Mears is doing a bit of research on women who have long early labour phase

[mears]

I am looking at developing a research question for women who had long phase of early labour. I am sure that applies to many of you out there and I am hoping you will share your experiences.

I am focusing on what your experience was when getting to hospital and being told that you were not in active labour and what your views are about your experience. Initial questions are

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission?

2. What was response from midwife on telephone

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour

5. How did you feel about it

6. How long did pre/early labour last

7. When did you go into actual labour

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going

9. What type of pain relief did you have

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently

Those are some initial thoughts about questions for women. Some of you may be able to suggest others.

I am trying to get a feel of how to approach it. Any help will be gratefully receives as ever, mears.

First Labour

1. Admission - waters had broken after 24 hours of mild/mod contractions
2. Come in
3. Went in imediately, I wanted to but also told to.
4. Had to stay in hospital (was 3cm with painful contractions) but no pain relief offered - told to sleep on ante-natal ward.
5. Angry - wanted to go back home if things weren't moving very fast - couldn't sleep..too much pain..spent night pacing up and down corridor to help deal with pain.
6. 3cm to 4cm took 12 hours..took further 14 hours to get to 10cm.
7. Was admitted to labour ward at 4cm dilated, 6am - having spent night in ante-natal officially pre-labour - ie. moved when new shift started.
8. Was in labour myself..had drip to try to speed things up when 6cm dilated. (about 48 hours after contractions began) 9)Nothing until I had drip then asked for epidural which was unsuccessful (numbed legs only)
9. Emergency section due to fetal malposition (head turned over shoulder)
10. I would have liked to have some effective pain relief - I would have liked to go back home in early labour/attempt a home birth - to eat during early labour, actually can't think abour it too much, have blocked a lot of it out.

Second labour

1. Contacted hospital as had mild contractions but sustained and frequent and I was trial of scar.

2. Told to go in.

3. My decision as contractions were close and strong.

4. Was 3cm and was kept in all day and overnight as they were convinced I was in active labour - I decided I wasn't but the monitor kept recording strong contractions every 15 mins..eventually was allowed to go home (after night on ante-natal ward, kept awake all night as some other poor soul delivered her baby on the ante-natal ward (midwives kept telling her she wasn't in active labour, until the head was showing)

5. Relieved when I was allowed to go home - stayed away from hospital for 14 days - with mild/mod contractions all the time..until pain got unbearable.
   6)Pre-labour lasted 14 days, was 4cm 'active' when returned to hospital.

6. Middle of the night as is traditional - was still slow though but much more painful.

7. Went into labour myself - but did not progress 'quickly enough' - had ARM after 8 hours.

8. Gas and air followed by an ineffective epidural plus g and a after ARM.

9. Ventouse assisted with shoulder dystocea (can't spell that)

10. Had a doula with me, or independant midwife at home so could stay at home as long as poss. Oh, and told the consultant aneasthetist exactly what I thought of her before leaving the hospital.

11. for first labour - I wish the midwives hadn't changed so frequently (I saw 12 over the whole time - which must be the whole team!), and I wish one hadn't gone on about parking restrictions when I was trying to deal with contractions and no pain relief - I wish they had OFFERED me some pain relief - I never really got my head together enough to ask for most of first day. I wish that they believed that the epidural didn't work. I wish that they hadn't kept sending dh off for meals. I wish that the final one hadn't started an arguement about the name we had chosen for the baby.

for second labour - I had 2 midwives the first was obsessed with the monitor having a perfect read-out and was therefore negligent in dealing with the human on the end of it (was more worried about the monitor loosing contact when the epidural went in then about me staying still) - she only worked 1 day a month on the ward and it showed. I wish she had left me alone (sat in the corner of the room all the time - really put me off)
the second one was lovely,..only wish she hadn't had the same name as dh's ex, or I would have named dd after her

DS1 established really well - contractions started at 8.30am, internal around 2pm confirmed 4cm dilated, but cs at 9.30 as failure to progress (7/8cm dilated) and baby in distress.

So with ds2, nobody including me wanted to take any risks, I expected to establish as quickly again, and mw's always keen to check scar OK.

1. Started contractions Sat night, used tens and also took some paracetemol I think. Eventually rang around 6am Sun am and asked to go in.

2. Come in, but no rush.

3. Went in mid-morning, when sister arrived to look after ds1.

4. Initially told I was in active labour and that I was 2-3cm dilated. However, contractions gradually faded and everything ground to a halt by mid-afternoon. Obvious even to me that I should go home.

