Pregnancy's Best Kept Secrets

3onitsway

This has made me laugh so much!!!

When I had DS 11 years ago, at 38 weeks, i was young (25) and daft! Someone had bought me an american book and we followed to the letter the writing a birth plan letter, and what to pack in your hospital bag. We had ice packs, books, picnic etc etc!

Waters broke 5am on the thursday so we rang hospital. Hospital said to get dressed, put a pad in my knicks for leakage, and come up to hospital.
When we got there, the doctor came in and asked me to remove knicks for an examination to see what was happening. As I sat on the bed, he picked up my knicks, pad attached, put them to his face and sniffed!!! 'Yes, thats definately amniotic fluid' he said. :eek: OH nearly fainted at this point - i've never seen the colour drain from anyones face like that!!

Then, it seems like, 100+ staff armed with latex gloves came in to have a feel during the day.

By 6am the next morning the birth plan had gone out of the window, OH was nearly killed when he asked me if I wanted a sandwich and a book to read!! Then someone noticed during another examination that it wasn't the head everyone had been feeling, but a bottom. So the epidural was put in and i was rushed off for an emergency c-section for my breech baby boy.

DD arrived 3 years later, again at 38 weeks. No birthplan and a maternity bag containing only the essentials - i refused to read that book after the first time. I suppose I was quite lucky with this one. Slow labour all day at home, hospital at 8pm, waters broke after first examination and DD born naturally before midnight. I did however, have an old school midwife who didn't beleive in cutting, prefering to let me 'rip' naturally. She said it healed better - I still don't know whether this is true.
It certainley didn't feel like it was healing better for the next two weeks when I was scared to pee because it hurt so much! It felt like putting salt and vinegar into an open wound. The midwife suggested running a bath to sit in to pee - but if you need to pee, the last thing you want to do is sit and watch a bath running.
And when she was three days old, i woke up with the most agonising boobs!! Lovely size but they were so painful. I hobbled to my mums in tears - she was making sunday dinner and had saved me some cabbage leaves in the fridge to put in my bra - it really worked.

And, getting home from hospital, with 15 hour old DD, to have OH and his 3 sisters, sitting in my living room cooing over the baby, while i made constant cups of tea and cleaned the kitchen! As i said, i was young and stupid then, i'd tell them to pi$$ off now - i eventually did tell OH to pi$$ off.

No matter how wonderful your OH may be - you don't know what kind of dad he's going to be til you've got your kid(s). Now he's 45 but still thinks he's 18!!

The breaking point was him telling me to 'snap out of it' when i was crying, exhausted and suffering PND.


Anyway - it can't all be that bad - i've got two gorgeous kids, and new OH who's done a brilliant job with my two for the past 5 years - and we're expecting No.3 in February.
I see him being with mine as training, and he's so good, he qualifies to have one of his own.

I'm 14 weeks, constantly feeling sick (but not being sick), constantly tired, spotty, constantly hungry until I see food, my boobs are killing me and i'm a hormonal psycho !!!!!, but also horny while he's not :mad: - but it'll be worth it in the end.

And if it was so terrible, there'd be an awful lot of only children in the world.

truly1

After a marathon time with eldest DS, who ended up being assisted out from his breech position by a VERY large pair of pincers (forceps), I had an extremely fast labour with youngest, DD.

Went from 0 to 60 in the blink of an eye, was ready to push after 2 hours.

Midwife said, "If you give one big push your waters will break - and so they did, it was like an explosion. Even the midwife, and her trainee jumped back about three feet in shock. Mess, indescribable.

Loopy_Girl

The pain of getting your waters broken :eek: I was told it was to speed delivery but I was actually told later it was because baby's heart rate was far far too fast and they wanted to check for meconium.
I just saw the midwife coming towards me with what can be described as a crochet hook and I seriously thought she was scraping the inside of me out:eek: I was in labour for 37 hours with only gas and air and I can clearly remember that more than anything


Also, the smugness when you are a first time pregnant - no, I won't use the telly as a babysitter/give chocolate/only feed organic etc etc...THAT soon all goes out the window and the first 12 months are the survival of the fittest!!!!


I also breastfed and I fed small person in bed one night and then, as I was knackered, I laid her on the bed at the other side of me (double bed, was sleeping alone) anyways we both must have fell asleep and I didn't even fasten my bra up. Cue 2 hours later to me waking up to a strange sensation and the wee soul was latched on. So one thing no one tells you is that babies have a 'help yourself' attitude to feeding if they have the chance!!

