Really naive question about pain in childbirth

[MonsteraCheeseplant]

If you always plan on having an Epidural, how bad is it?

Personally I wouldn't plan anything - I just don't think birth works like that. Babies don't work to plans.

Why not just see how you get on?

Epidurals can have a huge list of side effects and post birth complications as I believe you can feel very little which can lead to you causing a lot of damage down below as you push through your personal barriers due to lack of feeling!

It really isn't that bad, yes I know people have different pain thresholds etc etc but it's only for a few hours of your life.

It really pissed me off when people told me to see how I go. I know so many people who did that and changed their minds but was too late for epidural. If the OP says she knows for sure she wants it then she knows she wants it! Am sure she has read the pros and cons, she's asking a specific question not if she should or shouldn't have it!

I woke up with my waters breaking and was almost immediately in quite severe pain. I managed on paracetamol, gas and air, and the birthing pool, but it was 8 hours of mostly bad pain, with pretty brief respites in between.

Everyone is different. For me, I felt like my public bond was in a vice.

Mine started with period pain. My waters went and I went straight into active labour at 4cm (was 2-3 on my stretch and sweep a few days before). Strong contractions - 3/4 in 10 minutes. Sometimes they didn’t completely wane before the next one started. Sometimes they were really strong and I couldn’t breathe and other times I could rock through them.

I had an epidural after 3 hours at 5cm. However it didn’t take perfectly so I had to change position often to get it to move around or I had pain on one side or the other.

Epidural was exactly what I needed but wasn’t an instant fix. But labour is still by far the worst pain I’ve ever experienced, and I’ve had surgeries and gallstones!

I agree with the first poster. I ahd my first baby last January and it wasnt anything like i imagined. I waa have irregular contractions from about 5am monday morning till 11.00pm when my waters broke (which again was nothing like I imagined!) I was just at home during this time and would describe it as bad period pain.

When i went to hospital after my waters broke it was more intense and although it wasnt pleasant i had no pain relief and was in the birthing pool for 4 hours before having him.

I know everyones experience is different though, and i feel very lucky to have had a good experience first time

Public bond? Well done autocorrect. Pubic bone.

I was induced. Started on a Friday morning by Friday night I had mild cramps requiring paracetamol but nothing else. I attached my tens machine one though as soon as I started to feel the cramps and built it up with the pain .
By Saturday morning the pain was incredible! It jumped from mild to unbearable really quickly. I managed to with the tens machine and paracetamol and codeine until the evening and by that point I couldn’t cope. I’d had some many internally examinations so on top of the contractions which were constant barely any break between them I felt really raw down below and couldn’t cope with being examined. I had to have gas and air just for them to see how dilated I was. The dr told me I was being silly and I literally snapped at him and said no vagina no opinion and declined for him to touch me until I had some pain relief.
A lovely midwife came to see me, she took one look in between my legs and said oh my god your so red and raw he’s not touching you unless you have gas and air. Glad it wasn’t just me feeling like a wimp!
I finally had an epidural at about 11am Sunday morning it was magical! I slept solidly from having it until about 4pm. I ended up having EMCS but that was because I had sepsis otherwise I was on track to have a vaginal delivery.

I was so frightened of actually having the epidural done but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be and the relief it brought me made it worth it anyway

One thing I remember with my second, even aside from the pain of the cx themselves was how uncomfortable and heavy down below I felt .

I was a few cms dilated and staggering about, bent low, I could hardly move to the loo, I felt so sort of heavy and incapacitated. Every bump on the road to the hospital was sore and I was shouting at DH!

When I got in the pool it was like all that was taken away by magic. The water was warm and soothing and I could just float about weightless.

Yes the cx themselves were painful but I really cant say enough what a comfort and relief the water was and not having to carry my own weight, just being able to float into a comfy position

Don't know if others felt similar ....

The other thing I remember, when I had an epidural with my first, was that it felt like it worked instantly. It was as if the pain was just switched off in an instant.

This despite the anesthetist telling me it would take at least 15 mins to get into my system!

