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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think it's impossible to explain how painful labour is?

521 replies

Mamabear1475 · 03/05/2018 17:49

Sil is trying for a baby. She asked how painful it is. I told her there is no way to describe it. She said it must feel like something. I can't think of anything that explains the feeling

OP posts:
Scabbersley · 04/05/2018 16:09

sometimes women who've not had a baby need to hear that you CAN sail through it without batting an eyelid

Oh fgs it's not a competition

I don't think it's actually possible to "sail through it"

I had three babies with no drugs other than gas and air - not through choice but circumstances. I was very fit. It still felt, at its worst, like being crushed to death.

A water pool lessened the pain hugely

FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends · 04/05/2018 16:11

sometimes women who've not had a baby need to hear that you CAN sail through it without batting an eyelid.

No because that narrative means that women who DON'T "sail through it" feel as though they have failed.

Saying fear and panic is what makes it hurt is patronising bullshit. My labour hurt because my baby was back to back, in distress, and my pelvis was too narrow.

Scabbersley · 04/05/2018 16:14

Fear and panic don't have any effect on pain perception. In fact adrenaline can lessen felt pain.

justabunchofbunting · 04/05/2018 16:18

scabbersley well im sorry but they really did for me! Can we maybe try to have this conversation without getting defensive or negating other peoples perfectly valid experiences. Everyones experience will be different and it would be nice if people could just share their experiences without other people telling them those experiences are bullshit or cant be possible.
Someone may end up having a similar experience and be glad of the advice at the time.
Im sure many women do not find the fear and panic the worst part.... but then many others will.

Scabbersley · 04/05/2018 16:21

But it's so awful to tell new mothers that if they are or behave in a certain way that they will have an easier time.

It is what it is, everyone's experience is different, you can't control it, it doesn't matter if you get scared or if you are unfit.

justabunchofbunting · 04/05/2018 16:27

well yes I agree to an extent. But if you look at how your previous labour went you can have some idea over what may aid you in the next. Obviously it all may go tits up but then again it might not.
There ARE things that help make labour easier for some women. Sadly it can be difficult to predict.
Me saying that panic made my labour much worse is not criticising other women... its what happened to me! So this time around im going to put some effort into addressing that. Might not end up working because as you say there could be some physical issues that end up making it ridiculously painful... but then again it may work, especially if my labour goes remotely how it went last time.

Saying there are things you can try to do to manage pain is not a criticism of women who end up feeling loads of pain!

CountFosco · 04/05/2018 16:28

I always describe spontaneous pushing as backward vomiting, your body just does it. But not everyone has that, I very much did with DC2&3 but had no urge to push with DC1 at all. Second stages with each child was 2h, 30 mins, then just 10 mins for the last one.

Tink2007 · 04/05/2018 16:30

With my first DD my mum said “Oh it’s fine, it’s just like really bad period pain.”

Off I toddle happy with this because, you know, paracetamol tends to fight off period pain. CHRIST ALIVE SHE LIED! And when I said it to her afterwards she said she had to bend the truth a little otherwise I would have been frightened. Bend the truth a little? She bent it and broke the truth in half, scattering the pieces down the toilet!

I completely agree, there is no way to describe it. Waves of pain that I can liken to absolutely nothing else.

Tink2007 · 04/05/2018 16:32

Completely agree with you Scabbersley. I only had gas and air with both my DDs but I still felt like I was slowly being murdered from the inside out.

RLOU88 · 04/05/2018 17:20

I know it’s my fault but I am due soon and this thread has me in bits Sad
It sounds fucking horrendous why do women have more than one baby if it’s likened by so many of you to being tortured or killed. someone tell me there is hope.

NotAgainYoda · 04/05/2018 17:25

I felt like I was being disembowelled. I was traumatic but I bore it with the help (in the end) of an epidural.The pains left a scar though. I have found every period and every smear since to be very anxiety-provoking

I always had really painful periods before I had children too

Original poster
Mamabear1475 · 04/05/2018 17:27

There is hope, no matter how painful my first birth was I definitely want another one now. I can't imagine life without my daughter and I can't wait to have another baby.

OP posts:
FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends · 04/05/2018 17:27

It sounds fucking horrendous why do women have more than one baby if it’s likened by so many of you to being tortured or killed. someone tell me there is hope.

