When people compare labours?

[Simonely11]

How do you feel when people comment on how your labor was? For example mine was very quick first time round, 4 hours in total. I've had a few people say to me that I had a 'breeze' of a birth and I'm so lucky to not have gonethrough hell like them, (20 hour labors etc). If I remember correctly it was hell! It was excruciating and I couldn't have any pain relief. My sisters friend also said recently that I cheated birth and didn't experience what it was really like because I'm a 'cheater' I was biting my lip thinking yeah ok then! Definitely not an easy process, although I know it beats a 2-3 day labor hands down.

For Loup > . I once had an operation abroad without an aesthetic, it was hell from the first incision to the final stitch. For you, going through this anticipating another possible stillbirth, it makes me shaky thinking about it too. More flowers for you >

I was just coming on here to say that women should be offered some kind of support after birth so totally agree with happy2bhomely.

I had a long labour, it was about 48 hours from start of contractions to baby born. Initially the contractions weren't too painful but about 15 hours in they were, and I couldn't sleep. Got stuck at 3cm for a long time and was repeatedly told I wasn't in established labour, even when I was in excruciating pain. Once my waters finally broke I got an epidural and actually the established labour part (13 hours) was much easier than the preceeding latent phase.

For months after I cried regularly about the birth and still feel angry and upset about it now. I actually have found talking to other women about my experience has helped me and I hope I haven't come across as trying to be competing for the worst birth story. Sometimes talking to other women has made me feel worse though, I had a friend say that I must have a low pain threshold... that really pissed me off.

I didn't realise how big a deal birth would be and how much it would affect me and my feelings on having another baby. It would be nice if there was some sort of talking therapy available but I guess that the NHS is already over stretched!

Thinkpinks comment about competitive misery is bang on. It's like people want to be a know it all and so when you do say how great things are going they have to say something negative that trumps that! Very irritating.

It is true that all labors are painful and also VERY different, which I think women need to bear in mind when they wish to share their stories.

Giving birth isn't a barrel of laughs, whether it be 'natural', c section, instrumental, drugs, no drugs, whatever.

Some women love the drama, love to dwell on what a traumatic time they had, love to compare and make sure everybody knows their experience was worse.

I just don't engage with people like that, can't be arsed

2 very clear facts here:

• you sister's friend is an idiot
• you can't compare labours the same way you can't compare pregnancies. We are all different. It is not a contest!

Ignore them

Oh this really winds me up! I had a relativly short labour (7 hours on the dot from induction to birth), managed largely with only a tens machine and a few puffs of gas to the very end and don't count it as especially bad or painful. Hard work, but nothing I feel the need to martyr myself over.

I was speaking with a family friend who insisted she was in labour for 72 hours and how awful it all was, finishing off with "You wouldn't understand, DS just shot out of you!" [Tinkly laugh]

Later in the conversation she quantified the 72 hours, noting she was including 2.5 days of pre labour as well as a 12 hour active labour. "Oh!" I said. "If we're counting that then I was in labour for a week!"

Her face was priceless. She's never tried to compete in our presence again.

When I announced was pregnant the first thing everyone did was talk about awful labours and how awful it all is. Now if that happens in a group I always try to steer the conversation on to the lovey things about pregnancy, birth and being a Mum.

"Oh you're never going to sleep again!"
"But it will all be so worth it when they first look up at you and smile!"
Then everyone has to agree and if anyone tries to be negative again they look like a dick. Works every time and you can do it repeatedly in a conversation if it starts to turn negative and competitive again.

I was in labour for 7 hours with DD, but it was quick and agonising and I couldn't havre any pain relief. My friend was in slow labour for a couple of weeks and was in lower level, but more constant pain. You can't really compare.

I agree that the talking about labour is often a therapy. Also when meeting new mums, the fact that everyone has gone through a birth means that it tends to be a topic of conversation that people relate to.

My first labour was 40 hours from the first check in hospital and 13 hours from admission. Two hours of attempting to push out a large, back to back head and an EMCS. We had complications after. I was totally exhausted, not helped by being in a poor state from a combination of carpal tunnel syndrome and SPD that had stopped me from sleeping more than an hour at a time for months before.

