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Childbirth

Share experiences and get support around labour, birth and recovery.

Original poster

What does labour feel like?

121 replies

NewMummy5July2011 · 03/05/2011 13:29

Hi
I'm 31 weeks with my first and now that my NCT classes have begun, I'm really starting to think more about the labour. I'm half terrified/half excited!

I am intersted in reading more about birth experiences generally, and finding out more what labour actually feels like. I really am hoping to give birth naturally (Tens and Gas and Air) but of course realise the pain may get too much and am open to more drug relief such as an epidural.

Can anyone explain what it felt like? The worst pain of your life or is it not as bad as that? I suppose I have moments of sheer panic where I think I won't be able to cope, and others where I feel very positive about the whole thing.

Any advice or thoughts would be really great.

Thank you. x

OP posts:
CalmInsomniac · 04/05/2011 14:23

I found contractions like a very strong and burning period pain. I coped with a TENS machine and hypno breathing (honestly, breathing slowly rather than getting tense helped me massively). I visualised the pain as being my cervix stretching and opening which somehow made it more bearable. I managed till transition on the TENS then got in the birth pool where I pushed. Pushing didn't hurt so much as feel like a big downward vomit spasm. I was very fortunate as i was relaxed at home with good support and also had a baby in the absolute optimum position for birth (LOA) so I know I was lucky.
Even though I had a lovely homebirth, I still think it is still a brutal thing to push a baby through your body and there are no prizes for suffering. If you need more pain relief then ask for it x

Original poster
NewMummy5July2011 · 04/05/2011 15:27

Hi BeeBopBunny - your comment about NCT is interesting because that is exactly how our class is. I really like our teacher, she is very 'earthy' and lovely, but she talks about the pain of labour in a very fluffy way. I think I'll do what you suggest and expect it to be very painful so that if it isn't I'll be pleasantly surprised!

Thanks for all the well wishes from everyone and for sharing your experiences. It helps to be realistic about what to expect and understanding the various scenarios will definitely help me to feel more prepared and accepting of however the labour goes.

It's amazing how our bodies cope with it all when you really think about it!

OP posts:
nannyl · 04/05/2011 15:50

watching with interest, as 1st baby due in 4 months time

Really really hoping for home water birth with TENS in early stages then water & gas and air for the last bit.....

I think i have quite a high pain threshold and have certainly endured some extreme pain in my time.... was hit at 50mph as a pedestrian, remained consiouse and with my leg smashed (they thought they would amputate it) i still got up to walk.... then i had liquid iodine poured all over it while i was conciouse Shock ok i screamed & screamed and screamed. Im hoping it isnt any worse than that!

NeverKissPigs · 04/05/2011 16:02

You just don't know until it happens and luck will play its point. I have a high pain threshold and was determined to do it at home with no pain relief, only water.

Well dd was severely malpositioned (which we didn't know) and my waters broke as a result and labour started. From the beginning contractions were 2.5 minutes long with a 30 second break. They had no peak to them and the pain did not stop inbetween contractions. DD was back to back but her head was transverse and asynclitic.

I did stay at home and only transferred in after pushing for 6hrs with no descent. Had a lot of intervention and finally an emcs where they realised the problem. The pain was like nothing I can explain to you. It was everywhere and nowhere. It was in my teeth and in my fingernails and I was consumed by it. I thought I was dying and in all honesty would have welcomed it.

I am not telling you this to frighten you. I was a bloody muppet. I should have transferred. I should have trusted my instincts but being a first timer, my pained wails of 'something's wroooooonnnnnggggg' weren't listened to. Labours like mine are the reason there are drugs. Because I didn't manage or enjoy it, I endured it and it was the single most horrific experience of my life. But it shouldn't have been. I should have gone to hospital and had the blasted drugs 2 days previously. My birth 'plan' hadn't been read by dd who was twisted and stuck.

Most labours won't go like this but please do keep an open mind and do what you need to do on the day. You haven't failed or let anybody down. And you don't get a medal at the end. You get a baby.

