If you had an induction at 38weeks..

[anonny55]

If you had an induction at 38 weeks..what was your experience?
Was it your first baby?
How many days did it take?
assisted delivery?
Did it end in emergency caesarean?

Induced with a pessary around 6pm.
Contractions through the night which stopped at daylight.
Waters broke at 3pm
At 8.30pm they sent husband home saying i was only 2cm dilated.
By 9.15pm I was literally hanging off the rails in full blown labour.
Baby born at 22.43

If you had an induction at 38 weeks..what was your experience?

Was it your first baby? Nope, third
How many days did it take? 5 days
assisted delivery? No
Did it end in emergency caesarean? Yes - after reaching 10cms and pushing for 40 minutes.

Induced on the drip at 38 weeks after premature rupture of waters. In at 8am, baby born 10pm. Forceps in theatre, but was prepped for a section in case forceps failed. What is the reason you're considering induction at 38 weeks?

Induced with pessary in afternoon. All night had like period cramps, by 9am was crying with them. 😅 still told it wasn't labour. He was born at lunchtime during the epidural 😂😂 labour written down as 1 minute..think miscommunication somewhere..

My experience ended in forceps. My advice is that you should get an epidural before being started on the drip, assuming the pessary doesn’t work alone. I have done birth without and with the drip and the drip makes contractions much more painful. Strong recommendation for an epidural. It’s never very “natural and straightforward” with an early induction (assuming it’s your first baby) so just get the epidural

Slightly earlier inductions at 37 weeks due to pre-eclampsia.

Was it your first baby? Yes. I had another for my second baby as well.

How many days did it take? First gel (of 2) was inserted 10am on Wednesday. Taken down to delivery suite 1am Thursday. ARM 3am. Drip started 5am. Baby born 4.41pm after 20 minutes pushing.

Second baby was born during a much busier time. First (and only one needed) gel in at 12pm Monday. Delivery suite 8am Friday! ARM 10am. Drip 11am. Baby born 2.13am Saturday.

Assisted delivery? Nope. Placenta took longer than expected to come out, though I didn't need a manual removal. Second degree tear that was stitched up under local and gas+air in the room.

Did it end in emergency caesarean? My second induction did. Progress in labour had been slow and only reached 5cm. We threw in the towel after ~13 hours of the drip after baby started showing signs of distress. Turns out he would have been undeliverable vaginally anyway. I do not blame the induction in any way.

Hey, thanks for replying. This is my first baby who's measuring to be 9lb at 38w. I've been offered induction at 38w or section at 39w if I wish.

It seems most first time inductions done before 40 weeks seems to end in forceps or emcs so I'm keen to hear as many experiences as I can☺️

At how many weeks? And was this your first baby?

5 Pessary attempts. No dilation. Ended up in a section. She was my first baby and there was concern about her growth.

Mine was at 37+5 so a little earlier. Had the pessary at 9pm. Water broke at lunchtime the next day. Started drip about 6pm and she was born at 5am. No forceps. Had a small tear that needed a couple of stitches.

I had an induction at 38 weeks. My second baby. Induced at 7:30pm on the 8th May. Nothing progressed so the next day had my waters broken around 7pm. Baby born naturally 7 hours later at 2am on the 10th May. No intervention or stitches needed. (Unlike my first!)

@justusandthecat first baby? How much did she weight? X

@anonny55 i was induced at 38 weeks
It was my first baby
No forceps
Gas and air for 20mins when I got into the delivery suite at 22.30

@anonny55 yes she was my first. 6lb 4oz.

I reacted badly to the medication used at induction so I became ill from it very quick (like within hours) and they had to take it out and I ended up in EMCS. None of my friends/relatives had successful inductions either so I don't feel positive about them.

All three of mine were induced at 38 weeks

First one was pessary. Inserted at midnight baby was here almost born in his amniotic sac at 6.40 am weighing 8lbs 5. Established labour was about 4 hours.
Second was hormone drip. It was started at 3pm and my waters were broken. She was born at 11.03pm weighing 9lbs 8. Established labour was five hours.
Third was gel induction started at just before midnight he was born at 3.10am weighing 9lbs. Established labour was about twenty minutes.

Didn’t have anything other than gas and air and no assisted delivery

Hi there
POSITIVE INDUCTION STORY here

I was induced at 38+4 with 1st baby

1st gel was at about 1am on Sunday morning (At this point I was not dilated at all)

2nd gel at about 9am. Sunday Luckily very sunny day and was able to walk loads (20,000 steps outside) - by next exam 4/5ish able to break waters but no space on Labour ward so advised to sleep.

