Overdue- kind, unwanted advice and support

[Rosebluemoonradish]

General rant of frustration here about waiting for labour..

I've build a lovely supportive network in my community and everyone is genuinely excited in having my first baby. I know people are 'checking in' out of kindness and I've literally done the same thing to others and I am grateful. But I really wish I'd lied to everyone about my due date!! Now I'm at 41 weeks + 4 days I'm getting quite tetchy.

It's the whatsapp's- up to 10 a day "hey how are you feeling?xxx" and in the street from my lovely neighbours and people in community "baby still hasn't come!!?" telling me with great assurance that hot curries work, pineapple juice, long walks, raspberry tea. Older women I don't really know almost aggressively telling me to have sex, but not nagging my partner who is the only one who can make that happen! Evidence is out on all of it, except maybe sex, but he is so uninterested in that and I just find it too personal to be discussing with anyone but him!

I think I'm going to sign out of WhatsApp. Have considered turning off my phone, but use it so much. Feel like locking myself inside.

I know from hypnobirthing baby will release a hormone when it's ready and this will start dilation and then contractions. It's not a great mystery or something that can be brought on with jasmine essential oil- I've tried!

I know soon the advice is going to ramp up and people will be pushing me to get induced. Sister in law has kindly recommended a sweep. But I think I just need to finish making the space ready for birth, try to get romantic with my partner and mentally and physically relax.

I just wish everyone would leave me alone!

Has anyone else found a polite way to respond to unwanted advice and remind them they are talking rubbish and I'm doing everything I should be, I'm not a failure, it's just the baby is not ready yet!? Also that I promise I will tell them when it's born- they don't need to ask if it has been born yet- daily!?

I ended up not responding to the messages , personally I found it was from people that wanted to 'be in the know ' .
It makes for a more peaceful life to remove message apps and just text the people you normally speak to instead ( mum / sister / best friend !)

I'm quite a fiery person anyway but when the messages started when I went a week over I found myself going over the boil
Not proud of it but there is still a dent in my bedroom wall where I lobbed my phone at it
I never ask anyone who is due for updates as I know how frustrating it can be

Haha that's hilarious! Hopefully I can save the wall from a dent. Thanks for the camaraderie!

Hi lovely,
had exactly the same thing! I was massive due to high fluid and there was talk of me being induced at 39 weeks which didn’t need to happen thankfully. I went to 40+6 and the messages were killing me. As PP said I stopped responding. I never use my Facebook but I knew a lot of the people messaging I also had as friends on there so I just put a status up saying I’d let people know when baby was here…a subtle leave me the hell alone! It’s so hard because people are well intentioned but it really does drive you mad x

Just don’t reply to the messages. It’s nobody’s business but yours, despite their intentions.

Interesting that you’ve done it to pregnant women before though - at least you now know how annoying it is/was

I'm with you. Was my due date yesterday. No solid signs of labour beginning yet. I want to be left alone, especially by mum and MIL because they're both quite anxious which is exacerbated by neither fully understanding or fully supporting my birth plan. I just want to stay in my calm place as we draw nearer to labour.

My partner and I have told the most important people that he will notify when I go into labour and he'll update as necessary but my mum is still calling every day which I find annoying. I feel conflicted as I don't want to exclude her but I also feel compelled to just protect myself and my energy at the moment.

I don’t think people realise how genuinely traumatic being overdue can be. So much discomfort, mentally and physically. I had to have counselling afterwards, and still get occasional flashbacks.

My son (just turned 8) kept saying for 2 weeks before his birthday “oh, I wish today was my birthday! Mummy, why couldn’t I have been born 5/6/7 days earlier?” And I really had to hold it together not to get upset by it.

So I won’t offer meaningless platitudes, and definitely not advice! But you have all my empathy right now.

I was 41 weeks with my first. I had to force myself to calm down and taking walks in the park helped. She came along 2 days after I did that! You could try eating some dates too :) it worked for my sister

All my previous babies have been almost 2 weeks after their 'due' date, you have my sympathy. It's so exhausting having everyone going on all the time about baby coming when you're the one person who's ready for them to come the most! Try to stay off of any social media or messaging if it's stressing you out, you need to be as relaxed as possible right now (I know easier said then done x

I told people that I would consider induction if I was still pregnant at 44 weeks 😂😂 that did a fairly good job of shutting them up.

