First baby and would like to avoid pain relief or am I being silly?

[mrswee]

Hi

I am 31 weeks pregnant just now and planning for a natural birth for my first baby.

However of course I have no experience of the pain I may endure and I am wondering if I am just setting myself up to be traumatised for the sake of being stubborn!!? I do have a couple of friends who are struggling to recover mentally from recent first births.

I know birth plans often go out the window and that I can always change my mind and scream for pain killers if I really need... but I'd like to try to be positive about at least attempting to do this.

But can people come and talk to me about their good experiences and give tips on how to cope through a first natural birth?

and also if anyone who went down this road and really regrets it and feels strongly enough to say I maycbe making a mistake please also speak up!

thanks in advance

Chubbychipmonk, i just wanted to post to say that before the birth of my first dd in March my friends fell about laughing at my wish not to have pain relief if at all possible. There was much guffawing and suggestions of lavender oil and rescue remedy for such a ridiculous idea! Anyway dd duly arrived without any pain relief except a little gas and air for the ambulance ride 30 mins before a ventouse delivery (i was planning a home birth but had to transfer last min for a little help getting her out.) It was a really positive experience and def possible in a simple labour. Like loads of people said here an open mind is the way to go though. I would have taken pain relief if needed it esp if needed induction etc. just didn't need it on the day. I did listen to hypno cd a couple of times but not sure if it helped possibly made me remember to breathe which I would say is key .. Ignore the critics around you, its your body and your choice!! Just as an aside I am truely the type to cry on stubbing my toe so def not blessed with stupidly high pain threshold!! Good Luck

I don't think you are being silly at all, I think you are being very clued up actually and I wished I had been too.

Have two DC.

DD hospital 36 hours labour and all the drugs in the books (yes all of them and tens) + ventouse

When pregnant with DS thought there must be a better way. I had a home water birth (would have been lovely if I had been in the pool longer than 20 minutes to deliver). I used:

• birth pool
• was active for the first part (walking gently round nearby lake)
• hypnobirthing and breathing
• clary sage on wet flannel
• a bit of homeopathy

And that is it.

The best bit of a natural birth is that you recover much much faster. Provided you/baby do not have any specific medical condition and that the baby is in the right position, I really believe a lot of the coping comes from your mindset (and I repeat I am a complete wimp a papercut makes me wimpy). For me, I was determined to have a different experience.

This said, keep an open mind as you cannot control what will happen and what matters is a safe mummy and baby.

I thought I wanted to do it without pain relief and ended up with all kinds, plus a c-section on top of it.

Keep an open mind, and if it hurts too much,let them help, it's no biggie.

I don't think you are being silly. On ds I put down that I wanted pain relief in the order of G and A, Pethadine then epidural.

Although I wanted a natural birth I wanted to keep my options open. However ds was posterior and after 22 1/2 hours of labor I asked the mw for gas and air and she said no because she wanted me to sleep because I was going to be in labor for another day or two. She said all I could have was a quarter of the normal dose of pethadine it turned out stupid mw was wrong and I was in transition ds was born 30 mins later. Luckily no ill effects from pethadine as my dose was so small. So my first advice is if you do start feeling you cant handle the pain MAKE them check you you might be really close.

On dd I had no pain relief but had to be given gas and air as I was pushing before I was fully dilated. The second advice I would give is keep the epidural as a get out clause so when you have a cc you know you can make it stop it made me feel more in control.

Thirdly as others have said stay at home if possible, and try and stay mobile I was unable to do either of these on ds but it made a big difference on dd. Lastly a good birthing partener is worth their weight in gold hope it all goes well.

Hiya,

I was quite nervous about the pain of giving birth and I went for a homebirth although I was openminded about transferring to hospital.

Just as well as I ended up with an emergency C section after 70 hours of labour,and only getting to 4cm's after being on the Syntocin drip too!

Not sure many would manage that without pain relief but it's not what you would call a natural birth is it!

I think it's good to be openminded.you seem confident and there is nothing wrong with aiming for as natural a birth as possible.

I would imagine a 12 hour straightforward labour would be easier to manage without pain relief than mine,but who knows.

good luck

Thanks again for your further responses!

More great and helpful advise!

Needahand - what homeopathy did you use during birth? I'm thinking of going for a consultation before hand.

Slushy06- great advise, thanks... very good point at asking to be checked before thinking it might be time just to go for pain killers just in case I am nearly there anyway, will keep that in mind!

Chubbychipmunk - having just read your post I have realised that I haven't told any of my friends my intentions of trying for a natural birth.. I don't know if that was a subconcious choice I made to avoid thier stories and any negativity, but I think I may keep it that way!
I have been using a hypnobirthing CD and one thing it says is a line about letting people's negative birth stories wash over you and not enter your head! I hope it works!

Hi Mrswee

Can't remember what homeopathy I had. I went for a consultation (with my husband) and the homeopath made a list of what to take, when etc.. I also purchased one of the ainsworth mum and child pack (which I still use every now and again).

And I definitely second Slushy's adivce too!

Hypnobirthing is fab too.

Good luck, I hope you get the birth you wish for

Good point . . think from now on I will refrain from tellnig anyone else about my birth plans to avoid the negativity vibe! My hypnobirthing CD is in the post!! . . .fingers crossed for us!!

thanks both of you! fingers crossed for you too CC!

