Yay, new thread! Let's see how long it takes us to fill this one up...
Hersetta, glad I'm not the only one who isn't a skinny minnie smuggling a watermelon!
kiteflying>>> Bananabump - how does being overweight make you high risk? Is it an assumption that you are an unfit or am I just being dense? Sounds like a fight on your hands.
I'm not entirely sure how it makes me high risk, and god no, I'm not that fit it has to be said. I asked the consultant why I was there and he said "Your excess weight makes for complications in your care" but then when I asked further he just said the scans wouldn't be as clear (and they weren't, to be fair) but christ, scans are a recent thing, forty or fifty years ago they didn't even have them!
The only other thing I can think is that if you're carrying a lot of weight generally, it can be harder to do an epidural as the needle may not be long enough to penetrate to the right place in the spine. I'm not really THAT big, it's mostly on my tummy, bum and thighs. And of course I suppose there is the risk of blood pressure stuff and heart problems, but as I said, I've been totally normal so far.
I'm just hoping it doesn't lead to masses of intervention and monitoring. I've heard when the doctors start getting a bit overzealous some women are stuck in stirrups for hours with a catheter and a fetal monitor screwed into the baby's head, not allowed to move around. That'd be pretty crap in august's heat! I fully intend to be in and out of a cool shower like a fiddlers elbow, mooing away and amazing the midwives with my innate ability to pop him out without even a whiff of gas and air....