Anybody else due in NOVEMBER 2009 :-) PART 3

[ldeeanna]

Hopefully this has worked?

Hi guys

We've just got back from Sunday lunch at the 'in-laws. I have a steaming headache and DS2 still not himself poor dab. This is the hardest bit of being a mum I find: the worrying about them when they are ill.

I'm not sure I'd recommend reading scary birth stories: does anyone post the straightforward ones up there to balance it out? I used to watch birthing programmes on UK health or whatever it was called when I was expecting DS1 and they terrified me.

I've been told that I shouldn't tell my birth story to anyone because I'll scare them. It was by far the worst experience of my life, but here I am, pregnant again, so what does that tell you? Most women get through it without any permanent damage, and I gather some even enjoy it - it's not necessarily going to be a nightmare.

I do recommend trying to do some preparation, though, and making sure that both you and your partner are prepared to get assertive with your healthcare providers when necessary - if they're tired and overworked, they're not necessarily going to have your best interests in mind.

Tamlin I am scared by your post!! Was it really the worst experience of your life? How are you feeling now? I hope you managed to get some sort of counselling.

Well, I went to yoga this afternoon to help with relaxing/sleeping which was lovely, except I had another light-headed fainty episode which was v embarrassing... Apparently it is quite common?? Although only happened to me since being 12 weeks... Grrrr!

Really not looking forward to work this week. Got a school trip to the seaside (with 70 chn) this week, and I just know how absolutely knackering they are, and am already worried I will wear myself out! Just soooooooo tired and worn out all the time at the minute - worse than before 12 weeks - is this normal??!

Hope everyone doing well and had a good weekend.

PS Beckybendylegs hope your DS is feeling better.

Katster, I probably should have had some counselling - I went into shock after the labour, and had ongoing nightmares and anxiety issues for months. HV didn't help by saying 'Oooh, you seem a bit depressed, but you've got a healthy baby, that's all that matters!' Nightmares and anxiety got resolved a bit after I had surgery to repair the damage from the birth nine months afterwards (belgianbun, I'd argue that there are some SERIOUS design flaws, personally, and so would most women who experience serious perineal trauma, prolapse and the like - however, fortunately we're definitely not in the majority or nobody would ever do it.)

I am really quite worried about the birth of this one, to be honest, and my midwife has agreed to send me to a consultant to discuss my options. I think I might be able to get by without a section if I have decent birth attendants this time, but that's a pretty big 'if' - at least have hired a doula who seems nice and reassuring, and happy to talk out my worries. She did keep asking about my hopes and goals for this birth, but I don't really have any except for 'Please don't neglect, humiliate, mutilate or infect me this time, kthxbai' which doesn't make for the cheeriest birth plan. But I've got to say that I feel better just for going out and getting a doula - as if I've actively tried to do something to make it different from last time. At least I won't be constantly left on my own this time, and there'll be someone in the room who knows a bit more than poor DH!

[grace09] - cheese and pickle sandwiches, yum need to go make one now ... but wait I have no pickle in the house, it will be torture waiting for the shops to open!

[katser] - how lovely and special if your dad can pop along to your scan, go for it if you want it.

[tamlin] how tough, sounds a plan to get a doula.

I am of the assumption that the only rationale for the HV not getting hit by a flying object after her heartless comments to you were because:

1. the trauma of your birth meant your throwing arm was not in action.
2. you missed or she ducked.
3. you exercised great restraint.

Woke early after dreaming I was Elizabeth the 1st, yes that's right, the virgin queen, go figure? Also have joint pain which paracetomol has sorted, hopefully I can catch a snooze before work.

pinkfizzle what a random dream!!! Hope you enjoyed your night of regality!!

I had virtually no sleep.... Am becoming an expert in lying awake worrying about EVERYTHING Thought the yoga would have helped but not really... Think it is 'cos it is Monday today and I know what a manic week I have. Sorry for the whinge.

BeckY how is DS today?

Tamlin I am so sorry for you birth trauma. That does sound absolutely horrific. Your doula sounds good though. If you have a doula, can DH also be there? Sorry, I don't know much about doulas.

My best work trousers are VERY tight today....

Tamlin I'm sorry about your birth trauma. Hopefully this one will be a very easy and "nice" birth. Certainly the doula was a good choice for you.

Katster - Try to focuss on the good things! A trip to the seaside sounds lovely, even with 70 kids. I used to love school trips (I'm actually a qualified secondary teacher). And you won't even hear them because of the nice sound of the waves!
Your tiredness sounds a bit the same like me, it got worse for a short period of time, now, I think, it's better.

