Fear mongering

[Mrstobe90]

I went out with my husband and a few of our friends to see in the new year tonight. We obviously were sober (33 weeks pregnant) and as people in the pub got more drunk, they were coming up to me, asking when I’m due and telling me all about how horrific their births were, how it’s “the worst pain you’ll ever experience” and literally telling me every horror story you could think of.
Ended up leaving and now I’m in tears.
I’m already terrified and I’m doing hypnobirthing to try to help but this has knocked me back.

How do you all cope with nightmare birth stories? I’m really upset by it all.

Hi OP

Don’t worry about the horror stories. Your birth will probably be fine. But I think what people are trying to do with these stories is prepare you for the worst.

I was pretty naive about birth and had a twelve stage birth plan, including hypnobirthing and being drug free.

But I hadn’t shared that plan with DD or my uterus!

In the end my labour was too fast to hypnobirth (almost no latent phase) and DD went into distress because everything was kicking off so quickly.

Luckily, I was in hospital on the labour suite and they could check this and rush me through for a C-section.

On the face of it, my labour is a horror story. Only four hours long and ended with a section.

But it isn’t. Because I got a perfect baby in the end and once she was here I didn’t care how she got here. Afterwards I felt like I’d had a good experience. It is all relative.

My mum’s first baby was still born because of complications at 32 weeks. My entire pregnancy was only focused on getting her and me out alive. So I felt like I’d won. It is a very, very personal thing.

I found reading the book "stand and deliver" extremely helpful before birth. It adjusted my views of birth and prepared me better than any class.

I had an emcs as baby was in distress. The recovery was awful as I then stayed in hospital for 5 days (it's best to be out and walking around standing tall etc) and looking back now I find it hard as I'm 21 weeks and dreading the fact I'm likely to have to have a cs. However, at the time and for a long time after I saw only positives - safely delivered baby and I think I had what they call the baby pinks - very happy - took a while to fall in love with baby, but very positive about everything. It's only bad looking back as the cs was the start of chronic back issues - because I didn't look into best healing and physio and unbeknown to me at the time, have hypermobility.

The book describes positive birth stories - even when it was quite crazy and traumatic and I do feel it helped me to recognise that I may not have any control over what happens but that the experience can still be felt to be positive.

I had this all the time with my first, used to really piss me off! When I told them I was doing hypnobirthing they all but laughed in my face. As it happens, I had an amazing birth, so relaxed, not horrendously painful, only gas and air. My beautiful DD was 8lb14 and I remember it as an amazing day, not traumatic in the slightest.
I am due my second in 12 weeks and am honestly half looking forward to it. Yes, there is pain, of course there is, but it is bearable.

The problem I get know is either nobody believes I had a good birthday, or you get accused of bragging.

You will be fine, just practice your breathing techniques and your body will take case of the rest!

I had three terrific births - midwife-led, no drugs. Babies 2 and 3 born in the water (3 born in the caul!). I was very lucky.

I would suggest approaching the birth as educated as you can but with a 'what will be, will be' type attitude. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. Chances are, things will be fine. All the best!!!

Good birth lol

Badge of honour bullshit

OP I think you have to understand that giving birth was probably the biggest, most shocking, most exciting and most memorable thing to ever happen to a woman/couple. People should be more sensitive speaking to first time mums but the drinking will have loosened tongues. Their stories were about them, not you. You will have a unique birth if your own. Maybe even a very ok one. But just to explain why people talk about it, it's the biggest trauma most people ever experience and having come out the other side, there is a lot to remember and talk through unfortunately. They shouldn't with you though!

People love a dramatic story. I was terrified of buying a house because I'd heard so many horror stories of everything falling through at the last minute and people being gazumped and bidding wars etc. Buying our flat was totally straightforward and it made me realise that no one is interested in the "boring" stories where all goes to plan! It made me much more philosophical when it came to giving birth.