5. Very dejected, never occured that it could be like this, after establishing so well first time around. Never occured to me to ask for any sort of intervention and wouldn't have agreed if offered.

6. 24 hours?

7. Contractions started again that evening, phoned around 11 and went in around midnight. Was examined around 1am and mw confirmed I was 3/4cm dilated and established.

8. Myself

9. Tens, gas and air.

10. Vaginal but with 3rd degree tear.

11. Not sure that I would have done anything differently myself, as I assumed everything would happen as quickly (or more quickly than) first time around. Also had coped really badly with pain first time around, racing through pain relief options until I got to epidural (found out during cs that baby was op), so expected similar again.

12.Know your MW - where I live, great efforts are made to ensure continuity of care from mw for ante and post natal care. But mw for labour is a complete stranger to you. Personally, I'd rather opt for complete stranger to test my pee etc and have at least a passing aquaintance with mw who's going to deliver my baby. Perhaps it would have helped people like me who want reassurance if home visits were a possibility? Also, mw on first admission could have mentioned that being slightly dilated is quite common for second baby and is completely unrelated to labour...or so mw on second admission told me. Finally (honest) the change of shift is hard to cope with. First mw on the night was full of energy and really helped me cope with pain. On change of shift, was like someone had taken all the energy out of the room (and I had extremely long stage 2, that was going absolutely nowhere until I was threatened with epi for forceps in theatre in case no success and cs required...at which point I pushed for england, delivered baby and tore...)

This is about my second labour.

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission? Regular contractions (five mins apart) but they were not painful.

2. What was response from midwife on telephone? Come in and we'll have a look.

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone? Joint decision.

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour? They advised that I stayed in as labour looked likely to start.

5. How did you feel about it? Happy to be there because of worries about Strep B.

6. How long did pre/early labour last? Had been having gentle contractions since waking in the morning at about 7am right through to proper contractions starting about midnight.

7. When did you go into actual labour? Midnight

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going? The pace of the contractions suddenly picked up by themselves, no interventions (in fact I had just been given a Tamazepam to try and get me to sleep).

9. What type of pain relief did you have? Gas and Air only

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had? Normal but very fast delivery (second labour), second degree tear.

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently? Not taken the Tamazepam!

SP - interested in all. 15 hours seems pretty long to me.

Thanks Chandra - got your CAT.

Aloha - I agree with you. I think that there is something that needs to be done about supporting women rather than just giving injectable pain relief. For women not in active labour, high dose opiates is not the answer. I notice that distressed women often become calm again when they get one-to-one care in the labour ward. However labour wards are not staffed to have lots of women who are not in active labour. I think pain is intensified by fear and being out of your own surroundings to some extent. Would women be so fearful if they truly understood how labour works? Prelabour is a normal start to the process. It is finding out how we can help women through that bit without them thinking that you don't care.

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission?

advice. waters had just broken, had been having contractions for two nights previously 10-15 mins apart, just painful enough to keep me awake.

2. What was response from midwife on telephone
   good, said to come in and be checked over. examined but told she couldnt see for fluid, told to come back when contractions started again and got to 10 mins (reason for this was to be kept an eye on as previous section)

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone
   phoned up some hours later (around 9pm i think) when contractions got to 10 mins. midwife said come in and when i got there asked how the pain was. i said "bearable". she said "so why are you here?" i said i'd been told to come in. she looked at me like i was a crazy liar, shrugged and went to sort me out a bed.

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour
   to send my birth partner home and get some sleep with 2 paracetamol.

5. How did you feel about it
   rubbish, i wanted to go home. tossed and turned all night in lots of pain. 3 days now with no sleep.

6. How long did pre/early labour last
   until i couldnt bear it anymore, (was extremely painful by now, hadnt been examined so i dont know if i had dilated at all). panicked about baby's heartrate (i was told i would be taken down to theatre pronto, then 15 mins later told it was all ok now), was told they would induce me. (had been 18 hours since waters broke) burst into tears and asked for another section

7. When did you go into actual labour
   i didnt, see above.

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going
   as above again!

9. What type of pain relief did you have
   none apart from those ruddy paracetamol (which didnt work)

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had
    section in late afternoon

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently
    i wish i'd have researched vbac more instead of assuming i would just go into labour on my own.

12. What would you have midwives to have done differently.
    to have a bit more sympathy, not make me feel like a fraud who was being laughed at for making a fuss (the pain was VERY real i can assure you!) maybe if someone had explained to me properly what pre labour actually was i may have been calmer and not panicked like i did.
    (didnt give me much confidence when one said "youre not in labour, baby wont be appearing tonight..mind you..i said that to a girl earlier and she nearly had her baby in the bathroom" chortle chortle!!)

so you're not interested in mine either then mears?