To have a positive birth experience, it's very important to be prepared physically and mentally. So I'm reading books about it (not horrible birth stories, I prefer neutral stuff from experts) and I will get my body ready too. I suppose both will help me to feel confident and not scared about it (we will see in November how it worked )

DS is having total habdabs at the top of the stairs about doing a wee (or not doing a wee). Everytime he is ill, once he is better he turns into evil child! Does anyone else get that? He is just about calming down now and I'll go back up there to see him but he hit me in his fury and I can't deal with him when he's like that. Oh the joys of parenting. Makes giving birth seem a doddle!!!!

Tamlin I am also sorry to read your story about birth. Second births are usually much easier and it sounds like you've got some good support this time.

My first birth was hard, but relatively short at 4 1/2 hours, so a blessing in that way. I had a third degree tear and went into shock after also and wouldn't let the poor consultant near me to stitch me up so they had to give me a spinal so he could stitch me. The second one was a breeze in comparison and I would go as far as to say I enjoyed it. It was also very short though at just over 2 hours.

I do think being prepared mentally and physically is good but with positive preparation. I think it is good to be realistic and accept that it might be traumatic. Neutral advice is good! Things like yoga and aquanatal are good for physical preparation.

Katster good luck with your school trip! You never know they might be angels on the day.

I too started reading the thread about what they don't tell you about birth. But, after hanging around MN for over a year now, there was nothing especially new. The shocking thing was that most women's one or two bad things were all together, so you could read the thread as if they would all happen to you, which I suspect is extremely unlikely.

Having said that Tamlin, your experience sounds horrific, and I'm sorry you were so let down by the HCPs you were in contact with. It says a lot that you are pg again and actively tackling your issues by engaging a doula and talking it through with your MW.

Talking about MW's, I met mine for the first time the other day and forgot to tell you all! As you may or may not remember, I live in Spain, so it's a different culture. In general the MW made me feel good, she was calming, said that pregnancy is not an illness and that you had to live life to the full. There were a couple of things that made me though.

First, she's obsessed with stretchmarks. She handed out 3 samples of ISDIN stretchmark cream and recommended that I buy it or something similar and begin using it ASAP.

Second, to prepare for breastfeeding I should gently massage my nipples with a sponge or flannel every day in the shower. Now, I thought this old wives' tale had been disproved. Any thoughts on this one ladies??

Hope you all have a good day. Good luck to Katster with the school trip.
And of course good luck to any scanners!.

I think the only thing that can prepare you for breastfeeding is sticking your nipples in a vice six times a day... I don't think there is anything you can do really. I haven't heard about the flannel thing.

Good morning all. Lovely scans!

katster I think the heartbeat of mine bean was 175? I would have to check my dates though. The sonographer never said anything about being it too high? Will have a look at home.
Does anybody know what is the ?normal? rate for 12 weeks?

Easyeggs I am so sorry and wow at how well you are coping

Am terrified of giving birth again and yet the first one wasn?t too bad!

Let me tell you what I did on Fri. I am a terrible mother. I forgot to pick up ds from his play date! Went shopping after work with colleague, have been postponing it all week as really busy so was actually excited to be able to do it Fri evening? called my aupair to tell her I will be late so dh will be first home (he usually arrives 15-20min after me) and she just said oh how is that going to work as ds is at his friends house ? you were to pick him up so I am not at home?So there is me panicking at Bond St ? supposedly to be in north london in 30 mins ? and calling dh to pick ds up ? who was driving from Canary Wharf? calling the friends mother to find out their address!!! and forwarding it to my dh who types into GPS etc etc. He was only 20 mins late! Obviously he gave me a lot of grieve about it after me giving him hard time about forgetting his mobile when I had to go to hospital last week! To make things worse when I got home after rather short trip and feeling really guilty ? ds was already asleep at 7.30 (does not happen ever!) and up all night as he was so ill and vomiting. Some sort of bug with 39C after both calpol and nurofen. Oh my god did I feel bad! Spent whole Saturday on the sofa cuddling him and watching Disney while he was dosing off between the vomiting. He woke up fresh on Sunday wanting to cleaned daddy?s car! Am now worried will leave him in a shop one day!

Koumak You're not a terrible mother and I'm sure you would never leave your child in a shop.

Ok, a few questions:
About being prepared: Is the hospital usually offering preparation classes? Or do I have to find that myself? If so, how can I know if the offering organisation is good? There is a yoga place nearby, they offer pregnancy yoga but I am a bit worried about the qualification in this specific point.
About the second scan: I thought it is supposed to be in the 18th to 20th week, mine is in the 22nd. Does anybody know if that's ok or if there is a window (like for the nuchal scan) after which you can't check everything out anymore? I couldn't really find any information about this in the internet.

Koumak you are so not a terrible mother. I once left DS2 at DS1's preschool when he was a baby and ran all the way back to find him happily playing with all the bigger children. When you are working and a mother at the same time, and pregnant to boot, there is so much to keep in your head. My brother-in-law once forgot to pick up his daughter from nursery and at about 7pm the irate nursery staff rang him at home where he was sitting having a cup of tea!!! It happens to all of us. But I am sure you wouldn't leave him in a shop!