I won't go into detail but my birth wasn't what I planned / wanted and was mismanaged by the hospital. Ended up with a c section but within days I could barely remember it and it wasn't that bad. As pps have said the pain has a purpose and it ends when you get your baby.

FWIW if you do end up having a c section that also isn't the horror people make it out to be either! (Based on collective experience of me, my sisters and friends).

Good luck OP and I hope the Home birth goes well and you have a straightforward experience that no one will want to talk about because it is t dramatic!

People like to blabber on. If they're not telling you how hard birth is, they're telling you how tired you'll be once the baby is here.

The fact is some people have shit labours and some aren't that bad. I would def count mine as not that bad. People are just more likely to talk about the bad ones.

You never seem to hear the inbetween birth stories when you're pregnant. I only heard the traumatic nightmare experiences or the unrealistic hippy wonder birth ones. But it was somewhere in the middle, as I'm convinced it is for most women. Painful yes, but not scary. I never ever felt I couldn't cope, but I was very much of the mindset that it would all be fine because I was in hospital, had people telling me what to do and there were drugs.

Since having the baby I've heard a lot more birth stories and the vast majority have been that middle ground position.

I didn't care, I had waited 5 years to get pregnant that I couldn't wait to meet him and that's all I cared about, no horror story worried me and it was fine and I got to meet him finally and WOW, love him SOOO much. You will be fine, don't listen as every birth is different. :)

With my 2nd I decided to have a home water birth because my experience in a hospital wasn't good. I wish I had had a home birth with my 1st too. It was amazing.... I also did hypnobirthing. I can't say enough how I actually loved giving birth. I had no pain relief apart from a tens machine a short while before entering the pool. The pool was pain relief in itself. I had my Cd on for a bit but got fed up with it half way ...I was able to use the hypnobirthing and go into my own little bubble and breathe and work with my body rather than trying hard to get baby out, I just went with the contractions... There were 2 midwives who were there in case I needed anything but tbh they had cups of tea and let me get on with it. All done in 2 1/2 hours. Cuddling baby on your sofa at home with your surroundings was the best feeling ever. People don't often share the good things, try not to let it get to you. Your birth won't be theirs. Xxx

PS pain wise for me, intensely strong period pains, pulling down feeling.... Ring of fire while crowning for a minute but felt longer and then ok. No tears with water birth for me? Large fish 9.5lb baby.... It was way better than I thought. X

I agree with pp - most births are fine but you just don't hear those stories! I was the opposite to you - everyone I met told me how easy and straightforward their births had been, so I was quite shocked when mine went rather badly! FWIW (I know anecdotal evidence doesn't count for much but still), I know 9 people who gave birth last year, myself included. 2 of us had traumatic births / complications, 1 had the dream labour (short, no pain relief needed, homebirth) and everyone else had 'average' experiences - didn't always go to plan but everything was fine.
Honestly, within the first couple of weeks labour and delivery fades into a distant memory as you are so consumed by your gorgeous newborn. Try not to worry and congratulations!

I felt just like you when I was pregnant - absolutely terrified. I avoided anything to do with labour/birth like the plague!

Then when I got to 39/40/41 weeks (DS was 11 days late) I was DESPERATE for labour! I couldn't wait! I just wanted him out. I am absolutely convinced the last 2/3 weeks are so horrendous it is your bodies way of convincing you to embrace labour

It was also nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be.

All the best you will be absolutely fine!

I didn't have birth plans. Best way really as there's no disappointment if things don't go your way. I was just very open minded and relaxed. I trusted my body ultimately.

First birth was 6 hours. It was a lovely water birth. Second was an unplanned home birth of 3 hours. Lovely again.

Ah I'm sorry your night ended like that. Honestly i just kind of accepted otjer peoples negative birth stories as just being that - their stories. It wasn't really about me at all, it was a way of reliving something incredibly intense.

What happened to other people will have no effect on your labour and birth at all so try and focus on that, and all the things that you can do to help you mentally and physically prepare.