Whether I would have had an induction before 44 weeks is neither here nor there. The main thing was it stopped people asking.

I got to 40 + 6 and then I couldn’t actually bring myself to be polite anymore but that did at least stop the messages

I totally lost the plot after a nosy Parker I work with messaged me saying “hey is that baby not here yet” and I messaged her back saying no and you’ve guaranteed you’ll be the last to know when it is. It felt fabulous. Then my sister and my auntie both text me and I sent a copy and paste message to about 15 people at once plus a Facebook status which said the next person to ask me if the baby had arrived was going to meet a tragic end and if they didn’t want me to implode from rage they’d all better wait for an update WHEN I BLOODY WELL TOLD THEM THEY COULD HAVE ONE.

Nobody else messaged. This was also my second baby, maybe you have less fucks to give with each one??

All 3 of mine went over by the full two weeks. God it was depressing. I remember my dad would message and all it said was "baby here yet?" Grrrrrrrrrr
You have my sympathies. Hope it's not too long.

Say I'll let you know after he's here, so please stop asking as you're just creating more stress. Speak soon xx

Totally understand. I will add though, you sound like you have a lot of faith in the ‘natural process’, just keep an open mind as sometimes nature doesn’t always go exactly to plan.

I was overdue with both of mine. So I was more prepared with this with my second.

At 38 weeks, I set my whatsapp and messenger so no one could see if I was online and ignored every message if I didn't specifically want to talk to them. Left some messages a couple of days then answered "sorry for late reply. Just enjoying the rest before baby arrives. I'll let you know any updates when the time is right 🙂" then didn't open any reply until I felt ready. It set the expectation that I was taking a long time to reply so people jumped to fewer conclusions because a long wait for an answer didn't mean anything. 😅

In person, I just smiled and said "she/he'll come when they're ready. Trying to enjoy as much rest/peace and quiet as possible" or - with people who were giving unsolicited tips to get things started - I just said "I'm in no hurry! Lots to do/binge watch before then..happy for baby to stay in until they're ready" (even though I was actually desperate for baby to make an appearance.) I found that if I appeared unbothered/in no great rush.- then people didn't bother me so much!

I know it's hard but try to enjoy your last little bit of pregnancy. Hope all goes smoothly xxx

I’ve never experienced such rage as being in my due date month and receiving the number of messages as I had. It was worse for me that it was people close to me like immediate family or friends that would say “baby here yet?” like my answer would be anything other than not yet, otherwise they would know! Or when you go quiet for a minute and they message more excited that you could be in labour. I definitely took a lot of it being about people wanting to be the first to know, or not being left out, which angered me more, as they would pester more if they thought I was in labour.

I have no advice, but a lot of sympathy. Definitely try ignore them, but to be honest, I couldn’t. They would trigger my rage and I would have to respond a little rudely. This didn’t seem to deter them though. This pregnancy I am staying quiet about any trips to hospital and definitely ignoring messages!

Oh I feel this. Went 2 weeks over with DS.

I ended up putting a FB status up which was something along the lines of 'if you text me to ask if baby is here I will waddle over to you and shove my phone down your throat' (rage did get the better of me) and then ignored everyone till DS arrived.

Solidarity fist bump 🤜 🤛 hope all goes well when it does happen :)

Love the feedback! Thanks. Consider at 44 weeks that's good! "Thank you for your patience, I'm doing all I can until the baby is ready to meet everyone" that's my latest mindset. Yes rising above other people's panic and 'appearing' calm and in control is a good tact!

Actually inside I'm like- what the hell is going on in there, has the baby just given up any plans on a journey down the birthing canal?! Someone told me when they gave up hope, that's when labour started for them.

It's day 12 over and 5 am. I think I'm going to get up and paint a cupboard door, finish making the birth space perfect and have a walk with a friend. Try to do some Hypnobirthing and ball bouncing. Laminate the birth plan. Yesterday I achieved a lot of DIY so I'm grateful for the time.