I guess ultimately pain is all in the brain so if you think you have had total pain relief that is what you feel!

God it was brilliant. I was in active labour for 27 hours. Baby was back to back (thought she'd turned but she hadn't, didn't figure that out until about 22 hours in...). Was going for water birth but at one point I was in so much pain I started considering - seriously - drowning myself and thought, fuck this. Went for epidural. It was so great.

Issue was that it then wore off and we had a failed epidural the second time and then everything was a nightmare but I still would recommend if you want to have it. I am not sure how I would have coped without the relief of the few hours with that first epidural.

Great advice @56Marshmallow

It really isn't that bad, yes I know people have different pain thresholds etc etc but it's only for a few hours of your life.

I don’t agree with that as a blanket statement. It would have been absolutely true for one of my births but not all. Another one I would have actually killed myself to make it go away if someone gave me the means then and there, no exaggeration. Given the variability in births even for the same woman I do agree with giving it a go though and seeing how it goes as sometimes you get lucky.

That's a good point, actually having the epidural carried out was a worry for me but in the end it was an absolute breeze, only felt the initial scratch from the local and that was only because I was focussed on it, it was still less than a papercut!

The anaesthetist did say it was a pleasure putting epidurals in before active labour as it's much easier to do without working between contractions. I had negotiated having it done before breaking my waters because of how badly the induction was going (I think we'd all realised by then we'd embarked on a pointless exercise just because baby was measuring a bit small, all the monitoring was perfect so I think they felt sorry for me). I had a long labour but that was due to my reaction to the drip rather than the epidural, it all ticked along nicely but slowly once they stopped ramming up the drip rate.

It really is individual. Of my NCT group the one with the most similar labour to mine was screaming for an epidural but I managed ok with a tens and a bit of gas and air. There was one really bad contraction just before I started pushing and had I had hours of those I would have wanted every drug going!

When it worked, the epidural was great. I don’t remember pain at all. But I had three in the end.. and spent about 8 hours in quite severe pain thinking ‘oh my god, how bad would this be if I hadn’t had the epidural’.. only for the midwives to then realise it had unseated itself and hadn’t been working for quite some time. Having to have a new one inserted during the middle of contractions (induced so no breaks between them) was the worst part of my labour.

I would say it’s worth considering, but bear in mind they don’t always work. Despite all the hassle I would have one again as the pain relief when it did work was brilliant (I was trapped on the bed due to induction drip so didn’t have an option to move around anyway).

I had relatively short labours and no epidural (pethidine, gas and air) and would describe the pain as the worst I've ever had (though never broken any bones). It's kind of like combined acutely bad period pains and that awful twisted pressure you get with bad diarrhoea (irritable bowel syndrome sufferer). Then the stabbing, burning pain as the baby's head crowns.
Yet it's not a pain that stays with you in a traumatic way - not for me anyway - and obviously doesn't deter people from having more babies! It's unique and I'm glad I felt it rather than had an epidural, although I wouldn't stop anyone who wanted that.

It’s so different for everyone.

DD was back to back and I found it unbearable and lost control by 3cm. By then I’d been in labour for 24 hours, with painful contractions every 3-5 minutes. Not being able to sit down. I’d had tens, pethidine and gas and air. Then the epidural came and it was heaven.

If it wasn’t such a long labour with no sleep I may have coped better but I see no reason to suffer through it and traumatise myself by not getting an epidural. I had to go on a drip in the end as she was stubborn and didn’t want to come out. So overall labour was about 38 hours.

Just see how it goes. I loved my epidural, it made my birth feel calm towards the end. No bad tearing and pushed her out in 25 mins when I finally got to 10cm.

To be honest. If I were to have another child I’d probably just get an epidural as soon as I can. I just can’t be bothered and no one gets an award for the whole pain free birth thing. I hate seeing celebrities boast about it!

I've only given birth once and the Epidural didn't take away the pain at all however I had twins but I do remember delivering the 2nd twin was just as excruciating painful as twin 1 ( all that shelling peas bollox was just that - bollox)

My epidural failed and no one was available to top it up so I gave birth without one. Very painful.