I used to call it birth top trumps, whenever a group of women got together they seemingly had to compete over who had the worse labour story. Luckily I'm laid back and let it go over my head

My first was pretty awful, but baby was fine and so was I (after some healing time and later some psychotherapy to “debrief” and come to terms with some of the things that I was struggling to process - which is a much better idea than scaring pregnant women tbh). And ultimately it was 100% completely worth it - clearly as I’m now doing it again for DC2!

You will be absolutely fine, you are not an idiot, you know that it will hurt but it will absolutely be worth it.

Every birth story is so unique!! It's so unfair of people to tell a pregnant lady about their horrific birth stories. Plus what one person might have found horrific could be totally manageable to another.

Wishing you the best of luck, keep at the hypnobirthing too! If birth was so horrific people wouldn't go on to have more. I'm 34 weeks with my 3rd and actually loved my 2nd birth so much that I'm planning a home birth for this one. X

I would suggest approaching the birth as educated as you can but with a 'what will be, will be' type attitude. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. Chances are, things will be fine. All the best!!!

This

Birthing stories are like assholes everyone has one but they don’t need to be shared

Well it's jolly sore but not for ever!!!

Out of my NCT class of 9 (many of whom also did Hypnobirthing) four had forcep deliveries, four had emergency c sections and one had a ‘straightforward’ birth with no tearing. Four of my oldest friends have had babies now and every single one was a forceps delivery.

I think it’s pretty standard to expect some form of intervention and/or tearing/episiotomy in your first birth. Of course there are exceptions to this. You may well have an uncomplicated birth at home. But the odds aren’t in your favour. Just be prepared for any eventuality.

An NCT class of 9, or a MN thread of 20-30, is not a large enough sample to deduce anything. Look up the actual statistics for your hospital / homebirths / the UK. Read up on the possibilities and know what you would like in each scenario. Be prepared to say no to interventions if you are comfortable with the added risk. But think positively.

You will be amazed just how mich your body will know what to do, and just how managable the pain is.

Hmm at ‘your body will know what to do’.

Your body knows what it wants to do, not what you want it to do. The aren’t necessarily the same thing.

Do talk to other women to get a range of idea of what does and doesn’t work for people and to help shape your ideas. Talk to the women in your family about the kind of births they had, especially your mother. There is some correlation in birth progression in women from the same bloodline. My family all have super quick labours. I should have thought about that really. My sister, my cousin and my cousin’s son were all nearly born in the car.

And don’t focus too much on what went wrong for people. Focus on what they are really telling you: it is a really big, memorable event that you will only remember the really great or really terrible things from. I have almost no memory of nearly two hours I was in the delivery suite before they took me to my section. I remember two things- being sick on DH and one of the tests they did on DD.

Your partner (poor soul) will remember it all. Whatever happens, you will forget most of it. Otherwise women would never volunteer to do it again because it is painful. But it is a short lived pain with a big reward at the end.

If you get this far down the thread OP can I recommend that you ask people to only share positive stories with you?

I have to be really strict about this because I have quite a lot of anxiety already and tend to catastrophise. It doesn’t help anyone for me to have these horrible stories in my head, undermining my mental health. Yes, it’s awkward but if you say it in a light hearted way you can normally manage.

I’m now expecting my 3rd and honestly, birth is incredibly intense but it’s also the biggest high. Even after having the most amazing Home birth with DC2, I still have to focus to stay positive. I do hypnobirthing, empowering statements, visualisations and I also found a book called Birth Skills by Juju Sundin to be incredibly helpful.

Of course you can’t control everything about your labour (or anything in life) but you can educate yourself and prepare yourself both mentally and physically. I honesty believe this helps, no matter whether you have a Home birth or end up with an EMCS. I actuallly enjoyed my labour with DC2. Yes it’s painful but I also managed to surf the wave of natural endorphins and painkillers that your body provides - but it can only do that if you aren’t terrified.

So, please carry on with your hypnobirthing, stay positive and no matter what don’t listen to the horror stories!