Elective c section advice!

[henrysmama2012]

We went for a routine scan today (39 weeks) & found out the baby has flipped to breech, is measuring big (42 weeks) and there is also slightly raised levels of amino fluid so we are scheduled for an elective c section tomorrow at 9am! I was planning a hypno water birth, lol...am happy to roll with the punches though! But I wondered if anyone has any positive elective c section stories they could share with me as I am a lite but nervous!

I have 2 out of 3 positive stories for you, and the 3 rd one wasn't great due to my own fault

Let me swap from iPad to laptop and re-assure you

I ended up having my 1st elective section for the same reason as you are.
We arrived at 7am and went down around 11am, spent the time before reading papers and thinking of lovely things I would like to eat once baby was born!

The staff were great and I was very nervouse especially when DH went to get dressed and I was prepped, again the staff were very reassuring and we all had a good laugh at DH because he looked ridiculous in his theatre get up

It was really surreal during the section, we had music playing in the background and I could feel them pushing and pulling and then DD was born!

We were taken to recover and I managed to pull myself upright by using the ladder rope so got skin to skin contact straight away and we had our first feed in recovery.

I went home the next day.

DD2 was the same easy delivery but I had a cold when DD3 was delivered and had a horrible coughing fit right at the delivery point and my oxgen levels went all weird, DH said it was the worst experience in the world for him as I went all floppy & wheezy but everyine needed to get DD out!! I peronally don't remember any of that and only remember seeing her little pink face

How exciting for you!!

What a lovely post and so lovely of you to tell me that story, I feel a lot happier reading that I am glad you had such positive experiences and I'm feeling better about tomorrow now! Thank you so much

My ELCS was a doddle compared to my EMCS (and even that wasn't too bad).

You can plan everything in advance, get a good nights sleep before you go in and you'll know (roughly) how long it will take to recover. OK, you will be taking it easy for a while but it's worth it.

3 maternal request electives here all lovely, calm, recovered quickly without infection, up and about within hours and was driving again within 2 weeks, after 10 days with no.3. Best of luck how exciting

oh, and the theatre staff were lovely both times. bear in mind they've done it hundreds of times so they'll look after you, and your DP and the baby.

All the best.

Yep, another good experience too for me...DD1 was emergency CS which was incredibly scary/fraught and actually put me off ever having another baby!! However...when she was 5 we changed our minds and now have DD2 who was elective CS...a completely different experience...great recovery time, calm and organised in theatre with lovely music playing..skin to skin with baby directly after like with a VB A top tip for you...take extra sani pads in with you and some BIG knickers cos bikini type that sit across the scar hurt like hell!! And the pads are good for cushioning it and stopping knickers sticking to it if it weeps at all. And when you are going in a car put a cushion/pillow between the seat belt and your tummy, its far more comfortable and stops any damage occuring if for any reason there was an emergency stop!! Good luck, hope it all goes really well for you

I had an elective CS and it was a great experience. DP was in the theatre with me, DD was born very quickly and placed on me and I spent the rest of the op looking at her!

I had a very straight-forward recovery and I was riding by week 7.

Best of luck tomorrow!

Thank you everyone for such lovely reassuring messages-it's making a big difference to how much happier and more relaxed I am feeling about tomorrow! I'll make sure I post an update as soon as I can afterwards

Just to add - I have had two ELCS, the most recent one this week, it was a great experience, I was given time to talk through my fears with theatre staff and had my own midwife who stayed with me all day. It took what seemed like no time at all, DD2 was put straight on me in theatre, to be honest, I didn't even realise they had properly started and there she was!

I went straight to recovery, skin to skin and breastfeeding within a few minutes. DD2 stayed in skin to skin for ages, was very calm and relaxed. I was off the ward for less than two hours all in. I was home in less than 48 hours with lovely snuggly baby - good luck for your op. Given the choice, I'd do the same again in a heartbeat!

Thank you to everyone for posting such lovely messages on this thread! Little Henry was born today at 10.01am-it was very quick & pain free, we had skin to skin straight after the delivery & he is already breastfeeding well! What a great experience! X

Congratulations!!!

aaaw. lovely to hear you're both ok.

I found BF after my ELCS very easy. I was rather forced to lie down while the spinal block wore off so plenty of time to get to grips with feeding.

Fantastic news! Glad everything went well. I had an elective Caesar in Dec and it was great- before I knew what was happening the doctor said- oh take a look the head is coming out. I did not know they had even started LOL

We brought a CD so baby was born to George Michael's Freedom '90. My first choice was Duran Duran 's Rio album, but that was vetoed by hb.

I had no probs with lifting bubba afterwards or feeding or anything like that. Just do not be shy of taking the strong painkillers if you need them- I took some sort of pain relief for about 1 week, but the strong stuff only about 3 days.

Oh what is Henry's weight?

Cheers! or

Yay!, I'm very of your lovely little treasure. Can I pop over and smell him?

Don't forget to take it easy do nothing but eat and feed for the first few days at the very least, you will recover quicker if you rest 100% now.

Hi everyone, sorry for the delayed response - littleHenry weighed 8.6 pounds at delivery (39 weeks)-after a couple of days of recovery (appreciated the morphine!), I am feeling pretty good!-little Henry is so far doing great...I had a bit of a wobble with breastfeeding (initially pretty stress free, but then heard about5 different pieces of advice from 5 different midwives and lost my confidence for a bit, but seemingly back on track with milk starting to come through). I did have a specific reason other than general update to post this but now I have baby brain & can't remember so all I'll say is thank you again for making me feel a whole lot more relaxed about the experience

That's great. Hope you're getting some rest!

Congratulations to you! I have been lurking around reading this thread as I may well be heading for an ELCS just 3 weeks tomorrow! The posts here are really positive and reassuring and it's so lovely to hear your ownnpositive outcome henrysmama. So lovely to hear

Whoops, my own baby brain made me repeat myself there! But you all know what I mean! (I hope!)

Lovely to hear, and Henry is a lovely name.
Glad to hear you had a good experience. I've had two ELCS, and they were lovely experiences too.

Hi all, just bumping this thread as I an booked in for ELCS this Thursday! and am feeling nervous! Any additions to this thread would be greatly appreciated :) Thanks