How many weeks pregnant were you when you had your first baby?

[zebra]

1st baby, how many weeks (+days?) were you gone when the baby was born?
Was it spontaneous, induced or C-section with no labour?
If you don't mind saying, how would you describe your ethnic origin (some ethnic groups may go longer than others....)?

Ta! My answers are:
39 weeks+0days, spontaneious, American white mutt.

40w+16 days induced (took 5 days) British White

42+3... induced, failure to progress...CS after 11 hours labour. British white, dh South African white.

HI everyone -- thanks for additional replies! Revised stats.

PREGNANCY LENGTHS:
39+7d pregn. length everybody
39+4d pregn. length if spontaneious start

HOW LABOUR STARTED:
62.3% labour started spontaneously
30.8% labour induced with more than sweep or gel,
and led to C-section

INDUCTIONS
7.02% induced with only gel/sweep
5.26% premature births (before 36 weeks)
10.53% induced leading to birth after 41wks+4 days, including just induced by sweeps/gel

C-SECTIONS:
7.02% scheduled-C-section
20.2% C-section rate (however labour started)
7.04% C-section rate if labour started spontaneously
41.7% induced after 41 wks+4 days that led to C-section
4.4% of everybody, apparently induced for going over dates and then leading to a C-section

So, if you (apparently) were induced for going over dates, you had a whopping 42% risk of C-sections. I wonder if that's true for the general population! Ouch. I'm not out to start a debate about C-sects, but it's a stat to keep in mind when weighing up the risks of going past 42 weeks.

Although the risk of being one of those people whose pregnancy ends in failed induction for going over dates resuling in C-section, is only about 4.4%.

SuzyW: I could collect DH's ethnicity... but I think mother's ethnic group would be much more important, and all I could do here was try to pick out Celtic mums (Scots/Welsh/Irish) versus others. At a glance (all the data are good for) the Celts follow much same pattern as everyone else.

Oops, stuck the premies in with inductions -- should have been in the PREGNANCY LENGTH section.

40 weeks exactly. Spontaneous home birth.

Zebra, I'm curious as to whether you think there's a reason for homebirthers to go later?

Also, as others have mentioned scan dates, don't you need to differentiate between scan measures and last period measures for the pregnancy length figures to be meaningful?

I would assume it was because they weren't induced - homebirths cannot be induced otherwise they would be hospital births iyswim. Which seems to indicate that induction may be give too early and that the babies would come along in their own sweet time in most cases.

I guess you're right, aloha, but it was just the way zebra expressed it that made me wonder whether there was something more than 'absence of induction' going on.

Pimpernel:
Actually I would need the cycle length for this survey to stand up to statistical analysis, and probably quite a few other variables. Problem is you can't expect a good response rate if you ask for a lot of detail. It'd be different if I was collecting data in a hospital setting or from records, but this is only an informal survey. As it is, loads of replies weren't quite complete on the 3 variables I did ask for (pregn. length, how labour started & ethnicity). Keep it simple and accept the drawbacks if I want most people to give me the 3 vars. When people in the survey said their date versus scan date weeks after LMP I went with their date, btw.

As to why the homebirthers I surveyed tended to go longer -- good question! I did ask them for cycle length, and even adjusting for that they still tended to have an pregnancy length much above the average i've seen in the other 3 groups I've surveyed. My best guess is that for many, because these women tend to have longer pregnancies, they were more likely to be induced in first pregnancy, and this interference and the higher risk of C-section/whatever interventions REALLY upset them. So much that it polarised them. Also, most women who later do homebirth don't opt to do it for their first baby. I surveyed via the homebirth UK list; the purpose of the list is to support women who are having trouble getting support for a Homebirth. And why might that be? These are the very women who are least likely to get support for homebirth precisely because they had a problematic birth or fight to not be induced previously.

37+2 days. Spontaneous. Ventouse delivery. White UK.

Message withdrawn

Oooh! More replies. With any luck this thread will go on forever.

40 + 6, spontaneous, British white, wannabe homebirth -> hospital ventouse.
age 31.

Interesting thread Zebra. Whats this for anyway?

41 weeks exactly. Induced because of high bp. Induction- the whole works. Gel, waters broken, drip throughout. Apart from all of that it was a normal delivery. I was 18 at the time. Very English and very white.

Just a curiousity thing, read all the bits I wrote before on it.

38+5, c- section, british white

36weeks (after 8 weeks in hostpital) c-section very poor dopplers. british white

message withdrawn

Thanks for replying, zebra - I see what you mean about accepting the limitations in order to get the data at all!

I'd thought something similar about the homebirthers, but dismissed it because you were specifically asking about first babies, so previous experiences wouldn't be relevant. Fwiw, one of my reasons for opting out of the system and having an independent midwife was that my family have tended to go overdue.

15 days overdue (can't rememeber whether EDD is 39 or 40 weeks !) Induced. White british.

ds1 38 weeks +5 and a bit of a bruiser (9lbs 2oz) 16 hour labour followed by emergency c-section under GA (yuk)
British (quarter Welsh, quarter English, quarter, Scottish, quarter Irish.... really!)

ds2 37 weeks and a wee lad. (6lbs) Went into labour naturally but another C-Section - with epidural this time. Much better

No chance of #3 being a natural delivery Maybe I wasn't destined to "push'emout"

More info than you wanted.... but I'm on a roll...

DD1 - 36 weeks and DD2 just under 40 both spontaneous and i'm British white

I was 39+3
Spontaneous
White Scottish

40+10 days
induced by breaking waters and then drip
ventouse delivery
british white

43 + 1

spontaneous

british, white