RugbyWidow7 · 04/05/2011 16:30

What a great thread! And I've just bought this book, Ina May's Guide to Childbirth, which I'd never heard of before. Thanks!

droopypoppies · 04/05/2011 19:18

I remember within minutes of my DD's birth, I said the last 20 minutes felt like Jack the ripper was clawing at my insides with filthy dirty long sharp fingernails over and over again, it getting rawer and rawer each time. Sad

When DC1 was born, the elation I felt can't be put into words. When DC2 was born, the afterpains were horrific, almost as bad as the Jack the ripper feeling, but there's my experience, the truth warts and all. Sad

mrsravelstein · 04/05/2011 19:24

neverkisspigs i had a somewhat similar experience with ds2, 42 hours labouring at home wondering why it was so bloody painful... nothing like period pains/cramps at all... it was a sharp twisting pain that made me want to clench and pull up my pelvic floor and hold my breath even though i kept trying to 'let go'... when i eventually had a c section he was back to back and stuck in deep transverse arrest, so was going nowhere with the contractions, widest part of his head stuck above the narrowest part of my cervix. i am convinced my midwives realised very early on in the labour that he was stuck and wish they'd told me... when i asked them about it afterwards they said they don't like to be 'discouraging'.

mrsravelstein · 04/05/2011 19:26

and agree with other posters that the pain intensifies massively after your waters break, i guess it 'cushions' things somewhat before?

working9while5 · 04/05/2011 19:47

Though even that's not always true! My waters went spontaneously at 12 days over and I never even started labour!

I have terrible period pains since birth though.. some of them are very comparable to early labour now.

ShowOfHands · 04/05/2011 20:44

mrsravelstein, dd was in deep transverse arrest. I've spoken to other posters on here and they had exactly the same experience in terms of pain during labour when their baby was in dta.

mrsravelstein · 05/05/2011 07:32

showofhands that's interesting, i'd never heard of it before, and after ds2 was delivered the m/w and doctor sort of brushed it off as irrelevant, whereas i was convinced it was a hugely significant factor (then again the doc had kept telling me i was stupid to 'give up' and implied that i was just being lazy, so i guess she didn't really want to admit i might have been right to follow my instincts and insist on a section)

setara · 05/05/2011 07:47

I thought it was the worse pain of my life, but 4 weeks after birth i has pancretitis, and i can assure you Labour was nothing compared to that

I just think, yeah it hurts but its so worth it in the end :)

NoWayNoHow · 05/05/2011 07:54

Different for everyone, as most have said. Mine were manageable to a point, at one point they went really quickly from very painful to completely out of my hands and out of the realms of my mental control over my pain threshold.

I had 2 pethadine injections which rendered my unconscious but the contractions were so agonising that I would rear up out of the bed screaming until they passed, then flop back down unconscious again.

PistyNoMates · 05/05/2011 07:55

It is quite extraordinary - but purposeful iykwim
Intense, and overwhelming. Your body takes over and does its thing! When I said "I need to push" I surprised myself, because I was sort of being led by my body.

But the moment its over, its over and you cannot remember what it was like, until you have DC2 and then it all comes back to you.

Exciting times for you

ShowOfHands · 05/05/2011 09:09

mrsravelstein that's disgusting. It is not on at all that anybody should imply you're lazy. You can't birth a baby in dta. OT maybe but once they're actually stuck, they're stuck. It's not common though so maybe they didn't know what they were talking about.

My GP told me recently that in 50yrs of medicine, he's seen dta twice. I'm his third. He also said he'd never known a woman go on to have it happen again and that in his honest opinion it's just utter bad luck. Most children won't get stuck in that position. If they're moving from op to oa (which it's possible dd was trying to do), most of them do it well before there's a chance of being that far down the birth canal that they arrest in an ot position. I think things were just stacked against us. She was op and wonky from the start, waters broke too early and she had nothing to guide her down, plus a hefty dose of bad luck.

I am under the care of an obstetric consultant (for birth trauma) and he says it's extremely painful but not common. He showed me video to illustrate what was happening. I pushed for 6hrs and instead of it moving dd down through the birth canal, each contraction just forced the weight of her her into my pelvis repeatedly. Her head was a state and she had a lot of muscle damage as a result. All fine now thank goodness.

I do wish I knew what 'normal' labour feels like. When people say your body takes over and does its own thing, I don't know what that feels like. My body was fighting against something insurmountable. No urge to push, no expulsive effort from my body at all. It felt the exact opposite of purposeful.

Thankfully op, I am NOT the norm.

mrsravelstein · 05/05/2011 09:19

thanks for that link showofhands, never seen it, but is exactly how the m/w described it to me afterwards. i had an elective section for dc3 so i will never know if it would have happened again, but dd was OP throughout pregnancy, as ds1 and ds2 had been, so i suspect i would never have had a good labour...

