will i cope with gas and air, and other naive questions

[Mumblesmummy]

This will have been asked a million times before by others, so sorry if I'm boring anyone.

I'm the weirdest person ever because I am sooooooooooooooooooooo excited about giving birth. I've always wanted to do it myself and I'm really excited that it's only 14 weeks away. I'm going to use a birthing pool and hope it goes as smoothly as my best friends (who had a great labour, 1st baby, 20 years old, 2 hours labour and a few mins pushing and all done... and little miss glowey and lovely before and afterwards).

However, it's begun to occur to me that everyone hates it and is terrified of it so clearly I'm wrong to be excited. I plan on using gas and air... but now I'm starting to wonder a few things.

Firstly, everyone says they can't describe how it feels.. I get that it's awful pain.. but can anyone clarify exactly how it feels?

Second, will I cope with gas and air or do I need an epidural? i'd really rather not have an epidural, and I want to be able to cope fine with gas and air.

Third, how long is the average labour? i understand they vary, but is there a sort of norm? is it likely to go on for longer than a day?

I think that's about all my questions. I'm just soooo looking forward to it and everyone's going 'noooooo it's going to be horrendous, how can you look forward to that?' so I'm guessing I'm wrong.

Don't get me wrong, I understand there's a lot of pain and it's tiring, but there's a gorgeous baby at the end of it!!! Fantastic!!

Hi
You were abit like me when i was pregnant everything was buzzing in my mind about labour. What i will advise you is to keep your options open and prepare for everything. I was 2 weeks over and had to get started. I had always thought ill have an epidural and i wont feel a thing but the midwife talked me out of it as she said it would slow me down. I got my waters broke at 12mid day and was on gas and air which i found class! I then ewnt onto pethidine which i highly recommend it made you abit spaced out but i was still totally aware of what was going on and what was being said. I cant describe the pain, yes it was sore more like a real bad period cramp but my baby waslying to my back which made it alot painful. But 14hours later i had to have a emerg section as i only got to 9cm and she was 8lb15oz!!! I always thouught id never need a section and i found it hard to get over it once i got home. Be positive and you will be grand have to say i was quite calm in labour and had onlt 2 shots of pethidine in that time so i was quite proud of myself lol!
Any questions please feel free to ask me

I was exactly like you too and it really really helped me. I did cope with gas and air but I also needed the TENs. For weeks before the birth I had a moment in the day where I would put the lights out and imagine my labour going really well etc. It seemed to help. I was too broke for actual hypnobirth classes so I convinced myself it would be fine.
It did hurt, much more than I could expect or describe now, but i AM a really big wimp with pain! And yet, somehow, it was OK, I coped. People tell me I was lucky because my labour was only 3h45min for a first baby, BUT on the other hand i DO NOT KNOW what they mean about MILD contractions!! Mine were almighty enough to get me from 5 to 10 cm in less than an hour and that did bloody hurt, so no slow nice build up, no getting used to things etc.
All in all a great experience though. I was decided to TRY without an epidural, although I knew anything can happen (my mum had two horrendous labour experiences with C section at the end of days of agony), and somehow being convinced I could do it really helped.
Being positive CANNOT hurt!!!

nezelette - yeah I agree that somehow having that sheer belief that you can do it does seem to help. I had friends in my NCT group who hooted with laughter when I booked into the local midwife unit where there was no epidural available. But I was really happy with my choice even though it was painful,and feel i had a much better experience than being in a big conveyor belt type hospital

I've thought about it, and I will concede that positive thinking and self-belief can actually help. I would never have been able to generate enough of that by myself though. But my MW was so fantastic that she got me to achieve a natural birth in circumstances where I was so nearly heading for a C section. I am eternally grateful to her.

Giving birth pain and the pain you feel with everything else is very different imo. Giving birth pain is more 'positive' to me iyswim as every pain brings the baby closer.
I am a total wimp with pain so assumed I would be screeching for an epidural as soon as I got to the hospital, but managed both times in the pool, 9.9 and 10.12 lbs. You need to go with an open mind and postive thoughts.
To describe the way it feels, I would say it feels like passing a melon and hurts the same as I imagine a melon would. With DS1, I felt as though I could have closed my legs (I didn't/couldn't of course!) but with DS2, once he was crowning, I felt like my legs were jammed in the splits! You can feel the head/body/baby down in your vagina which can feel odd between contractions whilst in the pushing stage.

I was very excited both times and know I will be excited next time (there WILL be a next time so it can't be that bad ) and anyway, as soon as you see your baby, you remember it hurt, but can't remember exactly how much. Mother Nature...she's a genius!
Keep looking forward to it, it's amazing and have a good one!

I got through on g and a, the 3 things that helped me the most were 1. my supportive dh, couldn't have done it without his back rubs (lo was back to back) 2. breathing, whether with the g and a or without it the breathing helped me focus and work through the pain 3. thinking 'I got through the last contraction so i'll get through the next one. A positive attitude will certainly do no harm, research all your options so you can make informed decisions if things change. Most of all, congratulations and good luck

This whole "breathing" thing intrigues me. Before I gave birth a friend said to me that I'd be glad to be able to breath at all, never mind all that breathing through the contractions business. And you know what, she was right!

Sure you have had a gut full of birth stories - each 1 is different - I was neither excited or scared of the birth - he had to come out, I went into it with my eye's open. And took it as it came. I was actually in labour for 52 hours, I know it hurt at the time, but it passes and you know that. I had hoped to get by with minimal intervention, but after 40 or so hours I had an epidural. In the end they would of had to of done it anyway as they finally prepared me for c section but dragged him out the last min. I would do it all over again.

I was induced and coped just fine on gas and air even though for a lot of it there was little rest between contractions. Though I lost it a bit close to when I needed to start pushing.

