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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask for your help describing a contraction?

150 replies

Itsnotmessitsashithole · 10/12/2019 20:42

Lovely friend is heavily pregnant with her first and has asked me to describe a contraction to her...

Apparently ‘arrrrrghhhh’ was not descriptive enough. But even though it was only 6 months ago, I just found it impossible to describe Confused

So how would you describe a contraction? Will send her a link to thread so do your worst!

OP posts:
Ineedcoffee2345 · 10/12/2019 21:14

2 kids
Dd 2.5
Dd 3 weeks old and Im struggling to describe it. I could go into great detail of crowning pain though. Contractions are nothing compared to thay in my opinion

Pulpfiction1 · 10/12/2019 21:14

The first few are like a period pain or trapped gas.

The final few are like my body is trying to tear itself in half.

TinselRelatedInjury · 10/12/2019 21:14

Intense pressure, like my back passage was going to explode. As a few others have said, it felt more like D&V cramps than anything. I was in so much pain generally by the end of pregnancy with SPD that labour just didn't register to begin with - by the time I'd realised it wasn't bowel related I was pretty far on.

EskewedBeef · 10/12/2019 21:15

I remember it as like being on the verge of the most catastrophic, apocalyptic diarrhoea, for hours on end with no let up and none of the relief you'd get from just letting your insides fall out.

CountYourRoosters · 10/12/2019 21:15

Like those awful sharp cramps you get when you've really bad diarrhoea, and in my case (induction), every 3 minutes for 27 hours

RubaDubMum89 · 10/12/2019 21:15

I went straight into active labour, so have no idea what the early stages are like... But for me... Like someone trying to saw you in half, internally. Good luck OPs friend! Grin

20viona · 10/12/2019 21:17

@RubaDubMum89 yes totally agree

Original poster
Itsnotmessitsashithole · 10/12/2019 21:18

It's a bit like a period pain. In the way that a headache is a bit like being hit over the head with a mallet.

Grin

Thanks for those advising not to send her a link to this thread, especially the bitchy Hmm, but she knows I’m posting it on here - she’s just someone who wants to know every single thing about what to expect. She will gather from reading that everyone experiences it differently. If I don’t send it her, she will probably search it out anyway. Luckily, I know my friend more than you!

Some great descriptions here, better than I could do, so thanks!

OP posts:
PreseaCombatir · 10/12/2019 21:18

Really really bad wind? ...

Finefinedandy · 10/12/2019 21:18

Both of my labours were different so who really knows what it will feel like for her.

Back labour felt like a hot tightening belt.my second labour felt like a increasingly powerful and painful internal squeeze which got so intense I felt like I would break.I didn’t have any pain relief for that one,not by choice,but because I was waiting for the belt feelings to kick in.

dimdarkashian · 10/12/2019 21:20

Depends if the pain is in your back or front. Back wasn't as sore. To me is was like cramp that got worse and worse until it burned.

I once read a comment from someone saying it was like being murdered and I think I'd agree.

I only had gas and air so my fault for finding it so painful.

1CantPickAName · 10/12/2019 21:22

Don’t know what happened there...

I’ve got 2 children, the first was an emergency c section after a slow labour that went on forever, not too helpful for you.

The second was a two hour, swift, not planned home birth. It started with weeks of braxton hicks. These were a tightening feeling across my abdomen, when I touched my bump I could feel it getting solid, which did get to the point of almost painful and then passed, the only thing that helped was getting on all fours and doing breathing exercises. My actual birth started off like this and then my waters broke. I thought I was wetting myself but it went on forever and no ‘bladder’ control so I knew what it was. Because my labour was so quick, my cervix dialated very quickly and I bled initially, my labour felt like really bad period pains that came in waves. It really helped to be on all fours and concentrate on my breathing (the ambulance and midwife only just made it for the big arrival so bring calm was my only choice)

Hope this helps

Mooey89 · 10/12/2019 21:23

Like period pain, and diarrhoea pain, where your womb is being squeezed and released at intervals.
I remember it almost like an out of body experience - At one point I remember marvelling at how amazing my body was that it just knew what to do - I remember feeling like someone was literally putting their hand in my to help my insides move to push the baby out... fucking weird. Probably the gas that did that 😂

Pulpfiction1 · 10/12/2019 21:23

" I could go into great detail of crowning pain though. Contractions are nothing compared to thay in my opinion"

Omg I'm completely the opposite. The contractions were unbelievable, I thought I'd pass out from pain. But once dd was there and I was pushing her out it felt fine. Her coming out didn't hurt at all.

imnotsureaboutdinosaurs · 10/12/2019 21:23

I honestly wish I'd read a thread like this before I gave birth though. I was the first of my friends to give birth, most of my colleagues were male so no birth stories there and my mum and MIL both said it's just a little cramping and over before you know it, don't believe the scare stories it's really not bad at all. Thinking they were being helpful. Only afterwards did they tell me it was bloody horrendous.