Second time was a quarter of the time, 10 hours from a back ache setting in, less than 3 hours from arrival into hospital to his forceps birth in theatre.

One of the points that contributed to birth trauma the first time was when my waters were broken and the contractions ramped up without being mentally able to adjust to them (then pethadine entered the equation...). The shorter labour was intense, but I was less exhausted by the pushing stage.

Immediately after the birth, I had much more energy the second time, however the 3rd degree tear was more painful and combined with SPD impacted my life longer than the CS.

The exhaustion of a long labour can cause complications and delay recovery. Likewise the shock of a short labour can also cause complications and be traumatic as there is little opportunity to mentally process it at the time.

I think improved opportunities for therapy after traumatic labours would be very helpful and do a lot to improve maternal mental health.

They seriously piss me off. I have had two horrendous c sections and I get so sick of people saying 'at least' I didn't have to go through labour. Like having major surgery is a breeze. Really infuriating

I remember hearing a woman who had been abducted as an adolescent and torture and raped for 48 hours before being found. She said that people have told her 'it can't really have been that bad because you were only in the situation for a couple of days, in fact you were lucky'.

This tells you all you need to know about people and the fact we can't ever actually put ourselves in each others shoes (though clearly some get closer than others). Only you can ever know how the experience was for you and how it has affected you.

I agree it is infuriating. I've had both. Two weeks in slow labour followed by 19 hours in labour with dd1. I had an epidural and the eventual birth was peaceful and lovely. Dd2 was 4 hours start to finish. It was way worse!

All of mine have been quick (between 2 hours 20 and 2 hours 45 minutes) but very different. Most of ds1's was being very scared because they kept telling me I had hours and hours to go, and pushing (I still remember feeling sweat puring down my face after about half an hour of pushing and thinking 'but I don't ever work this hard!), ds2's was a bloody breeze (4 minute second stage with baby born in caul), ds3's was weird and the second stage was so painful due to his silly preference for being born with both hands on his head. Some people have said "so fast, you were so lucky" and tbh I agree- I'd not have swapped any of my labours, even ds3's, for the 28 hour nightmare ending in crash section my mum endured with me, or the 40 hour plus screamathon that a friend went through.

I like hearing about other people's births and I like talking about mine. I still feel like they were the most incredible, intense, powerful experiences of my life. I still feel that there is something miraculous (even though millions of women do it every day!) about birth. I'd do it again in a heartbeat if we were financially and emotionally able to have another child, I've even seriously considered surrogacy.

I think improved opportunities for therapy after traumatic labours would be very helpful and do a lot to improve maternal mental health.

This with bells on. The rate of PTSD in women who have given birth is higher than that for people returning from active service in wars.

We have rarely have anything in our lives that prepares us for experiencing what can be days of uncontrolled pain, having our wishes ignored and being treated more like a body than a person.

It isn't really surprising that we often come out of it traumatised.

I have no idea how mine would be calculated. If it was from first contraction it would be just under 5 and a half hours, if from when I arrived on the birthing unit and was examined and found to be 5cm then it would be just under 3 and a half hours. So, very quick, I was lucky in that for me it was a good experience. I did have one friend say who had a scary experience, she said "so, tell me about the birth" in a way that sounded like she was anticipating a dramatic story... She actually looked disappointed when I said it was straightforward and short like someone else said the competitiveness seems to start the moment you share that your pregnant and continues.

As far as I'm concerned birth is hard work no matter how it's done or how long.

My first labour was about 4 hours. Second was 10. Second was much more managable. Both hurt like fuck, but the intensity of the first one was really overwhelming in a way that a build up over 10 hours wasn't.

Only one labour here - 6 hours latent, 2 hours 1st stage and 2.5 hours pushing. Pushing was uncomfortable to say the least and I was exhausted at the end. Didn't have breaks between contractions and they were relatively short so not textbook.

I got sent home (40 minutes drive) not in established labour 3 hours before I started pushing so most of dilation was in the car which was painful. Didn't get gas and air until waters went at 8cm. Wasn't fun but it's what happened.

