Lies Told to Women

34, yikes! The fever thing sounds scary, glad you're both fine.

Hate hospitals.

I mean in the scheme of things I guess I'm glad they're there 'n' everything.

But hate 'em.

56 HOURS?!


ohhh..soz, you really ARE a goddess!!! :wink:
amazing.

but yes, the amnesia sets in just after you hold your baby.
My little one is in her swing having her morning snack ( bananna pieces and rye crackers ) and I tell ya, childbirth? Eh? whats that?

I wonder if it's a metabolic thing. I clocked in at under 5 hours from first contraction to birth, both times.

It's all kinds of things, wouldn't be surprised it metabolism is one part of it.

(You have kids?)

My first was 12 hours and mega-managed by hospital personel so I felt lucky that it wasn't much longer. My second was roughly 2 1/2 hours, but I think that was because 1) I just didn't notice until the last stage of labor 2) I made a conscious effort to do relaxation exercises -- deep yoga breathing, hot shower, etc... and 3) I wasn't in a hospital and was able to move freely right up to and after birth. I'm thinking that 3 was the most important, but that reflects my bias.

Yeah. I actually had a pretty good hospital as hospitals go, they didn't manage until hour 46 or so, and I spent the first 36 hours at home, walking around, etc. (The hospital was blocks away and we kept them updated.) At the hospital they had a bath I could use, which helped for a while, they encouraged me to walk, etc. Then I was finally just too too exhausted to manage the pain anymore and gave in to the epidural, and it was all downhill from there. (Pitocin, which I'd NOT wanted, etc.)

From my reading and conversations on this, the single biggest variable seems to be age when having the first baby -- younger women tend to have faster births, older women tend to have slower. I was 29 and 11/12ths, so not so old as all that. Second babies always seem to be faster.

Similar experience here as sozobe. I wasn’t a walk away from the hospital, but stayed at home for the first baby for the 16 hours or so. At the hospital the only thing that helped the pain was a hot shower, but how long can you stand in the shower? Finally gave up at about 10:00 that night after arriving about 4:00 to the hospital and got an epidural. I think it relieved my husband even more than me. Just like you, it slowed my labor and had to have Pitocin – didn’t have the baby until after 10:00 the next morning.

Maybe it is age. I had my first at 34 and second at 39.

But off of childbirth, what else are women lied about?

Maybe about careers? How about this one – you can have it all. You can have a fulfilling career and a family. Sure you can, but you get little sleep, you rush everywhere, have a messy home (if you want to spend quality time with your children). I still work full time, but have decided to not worry about the career. I will work 100% while I am at work, but I am not going to worry about going above and beyond the call of duty. Being at my little girl’s Christmas pageant for example is so much more important than getting that next promotion.

Oh .......my....... God!!!

Ive never been keen on having kids but that description tipped me over the edge,yuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!!!!!!!
I can see that the idea of a beautiful loved baby at the end of it makes it all worh it but I have serious trouble with the idea of a smear test let alone giving birth!!
Excrement,pain,toughened nipples,hemeroids,stretched tummy,please God no.Adoption looks great.

Yeah, that sounds like a better explanation. I know my sister had a similar marathon to yours, she had even planned a home birth but ended up in the hospital for a c-section after 2 days. I always believed that she would have had no problem if she hadn't asked my mom to be there :wink:

Both of mine were way overdue. The first one they induced at almost 43 weeks, and they only let me go that long because the hospital was crowded. I also did not want Pitocin and repeatedly had to stop nurses from giving it to me. Once they did, I caved to the epidural. Eventually, my son's heart rate would nearly disappear with each contraction. Luckily, I had one kind nurse who turned off the pit drip and lo, his heart rate never dropped again.

But yeah, my husband took pictures of me in the delivery room. I burned them all as soon as we got home. Hideous.

Second experience was much better but still not exactly what I would call beautiful.

Sorry, Linkat, I posted that after the change of subject.

Pitocin without epidural must be brutal.

Sozlet was two weeks overdue, also, we had an appointment for induction on a Wednesday, I went into labor the Sunday before. She was born a few hours after the scheduled induction.

I definitely had to do a lot of fighting -- the nurses were actually great, I had an absolutely sucky OB though. It was an OB/Gyn group of two women and one man, I'd seen one of the women for all the prenatal appointments, but of course it was the guy who was on duty. (I'm sure there are good male OBs, he wasn't one of them.) So I did a lot of HOOOOOLD up what do you think you're doing??? kinds of interventions. The nurses gave me private ovations, evidently that doc is not often stood up to.

Surprisingly material girl – I have no stretch marks from giving birth. I am very small too so I thought for sure with how big my tummy got that I would have them. I also gave birth at an older age when you skin is not as prone to spring back into shape. Just lucky I guess. I can still wear a bikini.

Go Soz!

Didn't see the intervening posts either, weird!

Yeah, materialgirl, there's a lot to be said for adoption. ;-) I dunno, I'm glad I did it and everything, certainly thrilled to death with the end result. And also one of those, that's right, I'm tough, look what I went through! kinds of experiences that can be useful to remember if you're feeling not so tough.

Linkat, yep, the you can have it all thing is a big lie, sure.

The labor thing is also great for future guilt trips as your child gets older. On a more serious note, I loved being pregnant and did think the pregnancy thing was beautiful. I was fortunate I did not get sick; occasionally would feel sick. The only problems I had were that my back hurt toward the end and I was very tired and an occasional leg cramp. I loved the feeling of my baby moving inside me even those huge moves when you could see an imprint of an elbow or foot.

True, true. I was extremely sick the first trimester (?) -- would loll in bed with my Blackberry (really Wyndtell, but they're the same thing and more people know what a Blackberry is) staying in touch with my staff, solving problems from afar, between making sprints to the bathroom.

2nd and 3rd trimesters were way cool.

I never got sick but hated pregnancy. In that sense, childbirth was almost a relief. My entire stomach from belly button to pubes is pure stretch marks. They aren't so easy to see anymore, but there they are. If I had it to do over again I think I would resist the urge to scratch my belly.

It would be nice if the stork really did bring babies, at about age 1, to your doorstep.

God I can't wait to get pregnant

:wink:

Well done LinKat,nice to hear it happens for some people.I know if I have kids my body will go through changes as it is meant to, but Im not looking forward to it.

It just all really scares me.Id love to be a mother, I think kids are lovely(tho alot of work)and the sense of achievement you mention after giving birth must be great.

My friend has a 6 year old daughter and is expecting her second child.I often feel as tho there is a wall between women who have had kids and those who havnt,like a kind of gang.It makes me feel like Im not a complete woman and maybe never will be.

Another friend the same age as me really wants kids and cant wait to get pregnant.I keep thinking there is something wrong with me because I dont have this yearning to actually go through the experience.

Financially and emotionally Im not at a place to even think about having kids so this is premature talk but adoption seems quite a good way to go.

I was reading about Angelina Jolie this morning and her views on adoption.

Heh.

Um.

We're kidding! Yeah.

(See what Cinn said, it's not always bad. And you're young, right?)