Meant to say thank you so much for sharing your experiences. Missed your post Cha - yes I would like to have you

Probably when I get to grips with setting my actual research question I will concentrate on first labours so that the women have no prior experience of labour. It will be a small project really. I am going to save this thread so that I can digest it properly.

Can you think of any other questions I should be asking women about the prelabour phase?

Jampots - when you were admitted for observation did they decide that the waters hadn't broken after all? If it was confirmed you certainly were left a long time. I think you are outwith my low risk normal category

they scanned me on the monday (waters broke on the sat morning) and ascertained that i had "diminished liquor" so i presume they'd gone. Certainly one of the points they apologised for was not administering my anti-biotics when they should have

hi mears

1. to ask advice and get reassurance cos i was so anxious/hyper/excited

2. calm down debbie! come in and see us if you feel you want/need to (i live only 5 mins away from the birthing centre)

3.went in an hr later

4. stay in the ward if you like, or go home and keep in touch

5. felt disappointed although i knew they were right

6.lasted 19 hrs from 1st contraction at 2am

7. 11pm next night

8. went into labour myself

9. had gas and air and 2 inj of diamorphine

10. delivery was just straightforward vaginal

11. wouldnt change a thing

12. was really happy with the midwives, althought they could have brought my tea and toast a bit quicker afterwards!

1st pg was horrible cos dd1 was rushed off, so this pg and labour was fab

hth

1. First rang the hospital when contractions were happening every 5 mins.

2. Told to ring back when every 3 minutes

3. Phoned when they were 3 mintues and told to call back when they were 2 minutes

4. As above

5. Frustrated as I'd been having contractions for almost 36 hours by this point

6. Had mild contractions every 10 mins for about 6 hours. Stronger contractions every 5 mins for 8 hours. They stopped for about 2 hours and then returned and were every 10 mins for the next 8 hours then every five mins for a couple of hours and then speeded up over the next few hours until allowed to go into hospital at 1am. Baby delivered at 3.15pm following day. So contractions for 48 hours approx.

7. I don't know when I went into active labour. Went into Kings, examined then left for four hours.

8. Waters were broken by midwife

9. Tens, gas and air

10. Active birth, 'textbook delivery'

11. I wish the midwives I'd spoken to on the phone had been a bit more sypmathetic to the fact that I'd been in pain for so long. Also wish dp and I hadn't been abandonded in the delivery room as I had no idea whether I was in active labour or how close to delivery I was.

That said, I had a new fantastic midwife (Jane Grant) arrive at the shift change in the morning. She and student midwife Xim turned what could have been a very miserable frightening time, into something extremely positive.

OK -

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission? I had been told to just go to the hosp (no phoning midwives here - that would be far too high tech).

2. What was response from midwife on telephone
   n/a

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone - Mine - see above. I went in when contractions were 7 mins apart because I couldn't remember if it was 5 or 10 mins that the midwife had said

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour - no options - told to wait in ward. Now you come to mention it, I probably could have gone home if I had asked, but didn't have the confidence to do so. I had no idea of how long i would be waiting for - midwife said I was 2 cms dilated but i didn't know what that meant.

5. How did you feel about it - dissapointed I guess - wanted to get it over with!

6. How long did pre/early labour last - 15 hours (from 8 am when we arrived at hosp)

7. When did you go into actual labour -11pm

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going - midwife broke waters

9. What type of pain relief did you have - epidural

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had - vetuose (after 2 hours pushing.)

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently - wouldn't have had epidural, would like to have stayed at home for longer.

12. would like to have had more info from first midwife. Second midwife (the one who let me push for 2 hours even though that is very long for a Spanish hospital, and also tried to dissuade me from having an epidural) was great. If she hadn't been childless, I probably would have listened to her about the epidural.

I don't actually know what 1st stage is. Is it before you have got to 3 cm? If so, this lasted about 1 1/2 weeks for me, but then going from 3 cm to 10 cm took an hour. Completely normal, low risk, but one difference might be that I was booked for a home birth (but ds born in hospital), so procedure would have differed.

