Has anyone else experienced failed epidurals?

I’m flexible but not notably bendy as in hyper mobile as such - both my sisters are tho and two of my sons.
is that a reason then ?
I did wonder at the time why didn’t take, but never really asked or looked into it…midwives didn’t seem to think was unusual at the time or refer to it after looking back now ..

Do you have hyper mobility? That can make them fail.

With my daughter , 26 years ago it didn’t take at all. I was gutted at the time but very relieved afterwards as jumped straight up went to the loo and felt right as rain afterwards.
With my first son 3 years later, planned to have one but during labour I felt didn’t need it and then when I decided it was late and he came quite quickly. Again was glad I was mobile afterwards straight away which I appreciated, but I suppose must mean it didn’t really work - hurt like hell too so I guess it didn’t
With my twins, born in Spain, it was never really even discussed as an option. I also knew from the get go, if the birth became tricky a Caesarian would be done under general not an epidural as that’s how they did it there, 20 years ago.
With the other two not having worked I didn’t even consider it

I was not planning one but it was Avery long labour Mine only worked on one side .. baby was distressed so was I ! resulting in GA emergency caesarean .. that’s probably the worst story you will hear ! We are all different and it’s down to circumstances at the time .. but I would say yes go for it!

It wasn't done in theatre, it was on the delivery unit

My planned section with an epidural only took on one side - and they only checked the other leg. Once I started squawking (according to the ex, they didn't pay attention until they were already separating my muscles when I got really loud) they hastily slapped a mask on my face and whacked in enough anaesthesia to leave me unable to move for nine hours.

Next birth - there was no way I was going to have a section after that experience and no way I was going back to that hospital - I had an epidural after telling them what had happened the first time round. It worked fine.

5 times they tried and didn’t work, tried spinal, didn’t work. I got IV pain relief I had to press a button for, can’t remember the name of it but it worked.

second time I went for ELCS. They took a long time to get the spinal done, lots of prodding and I was worried but it eventually went in and was fine.

I was the same as you, 2 failed. Second child had an elective c section with a spinal. It was a much better experience, recovered well, was out going to the shop by day 3. I lived alone too and definitely managed fine.

I had an epidural with my first. Think it was 18 hours labour spent lying on my back in the bed and by time the anesthetist came back on check it hadn't worked despite me telling everyone. It was then too late to redo. Had a forceps delivery and stitches..

Second time I knew more and spoke up and stuck to my birth plan. DH was also a strong advocate for me. I spent my labour standing, or kneeling or walking round the delivery room. Only got on the bed to be examined as they refused to do it any other way even though it had been agreed that I wouldn't need to.

Delivered without any pain relief kneeling on the bed. There was no way I was lying down when other ways were proven to provide a faster outcome. It was 16 years ago so don't know if the advice has changed.

Not for child birth but I had a failed epidural for major surgery recovery. Hardly worked at all

ah, fair enough. Little bit unusual to do an epidural if it was for a trip to theatre rather than for labour analgesia, but not completely unheard of...glad that it worked.

They said it was an epidural, but I was 3 days in labour by that point so who knows 🤷‍♀️

Almost similar to you, although I ended up with a C Section. 5 days of inductions, waters broken when at about 2cm. Drip from midnight, epidural from 3am. First epidural they didnt tape it so it came out. Second was sited wrong and only worked on some of half my body at a time. No solution to this and was told to roll from one side to another every 30 minutes to allow the epidural to flood the opposite side, despite me still having a lot of feeling from the tops of my legs down (where the labour pains happened to be!) They messed about like this until midday (so 12 hours on the drip with almost no pain relief and me asking if they'd actually turned on the gas and air cos I was feeling everything) and they checked me. I'd gotten to 3cm in 12 hours on the drip. They asked me to go an extra hour to get to 4cm. I refused for a variety or reasons (zero pain relief, even if I got to 4cm I didn't know how I'd manage to get to 10cm, I'd been awake for 5 days and had nothing left to give)

They stopped the drip and the relief was instant. I have a high pain threshold but that drip should be used to torture people for information. I didn't know my own name. I'd have admitted to being the second gunman on the grassy knoll and knowing where Shergar was buried to have them stop it. Not one midwife or doctor who saw me curled up in a silent ball of agony for those 12 hours considered any other option than to proceed. Animals would be treated better.

It is one of the reasons we only have one child.

I did with my son, the midwife wasn't nice about it said its not like you have seen on the tv it wouldnt numb you completely. Then unexpectedly for them when they were doing hand over I crowned and pushed him out ao quickly they only got one glove on. They admitted afterwards that there is no way I would have been able to push him out so easy if it had worked. Majorly gaslit to be honest! The next child I had him 20 mins after being 6cms so didnt even get a chance to have an epidural. My final child I asked for an epidural, anaesthetist walked in the room at the exact time I crowned so I never got to have it. The failed epidural and the one i asked for it were the drip to induce, my middle one came by himself

sounds like the first was probably a spinal injection rather than an epidural.