My horrific birth is the reason I'm sticking with one child.

But look - it's pointless reading threads like these. Because for every woman with a shit experience there will be women with brilliant experiences - it's a lottery. My mother had four children, all excellent births. There's just no telling.

And remember - if you DO have a horrible experience, you can choose to have an elective c-section next time, which I understand from friends is much nicer than a traumatic natural childbirth.

FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends · 04/05/2018 17:28

Also if it's too much for you take the epidural. The relief when I finally got one was just amazing. I actually felt more euphoria when the epidural went in than when I saw my baby for the first time!!!

Scabbersley · 04/05/2018 17:28

My first birth was so bad that when the midwife read my notes she said "bloody hell I can't believe you are having another one"

But the second two were fine apart from the being crushed to death thing

Mooey89 · 04/05/2018 17:30

@RLOU88

For balance:

With DS, the first part was the worst. I was taken in for induction but my labour had started naturally so they kept me on induction suite in active labour. I was back to back so the pain was awful, but they wouldn’t give me pain relief because I was barely dialated (1cm).

A couple of hours later I begged them to examine me, and I was 7cm, so they took me to delivery suite and I had gas and air. G&A works miracles. It’s amazing.

Honestly, yes it was painful. BUT for me, it felt like... my body was meant to do it. It knew what to do. I remember just literally being in the zone oblivious to everything else and thinking how amazing the human body was that it was capable of it. I felt like someone was reaching inside of me to help pull the baby out... I don’t know how to describe it, it’s like your body is doing all the work and it knows exactly what to do.

You can do it. Just be flexible with your birthing plan, take pain relief if you want it, go with whatever you and your baby need. Congratulations!

RLOU88 · 04/05/2018 17:31

Thank you guys x
I know there is no point reading, I just haven’t been able to stop peaking at this thread since the early hours of yesterday and it seemed to be getting worse Grin

levelheadedmum · 04/05/2018 17:32

According to Dr Dick-Read, the man who started the whole natural birth movement, western women only feel pain because they are uptight. If we just relaxed a bit, we’d be ok. That’s why he developed breathing techniques. Hmm...

RLOU88 · 04/05/2018 17:35

@ Mooey89

Thank you for taking the time to write to me. This is my first baby so am being a bit of a pain in the arse worried. I can’t stop thinking about it.
It might be scatty of me but I don’t have a birthing plan, I luckily have great support and am just going to go with it.
Thank you for your congratulations :)

Rockandrollwithit · 04/05/2018 17:35

My first labour was back to back and then DS got stuck in my pelvis. I felt like someone had got inside of my body and was drilling on my spine whilst simultaneously ripping my body apart. Awful.

Second was an elective section. Absolutely amazing!

stressed3000 · 04/05/2018 17:36

Notsooriginalwerther

Yep, I felt like I was hung up from a tree & my lower body was getting sawed in half. I did the moo sounds too. Probably not helped by no pain relief and baby was back to back. I didn’t ger the gas & air in time as my active labour was 1.5 hours which took everyone by surprise. Having said that once he was crowning the stinging didn’t seem so bad & it was amazing how the pain just went. I thought I had a high pain threshold, 4 previous operations & a couple of stitches without anaesthetic but clearly not. I did have a semi elective cs with number 2 (for diff reasons) & that took me by more surprise. I’d read/heard a number of people saying they were fine, walking about etc. Yeah I was up quickly but I was shuffling/hobbling & achy for days.

foxpink · 04/05/2018 17:37

I'm due any day now, and wish I hadn't of read this thread 😰😣

stressed3000 · 04/05/2018 17:38

I do find it amazing that people don’t pass out from the pain, surely if it was happening to a diff part of you you would.

BrookBabbler · 04/05/2018 17:38

I’d forget the pain of labour in order to be able to tolerate the prospect of bearing more children... so I made a note of describing the pain to myself in detail as it was happing: It felt exactly like a large knife had been shoved up inside me from underneath and was moving around, cutting all of my insides out. Sorry, I realise that’s probably unnecessarily graphic, but there you go!

BrookBabbler · 04/05/2018 17:41

.. that last post was missing the top line which went something along the lines of ‘that I recall people saying that I’d forget the pain of labour’ and I didn’t want to do that so I made a special effort to remember it!