1. Contacted hospital to ask for advice as in quite a lot of pain.
2. Community midwife came out to examine me.
3. Went in because a. losing quite a lot of blood b. in quite a lot of pain, and told could have pethidine or gas and air ONLY in hospital, as not in active labour.
4. Options: stay at home and use useless TENS machine, or go to hospital for pain relief.
5. Not clear why I couldn't have pethidine/gas and air at home, but apart from this, fine.
6. If early/pre labour is pre 3 cm then 1 1/2 weeks.
7. About an hour later.
8. No intervention.
9. Gas and air on arrival at hospital followed by pethidine about 30 minutes later.
10. No assistance with delivery, no epidurals or anything.
11. In that situation I would have done everything the same, but this time round (baby due July) I will a. get advice, eg from ARMs, about bleeding during labour. I thought it was not unknown, and not necessarily bad, but my community midwife advises that they will admit and treat as high risk a woman with bleeding in pregnancy, even if she has a history of this. b. I will try to stay at home that bit longer, even if in lots of pain.

I regret having had a hospital birth only because of the care after ds was born. I was told he would die if I didn't stay in hospital, because I wouldn't be able to work out how to breastfeed (I wasn't actually given any help with this or anything). There was no privacy or even baby changing facilites! And the food was really, really bad, and I do believe that proper, healthy food is vital after doing something like giving birth. And no baths (there was ONE, way down the corridor in the pre-natal ward, but it was broken).

I had long latent phase for #3 and #4. I was worried about getting caught short because #1 was a 3 hour labour and #2 was a painless first stage, so I thought missing the signals was a feasibility. I had my babies at home, btw.

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission?

To say that I thought I was in labour and could they send a midwife please.

2. What was response from midwife on telephone

Took me seriously.

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone

Homebirth, so midwife called promptly

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour

Nothing, just wait and get on with life.

5. How did you feel about it

Felt I had been a nuisance and felt stupid for over-reacting given that I had had babies before.

6. How long did pre/early labour last

#3: had midwives round from about 10pm - 10am. Called them back at about noon for the real thing and baby born at 2pm.

#4: had a bloody show on waking, so called the midwife who checked dilation; came back a few hours later and not much change. Called midwife at midnight and she came and sat with me for about 6 hours before deciding that nothing was happening. Real labour started a week later, and took about an hour.

7. When did you go into actual labour

#3: within a few hours; #4: a week later

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going

Spontaneous

9. What type of pain relief did you have

gas & air

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had

all natural

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently

With #5, I waited until I was in serious pain - but this ended up very different as it was a breech baby (natural delivery) in a US hospital.

This was my first labour:

1. Waters broke early morning so phoned hospital and they said come it to check. They confirmed and sent me home with instructions to come in once labout had started or within 24 hours if it had not. Contractions started some 9 hours after waters broke - absolute agony so I went in.

2. See above - midwife quite happy for me to come in.

3. Was told to when waters broke, when contractins started wanted to go in as was in agony.

4 Options were home for bath and/or paracetamol. I also had a TENS machine (for all the good it did!)

5. Felt gutted - paracetamol didn't work. Overheard someone say that the unit was now full and they couldn't have any more admissions, so decided not to go home under any circumstances - I was in PAIN!

6. Actual labour (they defined as once I had reached 3cms) was about 10 hours later.

7. 10 hours, plus another 9 since waters broke.

8. Labout was spontaneous.

9. Begged for epidural but it was now 1.00am so only one anaesthetist available and he was tied up with emergencies all night. Settled for Pethidine and gas and air. Finally got epidural at 8 in the morning (7 hours after established labout started).

10. Ended up having emergency CS - 25 hours after the first contraction. I managed to dilate to 6cms myself so was given syntocinon for 6 hours but dilated no further.

11. More anaesthetists to administer edipural! I think someone else has also mentioned but certainly I had no idea how painful the contractions were going to be - some idea of this would have been good - I might have felt more able to stay at home and manage them myself.

12 Midwives were OK, could have been more sympathetic (one could have made sure her fingernails were cut also - ouch!) especially in the early stages where they didn't really believe I was in so much agony. But I was - if someopne had given me a knife to cut dd out myself I would have done it!

It was so painful I decided that I would have a CS next time - and my consultant was quite happy to agree, but I would have gone private if he hadn't - there is no way on earth I am going through that pain again.

Hope that helps!

1. My waters broke

2. She came round to see me and confirmed the waters and said I was about 3cm on examination. Told me to put the babygrow on the radiator to warm!

3. Homebirth planned so midwife asked me to call her when contractions regular. (she lives down the road)

4. Stayed at home. Didn't have any contractions. Went to bed and had a good nights sleep. Midwife rather surprised not to be called.