ShowOfHands · 05/05/2011 09:37

I can understand why you had an elcs. As much as I'd like to have a normal delivery, I would never want to go through that sort of labour again. The other normal labour adage of 'you forget the pain once it's over' also wasn't true for me.

The best bit of dd's delivery was the emcs because it was productive. I wouldn't be at all worried about a repeat section. To my knowledge there are 3 other women on MN who had a dta. I always wanted to be in a club. This is not what I imagined tbh.

NoWayNoHow · 05/05/2011 11:39

showofhands same for me- 3.5 years on and I still think about my hideous labour almost every day. No more DCs for me because if it, even though I've been guaranteed an ELCS should I want one cos of the physical and emotional trauma of it all. Feel sad sometimes that my head space just won't let me get past it...

herethereandeverywhere · 05/05/2011 11:49

ShowofHands and Mrsravelstein my DD was also deep transverse arrest - I too had the hellish, no break, wish I was dead pain - I really find it difficult to comprehend those who talk about having a break between contractions and it being "like period pains". I too will never forget that torture, no immediate forgetting for me either.

My DD was born by Keillands forceps (top consultant at St Thomas's who prides himself on keeping the CS rates down) and as a result she has permanent facial scarring. They knew she was OP and large for me and for a 1st baby before they induced me, yet they continued with the induction.

CS should be like heaven in comparison and not having to sit on or pee/poo near the stitches is also a bonus! If I have another I'll be fighting for one.

GothMummy · 05/05/2011 11:58

Oh yes, and despite what was a horrific time with contractions, the pushing stage (which for me hardly lasted any time at all, 2 maybe 3 pushes??) was exactly like calm insomniac said, like downward vomiting. Nothing I could do to stop it, or control it, but it didnt hurt at all. I didnt realise I was pushing DS out though. I thought I needed to poo...... !! I felt something bulging (my waters hadnt broken) and was a bit suprised to find DS's head in my hands.

The pushing I was really scared about but it turned out not to be an issue at all for me!

RobynLou · 05/05/2011 12:06

DD1 was induced and it was very intense, I had a shot of pethidine because I wasn't coping - mainly because I had no space or privacy in which to labour.
DD2 was spotaneous labour, huge back to back baby but I just breathed through it, tried a puff of g&a but hated it, had a tens which really helped because alot of the pain was in my back. I had privacy and space for almost the entire birth which made a massive difference.

it's intense but even in the final stages there are brief breaks between the contractions, that meant I could cope with it, especially the second time, I knew it would end and kept thinking of that. right at the end DD2 got stuck and that was pretty hideous, but only for a few minutes, then she arrived and now she's 3m and I want to do it again!

RobynLou · 05/05/2011 12:12

reading others posts about stuck babies, I had nothing as serious as that, but with DD1 who was well positioned my body just birthed her, there was nothing I could do to stop it, the throwing up downwards analogy is perfect for that.

with DD2 she was not positioned well - she was born face up and was over 10lb, and I had to be told to push and what positions to adopt because my body just didn't know what it was doing. she had a minor shoulder distocia which was released by the m/ws performing the mcroberts procedure, so I agree with neverkisspigs, your body knows when something is wrong, you have to listen to it and trust it.

ben5 · 05/05/2011 12:23

period pains but really painful.
feeling like i needed to poo all the time
once
i had gas and air I just wanted to be sick all the time.
/having my waters broken by MV was awful. wanted to punch her( but didn't!)
burning sensation just before head crowned in that region but made better because the mv asked if I wanted to feel the babys head. VERY recommanded. abit weird but something I remeber as a good eperience
wanted lots of drugs but only had gas and air sue to quick labours.
epidual only because I had a retained plancenta( that made me very chatty and almost like I had the whole bottle of gin with no tonic!!)
good luck

clitorisorclitoraint · 05/05/2011 12:23

Very unpleasant indeed I'm sorry to say. The first 20 hours or so were OK....the contractions were eye watering, but groaning and breathing through them meant that I could keep going with no pain relief.

When I got to the hospital they ramped right up a gear and I felt as though my innards were going to fall out. The pressure was really horrible. I was chugging away on that gas & air I can tell you!!

Turns out DD was breech and I was whipped in for emcs.

I reckon a 'normal' positioning and I would have been OK, but the bum first presentation (and being fully dilated for a couple of hours before anyone noticed grrr!) made for a grim experience.

I'm sure you'll be fine Smile

exhausted2011 · 05/05/2011 12:31

i cant remember.
it was only 3½ years ago.
And I was in labour for 2 days.