Is it worth hiring a TENs machine for an induction?

[birdofthenorth]

Expecting to be induced due in a couple of weeks due to gestational diabetes. This is DC2, and with DD1 I found my tens machine totally invaluable, I loved it, worked very well for me. Is it worth hiring one again for an induction though? Or will I be likely to skip through the early stages when it's most useful/ and or be so hooked up to monitoring equipment it's not practical? Or as I'll be in hospital the whole time will they have one I could use there if appropriate?

Thank you!

[scissy]

I had one when I was induced early and was glad, as I was in the labour ward for ages and they wouldn't give me any pain relief apart from paracetomol. I found I needed it after my waters went, contractions increased but I wasn't dilated enough to go to delivery. Hopefully things won't be as slow for you though! They might have one in the hospital but I was glad I had sorted my own because they didn't have any available at the time at my hospital.

[birdofthenorth]

Thanks that's helpful. I think if you'd have told me I had to go through the first stages of my last labour with just paracetamol I'd have shot someone

[scissy]

You might be allowed pethedine, unfortunately as an epileptic my notes had NO PETHEDINE in big letters scribbled all across them

[oscarwilde]

You can have mine - I'm done . PM me your details and I'll post it to you

[lola88]

YES i could not have coped without my tens machine i started to get pain at 8pm and they didn't give me anything else until 5am when i went to the labour ward

[intheshed]

Yep, I was induced with DC2 and had the tens machine on right up until I was about 7-8 cm dilated, by which point it was just annoying me.

It was great in early labour though, especially after the midwife came along and repositioned all the pads as DH had put it on in all the wrong places (might explain why I thought it was useless first time round!)

[GraceSpeaker]

I was induced and used the TENS maching until we got to 3cm and stayed there four 4 hours without making any progress. Found it a useful distraction!

[LoisLame]

Definitely worth having, especially if it worked for you first time. With DD, had a spontaneous labour and used tens for 18 hours at home until I got into hospital and into the pool. With DS, induced due to GD, ended up on the drip which took 5 hours from start to baby. Used just tens for first 4ish hours and tens + gas and air for last hour and all 8 mins of second stage.