5. Happy

6. 24 Hours

7. Midwife and hospital consultant suggested I go in to hospital for a drip as waters broken for 24 hours and no regular or strong contractions but 10cm dilated. I was upset that I had to go into hospital.

8. Didn't get contractions until the drip was in and then I was pushing right away. ds arrived 40 mins later

9. None

10. Induced, quite a big tear.

11. I would have liked to have been left for a bit longer to see if labour would have started. I believe they have changed the guidelines to 48 hours now before intervention after waters break. I didn't like the monitoring in the hospital. But it was only 40 mins so not too bad.

mears - would love to know what is categorised as a long early labour phase? Some of the replies on here are saying 11/12/13 hours but I wouldn't have said that was long? (mind you mine was 4 days!) just interested.

1. Suddenly started having contractions about 5 mins apart

2. to come straight in

3. after about 3 hrs - contractions were really strong and i thought i must be moments away from giving birth

4. really disappointed & fed up

6. about 24hrs

7. not really sure

8. baby was getting distressed so had waters broken, put on a monitor and had a drip as contractions stopped completely, there was meconium in my waters and dd had actually swallowed some.

9. epidural

10. managed to push her out myself but was moments away from having forceps.

11. i dont know what i'd have done differently but i was terrified that dd was going to die, was completely knackered, having to lie down all the while was horrid and i was sick from the epidural. Also my legs kept flopping off the bed and because of the epidural i couldnt feel them to lift them back and kept having to ask dh to put my legs back on the bed! Swore i'd never go thru it again but time must have dimmed the memory as i went on to have dd2, ds1 and ds2!

and had to have stitches as i had quite a spectacular tear down below!

Err... sorry to butt in... but you asked for ideas on other questions...

You have hypothesized that preparations might affect women's anxiety and ability to cope with pre-labour phase... Maybe a good question to ask is whether they had antenatal classes, which kind of antenatal classes and what their expectation of pain and suration was?

I don't fit in your research... Was actually having contraction every two minutes by the time I decide maybe something was going on.... and had to be convinved by DH and MW to stay in hospital when I went in and found out was 4cm dilated... I think a big part of this was that I did Bradley classes (that was in the US) and was brainwashed that I didn't want to get to the hospital too early! So I think you might have a point that how you deal with it has a lot to do with what you expect...

HTH

Sorry meant to say expectation about pain and DURATIOn of labour...

wow, you all have a good memory! mine was only last year and i am struggling already - let's see:

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission?

waters broke; well, was told to call in when that happens

2. What was response from midwife on telephone

come in when uncomfortable

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone

6 hrs later we went to hospital

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour

go home

5. How did you feel about it

sort of expected it anyways, but still, once it's finally happening you don't want to be just brushed over with

6. How long did pre/early labour last

is this when finally 3cm? then monday 6pm - thursday 7pm (although had quite strong contractions; all mw told me baby will be here any minute! - but went from 2cm - 4cm - back to 1cm and so on ...) - although hospital notes say '1st stage labour = 13.45 hrs ???)

7. When did you go into actual labour

got induced thursday evening

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going

started off 'spontaneous' ended up with a drip

9. What type of pain relief did you have

started off with tens and baths, tried gas/air (didn't do anything for me) and then epidural!

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had

em. c-section

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently

can't fault the mw! they all were brilliant (antenatal and during birth) - and i got to see alot of them - maybe the post natal care was quite 'rough'; esp with having had a c'section! and re bf i could have done with more support!!! some mw were really great but there were some they made you think you are too stupid to do it

1. What made you contact the hospital - to ask advice or ask for admission?

To ask advice I suppose but...

2. What was response from midwife on telephone
   That if I wanted to I could go in and they'd check me out

3. When did you go in - was it your decision or the midwife's on phone
   It was my decision. I shall tell you about labour 1 at the end, but for 2 and 3, things kicked off in the small hours and I really really didn't want to get caught in full labour in rush hour traffic. I think I was a bit panicked by labour 1.

4. What were your options when told you were not in active labour
   I could go home or go down to the anti-natal ward to wait.

5. How did you feel about it
   Really happy to be given the option to stay. While I know it makes sense to be in your own surroundings for as long as poss, that really wasn't what I wanted. I needed to know that I was in the right place. Plus I think the worry of getting there again on time.

6. How long did pre/early labour last
   Not sure what the definitions are of these two. Does this help: labour 2: got down to the ante-natal ward about 7 am, contractions got really strong about 1pm, 3-4 cm dilated at about 3, baby born at 5.10pm.
   Labour 3: got in about 7 am, up to labour ward about 10am, baby born 2.30pm. Oh the pain.

