Being Induced....what to expect

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Being induced... what to expect?





A baby...




















I'll call my own cab......

izoomzoom

Ds2 is 9, so quite a few years from my induction.

He wasn't born in the UK, but I was induced for purely convenience reasons at 38+6.

Went in on Monday afternoon. Given first pessary at midnight, and then again at 4am. Started to feel very mild contractions.

At 7am Tues, consultant put in 3rd pessary and then started to experience regular contractions.

Not sure of times but at 7cm they agreed to give me a pethadine jab. Not sure exactly what happened but a few minutes later I have this incredible urge to push but was too scared to cos I knew pushing too soon could damage the cervix. I recall lying on my side trying to squeeze my buttock together but next contraction I just rolled onto my back and thought **** it. DS's head appeared and DH ran out to get midwife. He was delivered next contraction, at exactly 10am.

Looking back it was frighteningly fast. DS1 active labour was about 6 hours, DD (3rd child) was 3 hours, but she was born at home .

Good luck

ilovemyboy

Hi,

I, too, was induced. I went over my due date by 8 days and in the last couple of days got taken into hospital due to having raised blood pressure. I was induced in the morning and was expecting to have my baby the same day (1st baby, so i was pretty clueless! lol!), the 2nd morning in hospital arrived and still no baby so i was induced a second time. Again, to my dismay, nothing happened and on the 3rd morning i was induced again. That night at 8.30pm my waters broke naturally and i was on my way!!! It didn't run entirely smoothly though as i wasn't dilating properly. 14 hours and an epidural later i was still only 1cm dilated so got whisked off to theatre and had my little boy finally with the help of forceps. It was all worth it in the end though

Good luck with it all, let us know how your story goes........x

madtrekker

I was induced (overdue by 12 days on day of induction). Before induction, I had no signs of labour / contractions at all.

Went in to hospital at 4pm and was examined about 7pm. Told that my cervix wasn't favourable and would probably take at least 2 or maybe all 3 pessaries for anything to happen. First one in at 7pm. At 8pm I went for a walk around hospital and felt some slight discomfort. A bit like mild period pains. I returned to the ward at 9pm and got into bed. DP was sent home.

By 10pm contractions were more uncomfortable so I went for another little walk. At 11pm I buzzed the midwife and she helped put on the TENS machine and said I was probably in v. early labour. Pains got gradually worse and at midnight I buzzed again to ask for something else for the pain and she brought me... A PARACETAMOL. I nearly cried. She said she'd come back at 2am to examine me. At about 1:30 I buzzed again as the contractions were almost non-stop (pain bearable but getting more uncomfortable) and I wanted proper pain relief. My waters went spontaneously at about this time and I was transferred to labour ward. DP was phoned to come back!

On labour ward, contractions got a lot more intense and I was told baby was back-to-back. I decided to have an epidural and was glad I did. I don't remember a lot after this until 6am when I was fully dilated. They decided to let me wait an hour to start pushing (to allow the baby to decend first) and I started pushing at 7:30 I think. By 8:45 nothing much was happening so the Dr was called and LO was born at 9:20am by ventouse delivery, 14 hours after induction started.

Everything happened quicker than I'd been led to believe. It wasn't a bad experience at all and if I had to be induced again I'd be fine with that. The only thing I didn't like was spending all evening in pain on my own (well actually in a 4-bed ward), trying really hard not to disturb the other patients with my puffing and moaning and walking around!

Yama_2

PerfectPeaches wrote: »

Doesn't help that the hospital is nearly 2 hours away and my OH is on a course over in Coventry (hospital is in Cambridge) so he will be taking one day off and taking me in and then going back over to Coventry as I have been told it could take up to 4 days which is fine as long as I know where I am!

Peaches x

Is it at the Rosie?

When I was induced there a few years back, I was allocated a room in the delivery suite, rather than the ward, so DH was able to stay with me (inc overnight) until labour started - took 36 hours from my first dose of gel. I think I went from being 0cm dialated to 10cm in 20 mins and it hurt. Thank goodness for epidurals!

I wasn't offered lunch/dinner at any point as I wasn't on the ward so be warned if you are alone for a while. If you are on the ward, take your own meals as they're horrid

All the best!

RoxieW

Don't bank on it taking days! I've been induced twice and they've never bothered with any gels - just stuck me straight on the drip and cranked up the machine! My first took 16 hours and I had an epidural. Second took less than two hours!! The midwife did say perhaps the machine had been on too high. Great. I've also had a non induced birth and inductions are certainly more painful. They're also less pleasant as (if you end up on the drip which I think a lot of inductions do) you will be strapped to a monitor and also obv have a drip in so it is very difficult to move about at all and you are essentially strapped to a bed. Sorry to paint a negative picture but I feel that they are a more difficult birth. Take plenty to do and plenty to eat in case you are the for days but don't bank on it! I certainly wouldn't want my husband over 2 hours away. He'd have missed it and besides, you need support! If he really can't be there then take a friend or family member

inkie

I too can offer experience from both sides as I am a MW and have also been induced.

There is no set induction - it will vary according to hospital policy and your reaction to the induction. What needs to be born in mind is that the induction can take days (literally).
When you go in, you will have a baseline CTG (monitoring) recorded prior to internal.
At the internal, the midwife will assess you cervix in terms of how soft and thin it is, how much of it has been taken up already (effaced) and how well applied it is to the baby's head, also how high up the baby's head is in the pelvis. This is known as a Bishop's score. Depending upon the findings, you will either have an ARM (artificial rupture of membranes) performed (this will mean going round to labour ward to have this done), or the pessary will be inserted into the posterior fornix (high up in the vagina behind the cervix.) If it's possible for an ARM performed, if Labour Suite is very busy, you may have to wait until things have quitened down a bit before they take you.
After half an hour/or straight away (according to policy), you will be monitored again in either of these cases. In the case of pessaries being used, these are generally given twice a day 6 hours apart for a couple of days , or until you are ARM-able. After a couple of days, if it's not possible to break your waters, then you will be given a rest day and then process will start again.

I was induced at 38+ and just needed 2 lots of prostin, after which I started contracting, and laboured quite quickly after that. No more painful than my first, spontaneous labour.