I had epidurals with both.
DD1 - laboured in water with just gas and air for about 12 hours, then she became distressed and I needed an episiotomy and forceps so they did an epidural, I felt nothing.
DD2 - had to be induced and after a positive experience with DD1 I asked for epidural and it only worked on 1 side of my body, they tried resiting it but still no better. Needed another episiotomy and forceps, and I felt everything, then they stitched me and I felt everything, but they wouldn't believe me, it was horrific, DH reports I passed out at least 3 times from the pain.

I have no idea why 1st worked well and 2nd didn't. 1st should have been much harder as I was in late stage labour so struggled to stay still and they had to be quick between contractions. 2nd should have been easier as I was calm and relaxed. Same hospital, but different anaesthetists.

I don’t think mine with my 3rd worked fully, contractions were still hard to tolerate. While with my first it was suddenly so blissful and I could doze off between contractions (it was 5 in the morning by then). And he did a manual placenta extraction with my 3rd and that was , um, very difficult so no idea what the epidural was doing. It felt like he was staging a Tom and Jerry fight inside my uterus. At least I felt extremely confident there was no retained product.

what I would recommend to women who've had epidurals that have failed is to talk to an anaesthetist (ideally in the antenatal period, but alternatively on admission to the labour/antenatal ward). As I said, having had a failed epidural in one labour doesn't necessarily mean it would happen again, but there is a higher than average chance that it might. There are lots of reasons they might not work perfectly/at all and some of those might be predicted to be a problem repeatedly, but others might not be. Spinals and epidurals are different techniques, and spinals are most commonly used for elective sections (as well as a lot of urgent sections too). Very often if an epidural hasn't worked then a spinal will still be fine, but it does depend a bit on why the epidural failed. If neither an epidural nor spinal is possible the GA is the only alternative for a trip to theatre. For many women, that is not a light decision as, aside from not being awake for the delivery, there are some additional risks with GA compared with spinal/epidural, but if neither spinal/epidural are possible then there aren't any alternatives. The 'proper' emergency scenario is very different to the elective/'quick-but-not-immediately-life-threatening' scenarios, and where speed is vital to having a good outcome for mother/baby then there are often clear benefits of a GA.

It's important for the OP, or any other woman in a similar position, to take advice from the people who have all the info about them.... why the epidural might have failed, any other medical problems that might need to be factored in, any other risks in this pregnancy or with this baby, what alternative pain relief is there, etc etc.

PP has mentioned using ultrasound to help with siting epidurals and that is occasionally helpful, but it also doesn't guarantee that an epidural will work (there's probably a good reason that although ultrasounding backs has been 'a thing' since I started anaesthetising nearly 20yrs ago it still isn't that widely used, whereas in other areas of anaesthetic practice USS has been widely adopted).

Lastly, while I remember, there is an increasingly common alternative pain relief technique that might be available to ask about for labour, and that is a remifentanil PCA. Again, not universally available and there are pros and cons (as with everything), but it may be worth exploring.

@Pinkpupsx its fucking pointless that morphine injection isn't it, really dont know why they bother offering it as it genuinely does fuck all.
The gas and air did help me alot though.

My epidural failed, in that only one side was numb, the other side wasn't. They tried twice. I ended up having an emergency C-section and whatever they did then worked at least!

I haven't had a second child so can't help much there I'm afraid.

I was already 1cm with cervix in the right position when I was induced so laboured very quickly. They didn’t believe me when I said I had awful pain and put it down to “irritation from the pessary” until I demanded they check when I could barely breathe from pain, and turned out I was 7cm. They tried to talk me out of an epidural as I was too far along and gave me the morphine injection which did fuck all. When I got to about 8/9 I demanded the epidural as I was so worried about the pain of pushing. They reluctantly did it but it only worked on one side, so basically pointless and I had to wait for about an hour until I could start pushing as she was back to back. Ended up with an episiotomy as she was stuck, and bizarrely, the pushing didn’t hurt at all despite failed epidural..? I would like another baby in the future and I must admit I am scared of it not working again as getting to 7cm (and beyond technically as the injection didn’t do anything really) was awful.

I had an epidural with my first ds and it only worked on one side, so I also had an appointment with the anaesthesiologist when I was pregnant with my second. I was reassured that it would be fine second time round, they were thorough with their explanation and put it down with dd1 being born in another country.
I had placenta previa with my second so had to have a c-section and the spinal block also only worked on one side of my body- they managed to tilt the bed to get the anaesthesia to move around and worked in the end. I was told it was due to a slight curve of my spine which blocked it in certain places.

failed epidurals are not uncommon but hopefully it’ll be fine second time round for you

Mine only took one side both times so all the problems but non of the positives. I don't know why else you would be seeing the anesthetist.

I had a failed epidural with baby no 2, baby no 1 the epidural took great.

My sister had a terrible experience with an epidural and baby was born under general.