7. When did you go into actual labour
   Probably answered above already. How do you tell?

8. Did you go into labour yourself or did the midwife inetrvene such as break the waters to get things going
   No, went myself.

9. What type of pain relief did you have
   gas& air

10. What was the type of delivery you actually had
    three vaginal

11. Looking back on your experience, what would you like to have done differently

I don't think anything really, but the first was pretty traumatic. I hope that I will be forgiven by mothers who really have had traumatic times, but emotionally, my first birth took me a long time to recover from. I was 12 days overdue and taken in on Thursday evening, to be induced the following day. I don't think the procedure was ever really explained to me, but I was so huge and in such (pelvic) pain that I just wanted this thing out of me. At about 6pm on Thurs I had the gel, and I asked then what would happen next. I was told that I would probably be taken up to the labour suite at about midday. So at about 9, dh had gone home for a good night's sleep, and I thought I had better settle down for the same - in the comfortable knowledge that I would be having my baby the next day. My back was sore and I was fed up. 42 weeks pregnant and so uncomfortable. But I couldn't sleep. My back was getting more and more sore. the lights throughout the ward were now all off, but the drugs trolley hadn't been round yet - they were very busy. When she came, I'd get some painkillers and then get off to sleep. I went out to reception to see if they could tell me where she was. Just coming. Didn't come. I went to the loo and thought I was losing my baby because there was so much blood. "It's just a wee show" they said. I was now in severe pain, and really frightened. The person at reception was an auxiliary nurse and dh was at home in bed and I was in so much pain and all alone. Eventually the midwife came with her drugs and said did I want diamorphine. I was really frightened because I didn't really understand what was happening. I know that sounds really stupid, but after 42 weeks I knew when my baby was coming and it was tomorrow. It never entered my head it would be sooner. No, I refused diamorphine, because I thought it meant they would just go away and leave me alone. So she examined me and whisked me straight up to the labour ward. I was fully dilated at 12.15 and someone said "has anyone called the dad?" I think everyone assumed that someone else had done it. I had my diamorphine and plenty of gas and air and then pushed, without ever feeling the need, until 0537 on the Friday morning when he finally popped out. Then I had to have my placenta manually removed. That was great. i had a spinal and fell asleep. At last.
I cried about it all for weeks afterwards.
So saying, I have to stress that the staff at the QMH in Glasgow are absolutely superb. They are very accommodating and it was wonderful to be given so much choice about my comings and goings. I think the problem the first time was that I was completely unprepared for actually going into labour myself so I dealt with it in completely the wrong way.
Sorry this is so long...

I think I fit your criteria so here goes...

1. To ask for admission on advice of midwife who visited me at home.

2. I didn't speak to them myself (in too much pain!) but was advised to come into hospital.

3. I couldn't get there fast enough because the amount of pain I was in, and the length of time I'd been in that amount of pain, indicated to me that I must be in the advanced stages of labour - how wrong could I be?!

4. Told I was 1cm dilated & in latent stage of labour was given 2 paracetamol(!)and a TENS machine and packed of to the post natal ward to labour. Told to mobilise but was not sent home due to failure to keep track of baby's heartbeat adequately on trace machine.

5. Absolutely gutted and scared shitless - a general feeling of "if this is what it feels like when you're 1cm dilated what will the next few hours hold?"

6. Told I was 1cm dilatd at 15.30, got to 4cm when examined at around 21.40. Sent to labour ward, waters broken with crochet hook then at 22.30 decision taken to perform an emergency c/s due to decellerations/fetal distress.

7. See 6. above.

8. See 6. above.

9. 2 Paracetamol, TENS and about 2 whifs of gas and air.

10. Emergency c/s.

11. I don't actually feel that I had any power to change my experience. My labour simply didn't progress and I firmly believe that was always going to happen to me whatever I'd done to try and prevent it. I was left to labour on the post natal ward where mothers had their babies and visitors which in my view was apalling - I would definitely have changed that. In hindsight I wish I had been in a private hospital with a lovely private room with TV, other forms of distraction and access to food (which I wasn't offered in labour) where I could have had the epidural I had stated as my preferred method of pain relief without question or delay. On the day I gave birth at my local NHS hospital I was told, in no uncertain terms by a very harrassed sister midwife when I was in horrendous pain and extremely scared, that I couldn't have one due to lack of resources in terms of a very busy and dangerously understaffed labour ward.