Having to buy a new mattress as the one I had got ruined with leaking melons

The pain, oh the pain of your boobs first thing in the morning as they are so engorged

The sheer panic that goes through you when baby sleeps through the night for the first time...I remember poking her with tears streaming down my face

THE HAIR LOSS AFTER GIVING BIRTH!!!!

But I think the biggest secret is the overwhelming all consuming pure undiluted love that you feel for this small person:happyhear

arthur_dent_2

I didn't feel anything much about my newborn untill after I had had some sleep, After that came the undiluted joy and love etc, but to be honest I was knac.... very very tired.

pukkamum

My sister gave birth to her first child last week.
She was all geared up for her natural home birth, went on and on at me about how awful my 2 emergency c-sections must have been.
How her hypno birthing was all she needed.
She ended up in hospital on a drip and the first thing she said to me when i saw her?
I can see why women have elective c-sections hahahaha!!!
she said she felt like she had been run over by a truck!!!
She is also walking very much like a silver back gorilla as she used a birthing stool which means she is extremely swollen down there!!!!!

Loopy_Girl

arthur_dent wrote: »

I didn't feel anything much about my newborn untill after I had had some sleep, After that came the undiluted joy and love etc, but to be honest I was knac.... very very tired.

Absolutely...I'd been up for 3 days solid and was so so tired. An hour to push her out and an hour for stiches and then after my shower they took me down to the ward. And I was crying - in fact I had been crying since I had given birth to her, hormones I suppose - and I was sitting in my wee cubicle and this nurse came and I said to her I was very tired and would she take her away please (my mind was in la la land obviously!!) to which the nurse asked if I was getting her adopted:eek: NO I shrieked, don't take my baby away (30 hours of gas and air clearly had an effect!!)!!! I was scared to put her down in case they took her away from me!!! Not helped by the fact that the system they had for keeping babies safe (tag on baby that beeped if taken away from ward) was broken so I was also terrified that if I fell asleep someone would steal her....jeezo thinking about that I must have been a bag of hormones and nerves the 2 days I was in hospital!!!:rotfl: :rotfl:

My_Fathers_Daughter

OMG I am sat here crying!!! with laughter of course!!!

I don't know who it was but someone posted something about a consultant checking for anal tears...

I have been worrying myself silly about this...mostly because I simply didn't have a clue what anal tears were and they sound so awful that they terrified me...I didn't even want to ask the question.


Thing is - I have been thinking about TEARS - as in the ones you cry...it has just this second clicked that the lady was talking about TEARS - as in rips!!!!
:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

God knows why but the thought of ripping sounds less worrying to me than anal tears (crying) at the moment!




and if i am wrong please leave me to my blissful conclusion - i am 11 weeks and VERY hormonal!

billybobberyl

how the new baby card my MIL got us that plays "i hear babies cry ..." verse from what a wonderful world can still make me cry now and my son is 1!
How during early stages of labour you will need to pee the instant they have attached you to the monitor for 30 minutes.
how having celebrated no morning sickness on the day i turned 12 weeks can result in a 4 day stay in hospital on a drip for such severe vomiting!
How having celebrated 24 weeks with no further issues can result in a 4 day stay in hospital as baby decided to try and come early.
how after baby trying to come early you are told its likely aby will be early now so be prepared can result in baby being induced 10 days late in the hottest time of the whole year.
How you will experience some bleeding afterwards is actually a massacre for months
how having been telling people i never had cravings oh informs me it is not normal to eat mashed potato with cheese sauce every meal every day for 2 weeks!:D

fawd1

This is quite possibly the most worrying thing I have ever read in my life, especially as I am now 3 months pregnant with my first so now am just imagining what's waiting for me in 6 months time. Why did no one start this post 4 months ago, then I could have applied for adoption instead!!!!!:eek:

ginvzt

fawd1 wrote: »

This is quite possibly the most worrying thing I have ever read in my life, especially as I am now 3 months pregnant with my first so now am just imagining what's waiting for me in 6 months time. Why did no one start this post 4 months ago, then I could have applied for adoption instead!!!!!:eek:

Oh, but they did - started 2 years ago. However, even with all those gruesome facts, we are still trying for a baby!