For me the pain was like... well... ahem, cramps you get if you've had some lower intestinal problems, where you seize up on the loo, except all over my stomach. But then like I said, I was induced and I hear it can be more painful, though I have nothing to compare it to.

Having an epidural just wasn't on my radar so I never wondered if I could cope without one, just knew that at some point the pain would pass and I would have a reward.

You be excited if you want! A positive mental state can only help!

ROFL at the multiple messages Starlight! You sound so like me. TENS was rubbish for me as well, I ended up ripping it off. I couldn't even control the damned thing - the contractions were so strong that I just got completely confused and pressed all the wrong buttons, or couldn't even get to the control to press anything. Total waste of time.

My DS was ROA for the latter part of my pregnancy, which obviously carries a higher risk for an OP baby. Nobody told me that the baby was OP in labour, except when the MW realised he had finally come out the right way around ie LOA. She therefore summised that my horrible first and second stage were because he was busy turning around 270 degrees.

That's a very interesting theory about the endorphins, and I have to agree with you. I too found the pushing stage a lot better than the first stage (although it was still excrutiatingly painful and bloody hard work). I'm not sure at what stage the first stage got better for me. I think the answer is never actually, although I never experienced that whole transition thing.

To top it all, I also apparently get no endorphins flowing during exercise (although I still try to do it of course), and I also hate massages. Are you me?!

I think for me transition was no worse than anything that had gone before so I just didn't notice it! My contractions reached their absolute worse at around 4cm dilated and stayed that way. Thankfully they also got no closer together than about 2 minutes or I think I'd have died!

The problems I had with gas and air were
a) I wasn't allowed it early on when I really needed it, and
b) by the time I did get it I was in too much pain and too panicked to be able to use it properly. I could barely breath, so I couldn't breath in the stuff to get any benefit from it.

Now when I was having my stitches I understood what gas and air should feel like.

Starlight - I think it was about 12 hours from being in "established" labour to giving birth. My contractions started about 6 hours before that I think. And like I said the second stage lasted 3 1/2 hours (DS's head was visible going in and out for 2 1/2 hours of that).

No gas and air was allowed when I asked for it soon after arriving at hospital because it was "too early" (sorry for anyone who's heard this many times before). Apparently you can get saturated with it so that it stops working for you and you need something stronger - my birth plan said I didn't want anything stronger so I ended up with nothing. I wasn't allowed in the birth pool until 5cm dilated so I only had the crappy TENS machine during the most brutal contractions - not exactly how I planned it.

I was offered paracetamol, which completely added insult to injury, left along for hours at a time and encouraged to do the usual stuff - walking, having a bath, etc. It was all agonising and horrendous. I know I could opt for an epidural or whatever next time around, but to be honest the whole process of pregnancy and birth was just horrible so I can't yet convince myself to do it again.

I was definitely one of the lucky ones. Had my first contraction at 3.30am and dd was brn at 7.30am. I had no pain relief at all as there wasn't time. I arrived at the hospital at around 4.30 and was put on a monitor. The midwife examined me at 5.30 and said I was 2cm dilated and in the very early stages of labour. I walked up and down the corridor with dh for a while thinking that if this was just the early stages I wouldn't be able to stick to my plan for no epidural as the pain felt quite intense at that point. I decided to have a bath but as soon as I got into the water I got a massive urge to push so got out as quick as I could. I found a midwife and told her. She obviously didn't believe I was anywhere near ready to push but we were standing outside the delivery suite so she told me to come in so she could examine me. As soon as she looked at me it was all systems go. I was about to give birth and dd was born less than 30 minutes later.
I had a difficult pregnancy and had been too sick to even attend my antenatal class so I hadn't even learned about breathing techniques let alone hypnobirthing or anything else so I would definitely say luck has a lot to do with it.

No, I don't think I did, Starlight. The urge to push in the second stage certainly wore off though, to the point that my contractions stopped altogether after about 2 1/2 hours. I got DS out in the end almost without any help from contractions, under threat of a drip.

I was just the same as you, and floated along through pregnancy actively looking forward to the birth. The good news is that I m sure all the positivity paid off and it was fine - better than fine even - I would go as far as calling it quite enjoyable! Like some of the other posters I too did a fantastic hypnobirth course, and listened to a CD of (really rather funny) positive affirmations all through pregnancy (and also active labour much to the annoyance of the midwives at my homebirth!) Hypnobirth is about trusting your body; letting it take over and trying not to fight the contractions. And it definitely worked for me. Oh - I just had a bit of gas and air by the way. Didn't feel obvious effects but somehow just made it easier. I had a 5 hour labour and look back on it very fondly. Bring on the next one! Good luck to you. Try not to listen to peoples negative birth stories. I always politely said that I would rather not hear, and remained in my happy little bubble!

Hope you don't mind the expat here, but I wouldn't have described it as period pain.

With my first I felt like my body was clamping down on my belly and had waves of heat. I pulled all of my clothes off during my first labour (29 hours) and couldn't handle things touching or being attached to me. I pulled out iv's, didn't like being rubbed and made noises like roaring. A bit weird I'm afraid. I was induced 10 days overdue with my first. It reminded me of a day I went to the beach as a kid and I was in the water when a wave hit me. I scraped my face up under water in the rocky sand and then kept on getting knocked over by more waves and thought I was going to drown. During my labour I didn't really know what my dr, nurses or husband was saying.

My second I read more a on coping techniques and it felt more like I was riding the waves and wasn't frightened in the least. I was still noisy and wouldn't let anything touch me.

Aside from pitocin, I've not used pain killers during labour. It wasn't really an active decision during my first. They asked me, but just didn't seem to understand the question at that moment.

I realized that doesn't make sense.

"Aside from pitocin, I had natural labours."