04.30 am Monday bed became available
06.30 waters broken
Hormonal drip up at 08.00
Contracting 4 in 10 by 12.00 (established labour)
using TENS and gas and air
2.30pm remifentanyl for pain relief

4pm - 5cm dilated

6pm - examined earlier than should have been due to extreme pain - possibly fully dilated ? I was only 6cm dilated - epidural (aka GODSEND)

Able to have some sleep
10pm re-examined - fully dilated
Given 2 hours for baby’s head to descend but heart rate started to dip so started to push around 11.40
Baby born at 00.20 - no instrumental required / no perineal trauma. Baby was smallish at 6pounds 6 so maybe that had something to do with lack of instrumental etc.

Top tips
1)Walk as much and eat/ drink as much whilst gels / pessaries are in. I think the walking really helped me dilate !
2)Find out what your units stance on eating when being induced is - mine didn’t allow you to eat but my partner and I read up on benefits and risks and I kept energy up with cucumbers / baby bells / carrot sticks and loads of water - don’t think I could have done it without as it is exhausting
3)Have a good plan for pain relief - once drip is in effect it gets very intense v quickly - I found epidural really helpful get some rest plus if need an instrumental or episiotomy already have pain relief on board
4)have a good hypeman/woman as birthing partner
5)stay positive !! Hospitals can be scary places and often thigg ng a don’t go as planned / there are delays - trying to stay calm will help with oxytocin !

happy to be PMd if you want to - I think inductions get a bad rep - mostly because bad news travels fast but there are loads of positive induction stories on peanut etc if you search them out

I was induced at 38 weeks for a big baby. Pessary at 1pm, by 1am in unbearable pain and still told it wasn’t labour and only offered paracetamol. 9am Pessary fell out and bleeding started. Demanded to see doctor as was sure if this wasn’t Labour and it hurt this much then I needed a c section. Finally doctor came and it turned out I was 10cm 🤪
as soon as I was on delivery I got an epidural and, it was incredible. We ended up needing forceps in theatre but it was a really controlled great experience, healed really well from episiotomy.

my main advice is to get them to examine you to see how dilated you are if you’re in pain and get the epidural asap

Oh also baby turned out not to be big so induction wasn’t really necessary - but that’s with hindsight. I would never have been willing to take the risk so was always going to have an induction if the doctors recommended

Positive experience!
2nd baby, induction started at 12pm with pessary,
Waters went at 9pm, labour really ramped up!! 😅 had an epidural sometime in early hours! Labour slowed down but got to 10cms, had hormone drip to help speed up my contractions and had a normal vaginal birth at 11.46am!

1st was a spontaneous labour at 36 weeks ending up in forceps!

I was induced at 38 weeks. Mine was because of stop start premature labour which had been going on for weeks but never progressing. Second baby. 7lb 7oz.

Pessary at midday(ish). Hot bath at 10pm. Diamorphine at 11pm. Wore off at 4am and I was properly in labour. Asked for an epidural. Told no as I was 10cm dilated and it was time to push. Pushed. Born 5.15am.

It was a quick and positive experience for me.

I was induced 38 weeks with a small baby. Was actually already 2cm dilated so didn’t need pessary or the balloon so if you can it’s worth getting examined beforehand!

I had a sweep whilst waiting for a bed on delivery suite to break all my waters, the sweep actually broke my waters. My baby didn’t like the drip but I wasn’t on it long at all and because he was small there was a low tolerance. I had a csection but it wasn’t a super emergency.

In my NCT group there were 6 inductions and all of us had a section.

I’ve had two positive experiences of induction, just to add balance to the horror stories you often hear!

Neither at 38 weeks, but first was at 39+0 - baby expected to be big with a huge head!

Went in at 7pm
2cm already - so had ARM at 8pm
Nothing happened 😂
Drip commenced at 10pm ish
(Followed by epidural - wish I’d listened and got that beforehand…)
All fine after that - baby born at 5am

He was totally average size though with a very normal head.

I did. It took 2 hrs!

Not my first baby but was induced at 37 weeks due to waters going at 34.

She was out 11 hours after they gave me the gel. It was fine, didn't need any other induction stuff (pessary or drip etc). No worse than my first birth which wasn't induced.

I will say though, from what I’d read & talked to people about with the drip, I went in with an absolute refusal to give consent to the drip unless I physically had the epidural administered. Not promised it was on its way, or “let’s see how you go” but actually in and working. As it happened it didn’t come to that, but that was the advice I’d had.