22 weeks - Really bad gas pain, hope am not confusing it with contractions

[womanlytales]

I am 22 weeks pregnant and this morning I woke up and felt a really heavy weight on my stomach so much so that I wondered if this is what folks mean when they say their babies have engaged... THOUGH at my stage my baby is far too small yet...
I then started getting really bad pain - - I took it to mean gas pains because I felt like going to the loo and ended up going 2-3 times. TMI - my motions were normal.
After an hour or so the pains kept going on and even though I went to the loo nothing would happen. I also had some brief burps but all in all I felt like the gas was trapped in me and had no way to get out and hence the pain.

I called my GP who said that it would help for me to take medication for gas and then monitor and call her back if there is a problem. Ever since I took the medication I have been timing my gas pains which would recur every five minutes... now as I type it's been 15 minutes since my last wave of gas pain...

During this time I have been googling all of this (of course!!!) and reading about how some women can have contractions this early and need to monitored or medicated ... I will be calling my GP to update her on my situation - I am just not sure if I should be going to the A&E to have everything checked or not..

Have any of you faced such a situation? Any suggestions / tips?

[beckymcfc]

Hi there, I experienced this at around 25 and 27 weeks and to be honest I ignored it as gas pain. It was excrutiating at times, I couldn't stand, sit or lye down comfortably. In the end I googled trapped wind exercices and the best I found was lying on the floor with your legs in the air pulled towards your stomach. It relieved it slightly with a few good farts air passings and by the next morning I could barley feel it.

Saying that though at the time I was really worried it could have been more. I mentioned it to my MW when I saw her next and she said trapped wind is very common unfortunatley, but that if I was worried I should have gone to hospital to be checked out. She said they would rather see you and it turns out to be nothing, then you didnt go in at all and something was wrong.

Try the exercises for a while and if no luck get yourself down to A&E this evening. Good luck

[womanlytales]

Thank you Becky. My GP has called me in and if needed I will go to A&E from there. I really hope this is just gas pain - excrutiating as it is - just like you I find that I need to change positions immediately - - However what has me worried is that it keeps coming back every five minutes..and now an hour post taking the medication my GP subscribed its subsided to about every 10-12 minutes or so...and the intensity of the pain (initially lasted 7 - 8 long breaths) now is about 4-5 breaths long..

[flowerflo]

I'm 37+4 and had a similar experience a couple of weeks ago. I was woken in the night by the most excruciating pain I've ever had. It felt like wind but was so bad that I couldn't even walk or talk properly. I thought I was either going into labour or having a heart attack! We phoned the hospital who told me to come in striaght away. The pain lessened and by the time we arrived it had almost gone, however they were very good, monitoring the baby and gave me an ECG. All was well and it appears to have just been wind!!! I felt a bit embarrassed about this, but they were lovely and reassured me that it was better to be checked out in case it was something serious. I hope yours is just wind too - and hope you feel better soon. But go to A&E if no improvement.....not worth the risk otherwise.

[Nikki2ol6]

With my second baby my contractions felt like gas pain and I did poop also which wasn't soft it was normal but a lot of it. I completely missed the signs of labour and thought I had ate something bad! I had been at a christening all day and had a buffet there so I assumed it was the tuna sandwich. It wasn't and it was labour and it was also the clear out you get!! My gas pains were 2 minuets apart and if I hadn't of stared spotting I wouldn't have known it was labour! I was 39wks so in my case this was all ok but please get this checked out this will hook you up to a monitor to see if you are contracting