Can't believe the acid reflux is getting worse and that my ankles have decided to become balloons at this stage! Hopefully all these things will pass once baby is on the outside.

What a ride!

Haha just seen the last 7 posts- hilarious!
Wow everyone seems to have the same experience!
"Baby here yet?" As if that's going to help! Like you'd just forgotten to tell anyone that your baby had been born. So funny as it's well meaning and people are just excited. But I don't understand why they aren't hassling my partner? Why me??

Been there! (Spoiler; no one cares the second time)

I think I told my brother something along the lines of “no the baby hasn’t come, I think I’d know if the baby had arrived… and you’re my brother, so I assure you you’ll be one of the first to know.”

I was going to post this morning saying "how you doing OP? Baby here yet?" but I thought that even the fact it's an anonymous forum might not save me 🤣🤣🤣

I went in for a scan, ctg and sweep today. I didn't really want a sweep but all the pressure and comments were getting to me. The midwife was very sweet and kind, but the experience of the sweep left me feeling violated, letting someone reach into my cervix and aggravate such a vulnerable and delicate place which I should be protecting, I just feel quite dirty now and in pain from it 6 hours later. Kind of wish I hadn't. Although it was good to hear I'm 2cm dilated already which gave me hope.

Then they wanted me to wait and see a doctor to spell out the risks of being 42 weeks pregnant and gave me a free lunch which was kind. Was quite surprised to hear the change of tone- id been expecting it from hearing others experiences but it was still a wake up call of how the maternity system tries to coerce women- she came in and said I understand you are refusing induction is this true? I said no, ive just had a sweep. She said the risks of still births go up from 42 weeks and read out some stats very fast which I asked her to repeat 3 times but I still couldnt understand because it was not a percentage and it changed with every week- in 1000 then in 3000 etc. I looked up after and its 3.18 per 1000 which I think works out as 0.003% chance. I said have you seen my records and test results from today? Healthy strong heartbeat, active baby, plenty of fluids around baby, no signs of distress, not flagging as large. I don't see any reason to be induced at this stage when looking at my pregnancy specifically.

So she adviced me to eat yellow dates, curries, pineapple, walk up and down stairs and have lots of sex. Which confused me coming from a doctor who just tried to tell me off with data, when all the old wives tales have so evidence of success.

I just wanted to go home and get the oxytocin going but my boyfriend wanted to go to the beach and then proceeded to yell at me for 2 hours straight about money because I haven't worked enough this year and he's been supporting me a lot. Needless to say I'm feeling pretty shit and the oxytocin is definately not flowing. Plus my pregnancy tracker has just stopped counting days at 42 weeks and just says due 13th June. I hate this bloody 'system'. There is every chance they got my due date wrong, originally it was 21st June but they changed it because of the growth scan. The doctor said don't let it go past Monday which will be 42 + 18.
It's a pretty disempowering experience suddenly. Feel like I don't really want to go through labour now.

I'm really sorry you have that to cope with. I had the job a while ago, of giving updates when my DM was in hospital for four months. I was also home schooling during lockdown and everybody expected daily updates. After a while they started complaining about the style or length of my updates which was incredibly annoying as I was run ragged writing all the emails and doing all the calls. I also had to help them work through their emotional reactions to the situation which was a lot of work.

Would it work if you just said "no updates now until the baby is out"? That would save you a ton of work.

Once early contractions start, you will be too busy to talk, and it still might be days.

I'm sorry to hear you have such an unsupportive boyfriend, that's not on at all.

I think the midwives and doctors are just doing their job and safety comes first, over and above the woman's comfort. Which is a very strange and frustrating experience. For me it started in my first trimester when I was sick as a dog and a friend's husband said cheer up, it doesn't matter how you feel, you should just be grateful you're having a baby. It's like you go from being a person to just being an incubator.

That said, if you do get to 42 weeks, that can't be comfortable?? Have you considered a C section instead of an induction? I'm wary of an induction too and a sweep sounds very unpleasant too.

Yes great to just protect myself as kind as peoples intentions, they don't know what I need. I've deleted all messaging platforms now. Will just hold out for the weekend and consider options on Monday.

We are certainly not an incubator, anyone implying that can F off.