Your poor DS being so poorly. I hope he's feeling much better now.

I think most hospitals / midwife units offer parentcraft which includes birthing preparation. I think the NCT do some stuff too. DH and I went to one long Saturday session when I was pg with DS1. The midwives also offered the aquanatal classes which I attended.

Koumak I left my dd outside a shop in her pram when she was a few weeks old - had just forgotten I was a Mum!! She was fine and still there when I ran back a few mins later.
BBL is right, being a working mother is hard enough, add in pregnancy brain and it's nigh on impossible to remember anything.

usigurke you might get antenatal classes at your hospital but they will be v late on. You can do classes with the NCT but they cost around the £120 mark. We did them with DS and it was DH's first, they were brilliant and you are encouraged to then keep in touch with the other Mum's afterwards, invaluable to have other Mum's at the same stage as you to swap obsessions/neuroses about etc.
Ds is 3.5 and I'm still in touch with my NCT friends now.
22 weeks is fine for the anomaly scan.

Hello to everyone else, been lurking for a while and haven't managed to catch up on everyone's news sorry. Starting to feel brighter now though at 14 weeks so am hoping I'm heading into the blooming phase.
Even managed a bit of nocturnal activity with DH last night - was quite nervous about it after such a long break!

Morning all.

ursigurke My hospital has preparation classes and I thnk this is normal. We could choose between 4 evening classes (spread over 4 weeks) or one full day. We went for the full day (this is last time round- you do it a bit later in pregnancy) as the evening sessions were a bit early, but consequently we didn't really meet anyone,which might have been nice. The classes were much more about the labour and birth than actually becoming a parent, so it depends what you want. The NCT runs ante-natal classes too.

Not sure about the 20 week scan thing, sorry.

About reading that childbirth thread in order to prepare for the birth - I'm not sure if I would! It does make everything sound VERY scary. To be honest, I'm not sure what the best way to prepare is. It's good to be realistic, but then it's hard to compare labour to anything else you've ever experienced, so it is also hard to be realistic IYSWIM.

When I was in labour, I had 24 hours of the contractions being 5 mins apart. I went to hospital probably after 6 hours and they sent me home withcocodamol as I wasn't dilated enough. I went back at 24 hours and was a bit more dilated (I forget measurements!) so I stayed. I went in the birthing pool for a few hours, but things weren't developing fast enough so I had to have my waters broken. As there was meconium in my waters I couldn't go back in the pool because they had to monitor the baby. I had to have an episiotomy (a cut) right at the end, but apart from that it was a normal delivery. The time I was in labour in hospital was 13 hours, so DD was born 37 hours after I first rang the hospital declaring 'my contractions are 5 mins apart' (this is when they tell you to call). On the one hand, this felt like a really really long labour and of course it was very painful, on the other hand, none of this mattered at all the second I saw my daughter. I was on a complete high afterwards and all thoughts of the labour just drifted away (although I did come back to it in the following months). I can remember thinking to myself that evening 'I would definitely do it all again'.

It's not always so long. A friend of mine had a 3 hour labour with baby 1, 1.5 hours with baby 2. Even after the first one she told me she'd had worse toothache.

usigurke i am too scheduled for 22 weeks i asked the receptionist when booking it and she said that the hospital now does it at 22 weeks but didnt say why - I am at UCHL

Morning all

Sorry I'm such an infrequent visitor, but unfortunately I end up feeling bloody awful if I spend more than about 20 minutes on the computer! Not condusive to mumsnetting, or just generally getting things done!

I've got my first scan on Friday, when by my (very approximate) dates I'll be 12 weeks. I could be out by anything up to about 2 weeks though so who knows when I'm really due!

I thought my morning sickness was starting to ease off a little, but yesterday it came back with an absolute vengeance, and I've felt bloody awful ever since! The thought of eating makes me feel sick, but the longer I leave it the worse I get! The only thing I can bring myself to eat (raw veg) doesn't make me feel any better, and doesn't fill me up at all! At least I know that with DS the MS had stopped by week 14, so hopefully it'll be the same this time! Everything else has been exactly the same so far.

Anyone got any inklings about whether they're having a boy or a girl? My friends are convinced this is another boy as it's exactly the same as my last pregnancy, and I'm completely off sweet food. I'll admit I am quietly hoping for another boy this time, partly because it's the easy option! We have all the clothes and toys, and we know how the bits work (the first time I changed my friend's little girl, I almost had a nervous breakdown when confronted with all those flaps and a tube of bepanthen!!), and they can share a room for longer.

