancy I decided to track my BGLs 4 times a day for 2 weeks, whilst eating the same diet as I had always been. All readings were normal and within range (even while on holidays and when lots of “sometimes foods” were consumed). We never had any stress about a label ruling us out of the labour we desired or changing the care we received.

And even though eventually the birth ended in the same manner as my first labour journey, we had a beautiful labour at home, with a lot of that time spent in the birth pool in our lounge room. This is what I had always dreamed and hoped for.

My biggest advice is do your own research, talk to Claire, listen to the great birth rebellion podcast, research wherever will help you make an informed decision. Its your body, your baby and your pregnancy. Let my pregnancy journey with my first be a warning that in the hospital system, once a label is written down there is no changing that or the cascade of interventions that can follow!

Big love to any GDM mummas and of course a true GDM is a different story to being given a label that truly does not apply.

xx

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