Fetal Ejection Reflex

[PearlSupernova]

I feel compelled to share my birth stories and see if anyone has experienced similar.

with DS1 I had a very long, slow and painful labour. I wasn’t coping well (to say the least). Evebtually I was given an epidural. When I was fully dilated , I was told when to push, but because I couldn’t feel anything and I didn’t know what I was doing, nothing progressed. This continued for an hour until the midwives intervened and I had a very unpleasant forceps delivery.

My second labour couldn’t have been more different. Everything happened really quickly (5cm on arrival to baby born within 1hr 15 mins). My body pushed the baby out completely involuntarily. I didn’t have an urge to push, in fact I didn’t even recognise my body was pushing as it was completely out of my control. I recall saying to my partner that I thought something was wrong, because at the end of my contractions my body was ‘seizing up’ of its own accord. I was just a bystander. At this point he pushed the emergency button and the midwives all came rushing in. I still had my leggings and knickers on!
I asked for an epidural, but was told there wasn’t time as they could see the baby’s head! I was completely bewildered as I was only 5cms just a short time before.
The midwives said next contraction baby’s head would be out, but again I didn’t do any pushing. I was laid on my back. I distinctly remember feeling very far away, inside myself. Baby’s head came out on its own. I didn’t experience any crowning / burning pain. My partner said I was silent at the end.
I have since learned my second labour could have been FER, but have also read this is very rare? The experience was totally bizarre, but far preferable to all the unsuccessful pushing and straining of my first.

That’s exactly how I’d describe it, like vomiting but down instead of up 😅 I also had no pain when pushing with my son.

@TheBirdintheCave I had no pain at all throughout the whole labour and delivery. Just that gutteral, severe tightening, downward vomiting feeling. I’m guessing this is very rare.

I had a similar experience with my second baby in October. I had an elective caesarean with my first baby as I'd got to 43 weeks and was basically bullied into it. For my second baby I was determined not to be cohersed so decided to have a home birth. I went into active labour around 2am (4cm dilated) and baby arrived at 5am. Around 3.30/4ish I felt like a really needed a poo but wanted to go to my upstairs bathroom away from the midwives. Once I got on the loo my waters broke and labour went from 0 to 100. I'd had no pain relief upto this point and had managed with a tens machine. The midwife just about managed to examine me and said I was 7cm dilated (felt like I was going to kick her!) The contractions were relentless and it felt like my body was almost convulsing. The midwife asked if I felt like pushing which surprised me as I thought she would have realised that my body was pushing and I had no control over it. The midwife asked if I wanted to go to hospital and I said yes I wanted all the drugs! If I'd been in the right state of mind, I would have realised that baby was arriving soon and no one told me there was no time for drugs! We arrived at the hospital and I was wheeled into a room on the labour ward. I managed to step off the gurny and with the next contraction she almost flew out while I was standing. No head then shoulders, straight out! The midwife said after that she thought she would have to deliver on the ambulance and it was ashame I hadn't stayed at home. But as I say, I wasn't in my right frame of mind. And I was quite happy that I'd done the hard work at home and the messy part in hospital! There were a lot of moments where it was like an out of body experience and I was watching someone else give birth. Not sure if this is something everyone experiences as a way of coping

I had this with my third, I was having only Labour never gained momentum I was having 3 or so contractions every half and hour, I was in the pool and contractions got even further apart, I hadn’t had a contraction for ten minutes, when I suddenly had one involuntary contraction where my water broke, another one 90 seconds later where his head was born and one a minute later where he was born

This happened to my mum when she had me. She told them that her body was just doing it and she had no choice. I came out very fast and far quicker than anyone expected. They’d actually sent my dad home for a bit as they said it would be hours.
He missed my birth as a result 😂