to want to slap the girl on 'one born every minute'?

[HoopsIsGettingMassive]

in the title really, she is really making a meal of it!!

belgo Assault and the more serious offence of battery (which was what happened to your mom) have been crimes for centuries. The fact that it happened a while ago is therefore no excuse, although it may be the reason no-one was arrested like they should have been.

I liked Joy and thought she was totally justified in kicking up a fuss about her meal. FFS, getting a meal to someone who needs to eat for medical reasons ... shouldn't be this difficult.

YABU - Sam was scared and seemed to have no strategies for coping with pain at all. Which doesn't mean to say she wasn't also annoying ...

And WHY is everyone in the Princess Anne laying on their back all the time?

What is all this bollocks about it being her fault she was frightened and in pain because she was unprepared?

I went to NCT classes and read a million childbirth threads on here and books and still had a hideously painful experience.

SOome people on this thread are absolutely vile, vile human beings. I didn't scream like that woman last night but if I had I would still have been a far, far better person than the kind of utter bitch who thinks it's ok to belittle someone else's terrible birth experience.

Seriously it's one fucking step away from the scientologists view on childbirth on here sometimes.

I absolutely despair of you.

Indeed Ghouls. I read up, went to classes (which were jolly good imo), the works. Nothing prepared me for how much it fucking hurt - even at 2cms.

Agree with earthstar

I was in awful pain and felt very scared and out of control with ds2. I was crying/shouting/begging etc and you would have all wanted to slap me
I have been to NCT classes. This was my 3rd birth.

Every woman labours differently. It had nothing to do with not knowing how to cope with the pain. I know how to cope, have an epidural (not joking), but circumstances meant I couldn't have one. (plus my G+A was taken away from me...)

agree with ghouls

One of the reasons I was so bloody scared was that I'd somehow got it into my head that it shouldn't hurt so much early on.

Hooray for the last few posters. When I read the thread on Telly Addicts last night the general consensus was that Sam was annoying, being utterly ridiculous and that she should not have been "making such a fuss".

I honestly could not beleive this vitriol was coming from a group of mothers who have all been through the pain that is childbirth. I am so glad that, at last, there are some posters with humanity and decency.

Hear hear harimosmummy, Ghoulsareloud and earthstar.

How dare people criticise others for expressing pain and fear? It's their body and their thresholds. I know it was tv and therefore public and up for discussion, but some of these comments have been utterly vile.

Vivia, I think you are being a bit harsh - most people probably say at least one thing in the heat of labour that they don't mean.

What is the scientologist view on childbirth? And why are they suddenly everywhere with their little tables and board games?

Poor Sam. I just saw a girl who was in extreme this-is-a-billion-times-worse-than-I-expected agony and was being given no (useful) coping strategies other than being told to get a grip and stop making a fuss. Yep, that's going to help. It struck me that being told that her baby was in all likelihood back-to-back or a complex lie might have helped her get a better handle on things - might have helped her understand that she wasn't being pathetic or a wimp, she was just having a tough labour. I didn't find the mother particularly helpful or empathetic - nipping out for a fag here and there.

As for Joy, she was diabetic, heavily pregnant after multiple IVF cycles and she'd done four days of failed induction and had been shuffled around the hospital and sent from pillar to post. I therefore think she was entitled to be a little tetchy with Fabio for withholding the chocolate! Being stuck on a hospital bed for four days is no fun. I speak from authority as someone who spent the last five weeks of my pregnancy on a hospital bed and by day three I was stark raving mad from the stress of it. As for the receptionist and her 'computer says no' moment when Joy was asking about her food it was a joyful summation of my experiences of hospital receptionists.

The thing that I find amazing is that people are actually interested / bothered about another person's labour and the amount of pain they are in.

TBH I don't think she was that stoic but in saying that it doesn't really matter what I think as pain is subjective and it was her pain.

Also, labour is so unimportant in the scheme of things - the fact that she was so natural and happy with her baby was far more noteworthy IMO.

Scientologists believe in no-pain-relief and silent birth, no noise at all

AliGrylls you say that
" labour is so unimportant in the scheme of things "

Well that may be true if you have a good labour experience. I am still traumatised by the memory of the birth of my one and only child, now aged ten. I don't think that my birth experience was "relatively unimportant in the scheme of things" and I suspect I am not alone in this. I am also quite sure that there are plenty of women whose experiences of labour were worse than mine.

We should do much more to support women in the birth process in my view and it is a shame that seemingly many women whose birth experiences were positive are unable to realise this due to lack of empathy.

Of course some women have traumatic birth experiences. However, I am always amazed that so many women seem to go into it completely unaware and unprepared.

Just to clarify, Im not suggesting those who have a traumatic time do so because they are unprepared. What I'm saying is that if I had a pound for every woman ive met who decided beforehand (madness in itself) that they would gently breathe their way through a pain free birth, id be able to retire.

I went into labour expecting
a)it to be the most agonising experience ever.
b)That the hospital would be short staffed and I may be left on my own

Why do so many seemingly experienced educated women go into this so unprepared? Ive had friends say they are going to decorate or even write whilst on mat leave. Then at 2wks post birth when they are tortured by sleep deprivation and still feel like theyve been hit by a bus they seem shocked. Why? Why are so many women going through labour and entering motherhood so unprepared for the reality of either?

Just to add, Im not blaming the women themselves. I just dont understand why women are not better prepared either by the health professionals or by available literature.

It sad that so many women suffer not just from physical trauma but emotional too often through disappointment or feelings of failure.

Actually I am more inclined to want to slap the midwife for not being more supportive to Sam. I was actually shouting at the TV to get her off her back and show her how to use the G&A effectively.

DH is impressed at Fabios bravery in withholding chocolate from a pregnant woman.

Yes yabu, she was in pain and scared and tbh her mum was pretty crap, she should have been encouraging her, not saying a'h well, tough shit, you have to get on with it'. It didn't look like she was using the g&a properly either.

I felt a bit sorry for the MWs TBH. MW & her DP all told her to breathe slower/deeper with the G&A & at one point she did really snap & her DP when he said it to her (& yes I know she is in labour & probably not at open to calm suggestions/advice form her DP). I think she had just got it in her head that she wanted the epidural & just wasn't prepared to have/do anything else. She was a million times calmer after she'd had it...as are most people! I agree that the health proffesonals probably should have prepared her better & that she didn't have much support though.

I don't know why they didn't just give her the pethidine, I love pethedine.

'I love pethedine. '

I had it. It made me stoned. Did nothing for the pain.

Then I was stoned and asking for an epi.

Earthstar, I was not saying that your experience was not traumatic, and I was not intending to undermine how awful it was for you. I would also not go as far as saying my birth experience was positive, when in actual fact it was far from positive. I agree with you that women do need more support during and after labour.

My main point though was that the most important part of having a child is the 18 years after you have the baby, not the actual labour.