I was in shock for months and had nightmares about my labour. Didn't even know it was possible to have a 3rd degree tear. I knew stitches were very common but never heard of tearing through your sphincter which would require surgery to fix it.

Kensie · 10/12/2019 21:23

Early labour feels like stomach ache and then it gradually gets more painful as you go on. For me it was like period pain but I have had very very bad period pain so it didn't really 'hurt' as I was used to it. Your stomach feels very very tight, almost like it is about to pop. It feels hard and tense, and burns towards the end of the contraction (kind of like when you exercise and your muscle burns from being worked so much). The worst thing for me was the constant pressure pushing down onto my hips and vagina. That part didn't hurt but was extremely uncomfortable as I couldn't sit or find a position to relax in.

MustardScreams · 10/12/2019 21:25

My contractions were concentrated in a 3 inch square at the bottom of my bump. Didn’t feel them anywhere else.

It also meant the pain was concentrated and they were like the most horrific period pains imaginable. I would have preferred to peel my own skin off at the time!

And then I had an epidural and it was lovely Smile

Motherhippo · 10/12/2019 21:25

I had all the pain in my back throughout labour. I would describe it as period pain in my back The pain comes in waves, getting almost unbearable and then ebbing away

Cattycarryon · 10/12/2019 21:26

I found it just like bad period pains along with feeling stomach tightening but it felt like all the skin on my stomach was stretched so so tight that it might split but not actually extremely painful just a bit uncomfortable and the pressure with each one just that downward pressure between my legs...want to walk...cant sit down because it feels like i'm sitting on a football ! the pressure was the bit i didn't like !

TBH though i didn't even know i was in labour with my 1st !! just thought i was maybe having the braxton hicks that everyone talks about....so a quick trip to hospital when i started to feel like 'something' (like i didn't expect there actually to be a baby coming out) was about to drop out of there and just arrived and 20 mins later had the baby in my arms !!

sycamore54321 · 10/12/2019 21:28

I am a huge fan of epidurals so I can’t tell you what all-out unrelieved end-stage contractions felt like. But I was induced both times and the pain is hard to describe. However what I do remember vividly is the emotions and psychological headwreck that is intermittent pain followed by zero pain only to start up again. That in itself was a huge mental torture for me knowing that the pain would invisibly recommence very shortly - others describe it as a relief or a break, so obviously experiences vary.

As well as that, I got an intense feeling of doom and deep deep sadness right before each contraction began. It was incredibly weird and I’ve not come across anyone else describe it that way but there was a definite brief but very deep sense of dysphoria right before each contraction pain began. It was so weird and such a bizarre emotional rollercoaster all the way along until epidural sorted me out physically and psychically as well.

The closest description of the physical sensations for me was probably something like diarrhea cramps. But I’m blessed that I’ve never had period pains and rarely had gastric issues so I don’t have a lot to compare with. I did feel sensations from mid-thigh up to mid-abdomen which was a bigger range than I might have expected.

Andysbestadventure · 10/12/2019 21:31

Involuntary squeezing from your insides, accompanied by bursts of god awful period cramps. Pretty much sums it up.

Actually, tell her... You know that feeling when you're throwing up, but have nothing left to throw up? And your body does that thing where everything keeps squeezing and trying to get non existent food out of your belly? Well... That... But out of your vagina.

WeeDangerousSpike · 10/12/2019 21:31

Like someone spearing you through your spine with a vacuum cleaner hose and trying to pull your insides out with it. Over and over again

Yes, just like that. And that was with using gas and air after pethadine. It's worse than the worst pain you can imagine, it's all consuming, you literally can't be aware of anything but the pain. Then it stops like it never happened. Then the next one is worse.

The pethadine just made me sleepy, to the point I was falling asleep for the 90secs between contractions, so I didn't even get the respite of being aware of no pain between before being woken by the pain of the next one. The pethadine also made me so spaced out that I couldn't communicate that it was doing nothing, I wanted an epidural, and I was fucking terrified. I ended up having a spinal block, (prepped for emcs but it wasn't needed) the removal of pain was instant, I was suddenly coherent and able to understand what was happening and take in what people were saying to me.

EstebanTheMagnificent · 10/12/2019 21:32

It sounds odd but the one usual point of reference I was given was that contractions are sort of comparable to vomiting. Not in terms of how they feel, but because most healthy people don’t have any other experience of their body doing something so totally intense and entirely out of their control.

MonChatEstMagnifique · 10/12/2019 21:37

Thanks for those advising not to send her a link to this thread, especially the bitchy

Not sure if you classed my comment as bitchy, it definitely wasn’t meant that way. I do think some people enjoy scaring others with their labour horror stories unfortunately.

TSSDNCOP · 10/12/2019 21:38

Terrifying. The certain knowledge that things would only get worse was horrific.

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