Induction

[firstimemamma]

I'm nearly 41 weeks pregnant and booked for an induction on Saturday if I don't go into labour naturally by then.

We have a 3.5 year old and it's just got me thinking what do we do about childcare. We've got 2 places for him to go (friends' houses as no family nearby) but I keep reading about inductions being unpredictable- sometimes it takes 24 hours to work and sometimes baby arrives in a few hours.

So do we drop ds off then go to be induced without him? Or bring him along, I go in to have the pessary or whatever alone while dh and ds wait somewhere nearby then dh drops him off when things get going?

Advice from anyone who has been induced with a child / children already much appreciated! Hopefully I'll have the baby before then, just trying to think of all eventualities.

This is my current dilemma if I have to have another induction too, I'm leaning towards being left at first and having family do overnight babysitting if need be so DH can join me.

It depends on the rules for your hospital, firstly. Can your DH stay in the early stages before labour anyway? If not, you'll have to be alone anyway.

If he can stay, my induction took 3 days from start to baby being born so you may be in for a long ride. You may want to just be dropped off until it progresses and DH join you later.

Alternatively, could you arrange for family to travel and stay over and look after your DS or your DS go and stay with them? Could friends look after DS, including overnight/several days if need be? That might be a total weight off of your mind if you know there's cover for overnight/several days. Then you know you have a birthing partner with you the whole time (if that's possible).

Not to scare you but my contractions started and were very close on day 1, then they suddenly settled down overnight and then returned the same, it was unpredictable contractions like that up until day 3 when they got serious. If my DH had left, he'd have been back and forth. You just don't know how it may pan out.