As for labour, well my labour with DS was pretty textbook tbh. 5 days late, plug came out, real contractions started about 6 hours later, was in hospital after 18 hours, and DS arrived after 24 hours, and a solid hour and a half of pushing! It didn't help that he was back to back, and that I had no pain relief for the final stage (MW took G&A off me because I wasn't concentrating)...the cheek I tell you! But still, I got through it, recovered pretty quickly, and am daft enough to be doing it all again! At the end of the day, it's just something you have to go through, and just be glad you get something awesome at the end of it!

Anyway, apologies for the long rambling post and lack of personals! I hope you're all taking everything in your stride and coping well Hugs to all.

Afternoon all

Hope you've had a nice start to the week. I'm feeling very 'odd' at the moment. Had terrible headaches yesterday and have been feeling very sick / faint. I even managed to walk into a metal pole yesterday. Another thing I've noticed is my muscles seem to really ache after the lightest bit of exercise. I'm feeling really stressed out too with being pregnant and organising a wedding. The in laws have all started to interfere help!

I had a fairly unsucessful shopping trip for maternity clothes yesterday. Only managed to come home with two pairs of leggings!

laugs where did you get your maternity trousers? They sound perfect.

ursigurke my scan is at 22 weeks as well. The sonogropher said this was standard practise at the hospital. Hopefully if baby is bigger we'll be able to see in much more detail.

Hello all,

For the first time in weeks/months I feel great!

I'm back at work and just edited a pod cast which the boss said would probably be unusable but having just heard my cut has said is fab so feeling very pleased with myself .
Feels good to be back working again after so long off sick (and unpaid!!!!! Any freelancers know if you can claim statutory sick pay and if so how?)

Any way the sun is shinning and I'm even considering booking myself into pg exercise classes.

Sorry for those with sick dc's. I'm the most neurotic mother so I feel your pain.

Just found out that DP and I are working 8 festivals so hope the summer is a good one.

Apologise for the ramble. Back to work now.

Enjoy the sunshine

Just wanted to say that I really, really wished I'd been able to do the NCT classes in my area with DS - they were all booked up by the time I'd contacted them. They really do seem to be invaluable for putting you in touch with other mums due about the same time as you, and I think it would've made building up a support network a bit easier. I assumed that the NHS classes would do the same thing, but in my area, they've cut all classes down to one Saturday all-day class. You don't really get to know anybody, and they don't give you much helpful information. (What can you do in early labour? Yes, you can read a magazine! Yes, you can read TV! Ooh, yes, you can go for a walk! Good grief.)

Re. breastfeeding preparation - I got told that the flannel thing was unnecessary, Cies. I do recommend that Lansinoh lotion for the first week or so (they have a growth spurt at about six days when it seems as if all they want to do is chew on your nipples all day!) but I didn't find it painful at all after the first nine days or so. The best thing you can do for cracked or sore nipples is just rub a little milk into them and leave them hanging out in the air to dry - although as we're all giving birth in November, that might get a tad chilly!

lemontop, where did you try looking for maternity clothes..?

There's a thread on the pregnancy section about predicting the sex of the baby. According to this I'm having a girl but it also confirms that DS1 and DS2 were boys!

www.ivillage.co.uk/pregnancyandbaby/pregnancy/labour/articles/0,,17_534749,00.html

I second the milk on nipples thing. It does help. Also you can get really concentrated Vaseline-type nipple cream (I have a couple of packets given to me by a midwife friend when I had a sore nose from a really bad cold!!!). DS1 was born in November and I was always wondering around the house with all hanging loose. I found breastfeeding painful for the first two weeks or so but I had a bad start thanks to problems at the JR hospital in Oxford. Some people find it much easier than others. It is worth the effort though.

lemontop my jeans were from New Look. They had a choice of about 6 different styles, from about £16-£22. Tell us all about your wedding, please!

I remember doing the milk on nipples thing too. Also, I think you're not supposed to wash them with soap or anything drying. I found BF very hard for about 3 weeks, but it was definitely worth it. Being a lazy so-and-so I loved being able to just get up and go. I was never one of those organised mums with the nappy bag all packed ready and I think the faff of getting all the bottles together when you don't know how long you'll be out would have driven me mad.

I've just attempted to do the weekly shop and couldn't even face looking at most of the food in the supermarket. I have come back with a basket that is 90% green. I have lettuce, spring onions, cucumber, spring greens, leeks, spinach, brocolli - and almost nothing else! - natural yogurt and cream cheese. God only knows what I'm going to do with that. I couldn't even look at tomatoes (too red) or venture into the meat aisle (YUK YUK YUK). I am definitely losing it - ha! I wonder if I could be iron/ calcium deficient given the desire for a load of green food? Anyone else the same?

Just did that chart - it says I'm having a boy (and also got it right that DD is a girl). Oooohhh...