Honestly I've got better things to get annoyed about that people's opinions on my labour. They weren't there, I was, and it's not a competition!

My cousin was really upset that she'd planned her birth and ended up having a section as baby was transverse and wouldn't be turned. She sent me a text about and I immediately called her - only mothers give a shit about the births of their babies. The babies certainly don't! Obviously I'm not talking about the type where something has happened that was traumatic or yielded long term effects, but otherwise, I don't get the whole almost gleefulness that some women get about their labours.

I don't understand why some people have to make it a competition when all anyone wants is a healthy baby at the end of it. I've had a 15 hour Labour and a 2 hour Labour, both equally painful.. but grateful to have 2 healthy children, some people are not so fortunate.

People talking about birth stories was the worst when I had DS. It almost felt like a right of passage. I felt like I couldn't participate because I nearly died mid emergency c-section and had multiple stays in intensive care and four big surgeries in the 3 months afterwards. None of my other mum friends wanted to hear that. I couldn't care for my son for weeks and my memory of the whole time period is obliterated by drugs, pain, misery and PTSD.

Someone I know had what to onlookers seemed like an idyllic home birth. Only very few people know how wounded she was by it and will never fully recover.

So I don't ask other people for their stories unless they volunteer the information, and I don't go into detail unless people ask me. You never know what someone else is going through.

Just don't get me started on the "mine was longer so it must have been worse" stuff.

I had what the Dr called an oxytocin "dump". She likened it to one of those traumatic inductions where they get the amount of drugs wrong.
Very short. Not particularly pleasant on the scale of things. No time for drugs until they gave me some while they put my Fanjo back together.

I'm not traumatised but I think if I had the choice of a longer less explosive process I would go for that every time.

Mind you there is no choice. You get what you get. So it's pointless competing.

Parenting does seem to be bizarrely competitive about who has had/is having a worse time of it. My pregnancy was blighted by hyperemesis gravidarum for the whole 9 months, my labour lasted 4 days, was horrific and resulted in EMCS and I also didn't bond with DS afterwards. When people exchange pregnancy/labour/newborn stories I generally just don't join in at all.

DS now 21 months and sleeps through like a dream, eats whatever we give him, never sick and is ahead in everything (walking, talking, jumping, singing songs, catching balls, building blocks, also hand signals for food drink potty cold hot and various other things if he doesn't feel like talking, uses the potty etc). When people talk about what their child is doing, DS invariably did it first and far earlier. I don't join in those conversations either.

It's true want pp have said, everyone feels like they've had the worst time of it or like they have something to prove. Your labour may sound easy to some but they just want to feel hard done by. Any birth is a legit birth, any labour pain is awful for the person.

I'll admit something I don't tell people in RL. DS and I still haven't bonded. He never seen comes to me for anything, always daddy. If daddy isn't here when he wants something he sits by the door and cries for him. He doesn't want me and no amount of playing, coaxing, bribing, cuddling etc has changed his mind. I keep being told it's unusual for under 2 to be so independent from their mum yet so reliant on their dad. Knowing that doesn't actually help and I don't know anyone who's child is like this.

Everyone's experience is different.

Mine were all shite.

I refuse to talk about my pregnancies or births with an expectant new mum - my experiences were in no way normal and I think it would be unkind.

I'll never understand the competitive misery labour story one-upsmanship I have heard.

I don't talk about my labour to be competitive, I talk about it to understand my feelings about how it went.

For a long time. I thought I was 'okay' about everything that happened and then 2 months post partum I realised I was actually quite upset about the whole thing / how it was handled and actually made a complaint to PALS after talking with a number of my friends about their experiences and also discussing with the HV.

I ended up with an EMCS following a horrendously long labour (I was induced) including many times when my contractions stopped when I was fully dilated. I was sick, couldn't eat, physically exhausted and would never tell someone they 'cheated' by having a short / quick birth.

My mum pushed me out in 2 hours, my sister in an hour and only got to the hospital 5 mins before my brother was born. I don't think it was any less painful for her than my long labour.

Thank you Molly x