Dreaming Pink Due Date Group: TTC and Beyond

[atomic sagebrush]

I had babies 2,3, and 5 drug free. I could have done it with DS 1, but no one ever told me that the contrax. get to a certain point and pretty much stay there, I thought they'd get worse and worse and worse, but with my drug free births the pain just got bad and stayed that way. It was a disaster because epidurals don't work on me until I'm so drugged I can't even push, and it took me FOREVER to push him out.

DS 2 was at home with a midwife and it was GREAT. I used the birththing ball a lot with him and they used a lot of massage and it was all very gentle.

DS 3 was natural in the hospital, back labor and it was my most painful birth (that child does everything the hard way.) Luckily it was FAST.

With DS 4 my water broke and then I didn't go into labor and wasn't dilating, so they insisted on the Pit. That was rough. I had to lay in the bed, and for some reason with that pg I went almost totally deaf, and I also had broken my glasses and so I couldn't hear the TV or see it, so I had to lay there and be in pain the whole time (I concur that Pitocin is very hard to have natural, even for an experienced person)and I still wasn't dilating at all, so I caved and had the epidural. It still didn't work (I'm apparently immune to epidurals) but at least I had something else to think about the whole time LOL. Hard recovery too and very scary at times because I kept almost passing out at inopportune times and couldn't be alone for like 6 months afterwards.

DD was the easiest labor altho it took them FOREVER to get set up for me to push so that part wasn't fun. I was really ok in control the entire time except for the very last part. Easiest recovery.

So my point is, really, my epidural births were harder than my natural ones, the epidural doesn't make it a cakewalk, it's a hard road no matter how you slice it.

The main thing that was different about the 3 natural births were the level of support I had. DS 1, they were just about pressuring me to have the epidural and were kind of annoyed that I didn't want one. With DS 4, it was like the nurses were all busy doing other stuff and I really didn't have anyone other than DH and he was in a shitty mood that day. With my natural births, the midwives and nurses were very attentive and my husband was helpful too, so whenever things got hard I had the support - my main advice would be someone with you who will be supportive the whole time. You can TOTALLY do it!!!

[Sunflower3]

My ds 3 was a natural childbirth but by no means was done on purpose. I was Induced with ds 1 and ds 2 so I had no idea I was in labor with ds 3. I left for the hospital after I lost my mucus plug and contractions were 5 minutes apart. When I got to the hospital I was 6 cm 100% effaced my water broke and it was too late for drugs. Piece of cake! Lol. I delivered him within 1 hour if being there and I think 2 pushes. Really!! I was walking around almost immediately afterwards. The only hard part was I tore and felt every stitch. Ouch!

[Niva]

Cagirl, we are cycle buddies! I am on cd17 and I normally O on CD 18 so we are at a very similar place right now. Ditto on the desire to get back in the game quickly! Are you doing a cautious sway or going whole-hog-gimme-a-bfp?

Atomic, that's so great that you had some natural births you really enjoyed. I found myself a midwife for this time around so hopefully I will have a better experience than the first. Like you, my water broke but I wasn't in active labor or dilating. They let me labor on my own (without pit) for about 16 hours and then insisted on hastening the process with pitocin because they had set a 24hr time limit for the birth. I got the lowest dose epidural possible, and LUCKILY it worked -- I was throwing up and nearly passing out from the pit-induced back labor! Good to know that without pitocin or back labor the contrax will plateau. Hope I get to experience that someday. Charlee, go for it and you can always request meds if you get in a bind. Or better yet, try to go into labor on your own before they need to induce.

[Cagirl09]

Cagirl, we are cycle buddies! I am on cd17 and I normally O on CD 18 so we are at a very similar place right now. Ditto on the desire to get back in the game quickly! Are you doing a cautious sway or going whole-hog-gimme-a-bfp?

I told my DH that it depends on whether or not I ovulate from the left or right side. I frequently feel O pain, so I can recognize that I almost ALWAYS Ovulate from the right, Ha! I can't even remember the last time I ovulated on the left. Anyway, I told DH that if I do in fact ovulate from the left, we will do a less strict sway in an attempt to increase our chances to catch that eggie. Otherwise, we will be very strict in our attempt, like immediate J&D, more aci-jel w/ less of a delay between insertion an BD, longer hot shower for DH and more antihistamines for me. So for no EWCM for me whatesoever, though, and I usually have at least some a few days before O, but I just took my OPK, its getting a tiny bit darker, so I can't help but wonder if I will get a fade-in tomorrow with a more positive one on Friday.

[Niva]

Cagirl, do you know that both ovaries can give you O pains in the same cycle even if only one releases an egg? Often it is the one that DOESN'T release an egg that feels the pains worse, because the follicles on that side are still swollen and the pressure hasn't been released by the egg rupturing out. So unfortunately even when we think our O pain is consistently predictive, it may not be.

Hope you get your +OPK soon! Mine has been half-dark and I've had borderline EWCM for about 10 days now, so I'm still in limbo too.

[Cagirl09]

Hmmm, Niva, I definitely did not know that! That certainly puts a whole new spin on things for me. At least it may mean that I ovulate from the left more than I realize, but may change my sway attempt a bit. Hmm. what to do, somewhere in the middle I guess.

Lets hope this Limbo passes for us soon!!

[I Love Ladybugs]

Two days out of town worked...and 1 day closer to the u/s!! I feel really good tonight about stuff in general for me, but when I read the stuggles other girls are dealing with, I feel guilty for being excited for myself.

With boys, I did have back labour, but the support of my mom, DH and MD made DS1 arrival great...and with DS2, I was so much more zen and I wish that he would have been head down. All the more reason for my rainbow baby to be my VBAC!!

Cagirl and Niva.....I hope that being cd buddies means that 2 bfps are in our near future in this thread!!!

[Pumpkin2011]

Ladybugs, staying away from this site also works . I was working second shift on tuesday and yesterday we´ve been to the zoo all day long.

I went to my gyn this morning because I am having stabbing pain on the left side fom time to time and since I had an ectopic in dec I wanted to make sure everything is located were it should be. Everything is looking great and it even looks like we might be expecting two little pumpkins . We have seen two gestational sacs but one of them was hidden pretty good. My gyn could not tell 100% yet because everyting was still so small and I also have a retroverted uterus but she was pretty excited. Hope we´ll find out next friday .

Charlee I had a natural birth without any meds but only because everything was going so fast that there was no time for an epidural. I was fully dilated after only an hour and two hours later DS was born. It was a wonderful experience and I am really happy I did it without any meds. This time I was thinking of a water birth...

[GeCon]

Pumpkin, wonderful news that all is well with one or possibly even two little pumpkins.

[Emily]

Two days out of town worked...and 1 day closer to the u/s!! I feel really good tonight about stuff in general for me, but when I read the stuggles other girls are dealing with, I feel guilty for being excited for myself.

With boys, I did have back labour, but the support of my mom, DH and MD made DS1 arrival great...and with DS2, I was so much more zen and I wish that he would have been head down. All the more reason for my rainbow baby to be my VBAC!!

Cagirl and Niva.....I hope that being cd buddies means that 2 bfps are in our near future in this thread!!!

Never feel guilty about your own happiness - After my chemical hearing about BFPs and pregnancies kept me going. Yes, there were days when I thought "why not me?" but never to the point of not wanting to hear how my cyber buddies were doing.

Cagirl and Niva, O pains are so hard to interpret. I was sure that mine were dead on O due to cm changes and OPKs but when I started temping I realised sometimes they were pre O and sometimes post. Am crossing my fingers for you both and sending you lots of baby dust (you might need to dye it pink before you use it though LOL).