Bit of a daft one...is everyone always bruised/swollen after birth?

[Oscy]

This one's been playing on my mind with no. 2 due this year. After dc 1, I had (tmi alert) the most swollen bits I had ever thought possible. Honestly, everything was literally three times the size it had been down there. Also massive bruising on one side from a haematoma. My daft question is does this happen everyone? Or just those with long pushing stages? (mine wasn't that long, 1hr 15mins). I am very much not looking forward to seeing the car crash that was my ladygarden after birth, but at least I can prepare myself if the same thing is going to happen. Thanks in advance, and excuse the daftness.

CoteDAzur - thank you - I'm always happy to have something to add to my armoury.

Clitoral stitches? - ouch!

I remember telling my friend that I had elephantiasis of the undercarriage....

These are great replies - like so many birth issues I feel the real truth of swelling/bruising/car crash appearance etc is sort of glossed over, so I think the shock of it all was worse than the actual swelling iykwim. cotedazur I was popping arnica pills like my life depended on it. I a bit to hear they are sugar pills.
Anyway, from the sounds of it all the next dc's birth shouldn't be as swollen. I also feel a great relief that so many went through this, not just me!

I had this too. was told by the mw that it was like I had a black eye down there!!!!. I had some very helpful ultrasound therapy (physio came round with a machine) that reduced the swelling enough so I could sit down.

Take Arnica 200, one dose just as you go into labour, and another every 24 hours, or Arnica 30 more often. Should help.

Oscy - Sorry to break the news to you but indeed arnica tablets, like all homeopathy tablets, are sugar pills. There is probably not even 1 molecule of arnica in any of them.

Incidentally, there is a $ 1 million reward for whoever proves that homeopathy works. Here is the BBC documentary on the subject. Needless to say, the reward still hasn't been claimed.

"had sex within 2 weeks"

It took me longer to put on real clothes. I could sit by 3 weeks.

Had 4 stitches and some bruising - got off lightly, as dd got a bit stuck. Baths with tea tree oil helped, and I sat on sports ice packs wrapped in a towel quite a lot...

With 1st I was for AGES but the other two not really. Even with a 14 year break in between!

Cant say I was leaping about and doing the splits but it was suprising ok. Y'never know!

can someone tell me were you get these tablets???

with ds i had small graze and swollen and i bathed in savlon and put witch hazel on my pad TMI i kept it in the fridge and it was just so soothing and refreshing when you had it on .

At Boots, for example.

Before you reach for the purse, read this though.

Boots is becoming the country's largest seller of quack medicine, according to Britain's leading scientific expert on alternative therapies."

... more than 50 homeopathic remedies, which are shown by clinical trials to be no more effective than sugar pills.

Ernst accuses the company of breaching ethical guidelines drawn up by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, by failing to tell customers that its homeopathic medicines contain no active ingredients and are ineffective in clinical trials.