Mumsnet Talk

coraltoes Well, it was a tough few hours for him, but he stayed strong and pulled through.

posted this before...

pneumonia- imagine thousands of tiny little knives stabbing you from the inside out every time you breathe, move, well do anything really

I'll quite willingly have labour over pneumonia any day

I've heard lots of people say that gall stones were worse than labour. Labour was agonizingly painful, but at least there was a clear end in sight. I have a bad back and sometimes the spasms from that are worse than I remember labour being.

Sinus infection and tooth abcess that shattered the tooth were both worse than 18 hour back to back labour with contactions every 5 minutes from the outset.

RightSaidFreud I am with you there on cluster headaches.

And, coincidentally, I said "They aren't nicknamed 'the suicide headache' for nothing" to the GP I saw last week - after she suggested I try blowing into a paper bag to relieve the pain

After suffering a dental infection that made my whole face blow up labour was a breeze. Contractions come and go, you get a break from the pain. Toothache is constant terrible pain. For days and days.

Burst appendix was far, far worse. 24 hours throwing up with pain with no end in sight (was told it was gastroenteritis and I'd just have to get through it). And this was when DS was 4 weeks old so memory of childbirth was quite recent for comparative purposes.

the nearest i've got to it was my run in with kidney stones/renal colic last year.

having had two kids without pain relief, it really is a toss-up over which was worse, because at least with labour you could breathe through it.. renal colic hurts when you breath, and there were no contractions either, it was just constant and even morphine didnt touch it... it just made it so i didnt give a crap about being in pain anymore.

When I had pneumonia I had pockets of pus in my lungs. One of the ways they dealt with them was to send me down to ultrasound where the lovely man would scan across my back to get a picture of my lungs and then insert a long needle between my ribs, into the pus pocket and then syringe out the pus. It wasn't too bad.

Until the day that ultrasound were having a crisis and didn't have time to do the whole procedure. So the nice man scanned my back and marked with crosses in biro where they needed to put the needle. I was sent back to the ward where two new doctors (it was August so they were all shiny and new on the rotation) spent an hour ramming the needle into my back repeatedly. They weren't sure of the angle of entry and kept missing the pus, so they'd have another go. So I sat there trying to keep 100% still (like when you have an epidural) to prevent causing any extra damage, with tears running down my face as I felt the tip of the needle rasp across my ribs vomit.

The pain, coupled with the pressure of needing to be still and the fear of how much long it could possibly go on, beat labour hands down. I didn't have enough lung capacity to scream, I could only sob and fight for breath.

Tonsils out and then repeated vomiting for 2 days-pain was much worse than 2 vaginal births with no pain relief

Appendicitis is a real shocker, mine also turned to peritonitis and the worst of it is that you usually spend several days getting ever worse, all the while being told you have something else - in my case a UTI.

I've also broken all the bones in my ankle and had to have that reconstructed with metalwork and pins and stuff. It didn't hurt anywhere near as much as I expected, tbh although the moment that the bones went crack was one I'd rather not repeat.

I think the difference between illness, accidents and labour is that a happy outcome from labour is so much more productive, so to speak!

i was in labour for 4 full days induced 3 times failed forceps & ventouse that ended in an emergency c-section

not quite an injury but would definitely rather go through it all again than have toothache or earache!!

broke tibia and fibula and dislocated my foot. didn't hurt too much at first, but after the adrenaline had worn off it started to hurt. a lot. then when they reset the bone and my foot under morphine I could hear myself scream, but the I must have passed out 'cos I don't remember anything else until the pot was just about on.

it also hurt like fuck after I had surgery to pin it all back together again. was on morphine for 5 days.

I'd rather have another baby than go through that again.

YABU.

Different people experience labour (and broken bones) in different ways.

YANBU to say that for you this was worse than labour, as far as you remember.

3 broken arms.

1 broken ankle.

I birth - induced, forceps, back to back, episiotomy, epidural.

I wanted to DIE with the birth. NOTHING has ever been on a par with that pain worse. Nothing!!!

But I'm sure pain is all subjective/relative and different for everyone

And I did get a rather gorgeous baby from the birth so not going to grumble!!!

I thought that the period pains I had as a teenager were worse than labour pains, as they were constant not intermittent - but the gas&air probably helped!

Tooth abscess. Made me vomit with the pain.

Toothache with an abcess in my front tooth was way worse than labour, the only way to get any relief was to put my finger up my nose and squeeze the infected yuk down towards my tooth. <<shudders at memory>>

I had horific stomach cramps with sickness and diarrhoea when DD1 was due and thought it was the onset of labour it was so bad. I was bent double and in serious pain and then really dreaded labour as I thought it would be the same but worse - it was actually shed loads better.

Emergency section twin birth prety horrific. Screamed, literally screamed when the spinal went in. DH looked at me aghast and said that must really hurt for you to do that. I have never felt pain like it, although the recovery from an emergency section was pretty horrific.

I would much rather labour with no pain relief than have toothache, earache, backache, mastitis, sysciatica or an epidural.

Thanking big styleee I have never had a kidney/gall stones.

Another Gallstone sufferer here... It felt like my chest was being ripped open... Much worse than my appendicitis and labour... Cholecystitus was even worse and quite dangerous, which is why I'm having the bastard gallbladder taken out in a few weeks

I am tempted to say that I have had period pains worse than labour pains, but I think it is pyschological - the actual peak of a contraction is awful but (if you are lucky, I was) it does subside in between, and of course the main thing is that when you are having a baby you are a hero with people bringing you things and no one expecting you to multi-task in any way at all and life on hold and someone else looking after your first child and the whole world praying for you, but when you have period pains you are a snivelling shameful wreck on the floor of a toilet hiding from the people who are wondering why you haven't done that report yet and you can't come out and explain in case you vomit on them or shit yourself.

Ooh I like this one. Pregnant with my first and a bit concerned about what labour feels like. But judging by the comments above I should be fine as I've had 12 kidney stones so far so if I can survive that I can survive labour???

pretty
sciatica
DOH illiterate fool

In order
1) Renal colic
2) 9lb10 b2b birth with mad no drugs kiwi midwife
3) Twins vaginal birth
4) Appendix