I had first baby with pain relief, have to say I didn't think the relief was all that significant. Second baby was 9.4 and no pain relief (I want a medal), because hospital was overbooked for inductions, csections, and then flooded with walk-ins. I was induced too, and Pitocin contractions can be sharper than natural contractions. So no anesthesiologist was available during the window when I could have had the epidural. This was in the oh so fabulous US of A, in a university hospital. By the time I realised I would have to go it alone it was far too late to take my business elsewhere.
The thing is that birth happens and then the pain is completely over except for afterpains, which will go on for a while (maybe 2 weeks). I tried lamaze, but hyperventilated. There's a method (bradley?) where you mentally embrace the pain. I actually did this without knowing it. Also, I had experienced the first birth so I knew I had the great feeling ahead when it all stops. It gave me hope. It's easy to feel panicky when things start to feel really rough, and I had the serious thought at one point that I would like to go home and get some sleep and come back tomorrow when I was feeling better.
I went ahead and had the rest of my DCs without pain relief, but I had a shot for nausea with some of them. Babies seemed no different one way or the other, good apgar scores, healthy. Now that I think of it, there was one nice, simple pain relief method that was a little help, effleurage -- your birth helper strokes your tummy very very lightly with fingertips or something very light while contractions are at their height. Whatever you do, don't let any medical personnel do an internal exam during a contraction.

It's not stupid at all. What can you do?

1. Prepare for it to hurt. A lot. I was unprepared for the pain - it overwhelmed me and I ended up with pethedine. Second and third time round I knew what to expect and was ready for it. No painkillers and nothing I couldn't handle.

1. Keep all your options open. DOn't say 'I won't' just say I will see.

1. Keep moving. Don't lie on your back and groan like I did first time round It made it all longer and more tiring.

1. Remember that you can do this seemingly impossible task. Unless something goes wrong you are not asking more of your body than it can manage. If things do go wrong do what makes it easier.

1. Each contraction brings the end, and your baby closer.

Well, the pain doesn't really disappear between contractions. In fact, in the later stages, the contractions may be so close together that you can't tell when one ends and the next one begins. Bear in mind too that this is a huge muscular effort that you have not trained for. Even between contractions, after a few hours you may be stiff and tense and the muscles of your neck and thighs may be hurting. If you experience back labour, where the pain radiates to your back, things can be really rough. You and your birth partner need to find out the pain relief options in advance. You should plan on depending on the birth partner to really be an advocate for you, and to do a lot of calm listening and helping you decide. Thinking gets to be difficult as the process wears on. Your entire body and mind focus on the birth.

i had gas and air with both of mine. remember to breath and you'll be fine!!!!!!!! i had quick births so no time for anything else anyway!! good luck

I had a horrible first birth - 32 hours, ventouse, pph etc, and was determined to have a natural delivery second time around. I wrote out a birth-plan in careful consultation with my mw. It basically said I wanted to avoid x, y and z (Not I will not have...). I wanted to avoid syntocinon mainly, and wanted to avoid epidural and pethidine. I am SO glad I had this birth plan, because several mw's made noises about needing to 'speed things up' and so forth, but when they read my plan they were more in the picture about what kind of birth I wanted. My mw said basically unless you want to 'speed things up' there is no need to, and as people have probably said, once drugs like syntocinon are introduced into the equation, the pain shifts up a gear without your body being able to cope as well. So, if you can avoid that, and let your body adjust to the pain using natural methods like breathing techniques and TENS there is every chance you will be fine for a natural delivery. I switched my TENS machine off because it was irritating me so much, but towards the end the mw suggested I try it again as ds was back to back, and the contractions were sort of lingering - not disappearing as I'd expected them to do. This second chance for the TENS machine really helped. Then I suddenly thought that I'd try the birthing pool - anything to help relax me. I got in, and about five minutes later ds arrived, the water so amazing! I'd recommend you try it if you can. Good luck - it does hurt, and at the time I remember thinking I couldn't cope, but mw kept telling me not to think ahead, deal with each contraction at a time. I wanted to know how much longer I had to keep going for - but obviously you don't know, and sometimes it gets so disheartening if you are examined and you haven't dilated more for x hours, but you have to remain really positive and determined. Make sure you have a birth partner who really understands your birth plan and can advocate for you. My first birth went awry because I was unprepared, and just thought I'd follow the medics advice, and saw pain-relief as a sort of sliding scale, i.e. I'll start with gas and air and work my way up. Second time around I knew what I wanted and didn't want, and ds was born 9lb 13oz with just gas and air. It hurt, but we all recovered much better than the first time around. Good luck

Agree with all of the above too. My experiences have been no pain relief (inc g & a or paracetamol!)for dd1 now 3 or 14 weeks old twins - all delivered in hospital, on my back (known to be worst position possible)!!!

I think as the others have said it is important to look at what's available, be flexible during delivery as none of us know until we're in the middle of it how the baby is doing etc and trust in the person delivering/birth partner. (my midwives were all great as was dh). My preference for delivering all 3 babies was as natural as possible with as little intervention as possible - which I was particularly concerned about for the second twin, but also with a view to being open to whatever the medical team advised in terms of what was best for the baby. As has been said - no medals for not having pain relief and it was invented for a reason. On the other hand the pain isn't going to kill you -even if it might feel like it! And as someone else has said you do get breaks from it in between contractions.
It goes without saying that much depends on the length of your labour which no-one has control over - I was lucky as my babies were all born quickly and I know I would not have been able to manage the pain without pain relief if labour had gone on for a very long time. For what it's worth I did hypnobirthing cds during 1st pregnancy but not during labour but think that may have helped with breathing etc. Good luck with the rest of your pregnancy and hope you get the delivery you want.