Well, I’m finally on the other side! My original day for 40w was 10/24. Being my 3rd, I was certain I would go earlier like I had with my 2 daughters (39+6 & 39+5). Nope, dude has his own plans and came at 41+2.
Little back story, I had changed from my original OB that I had my 2 daughters with , to what I thought was going to be my rock solid respectful midwife team( I noticed red flags and GTFO ASAP), and finally switched to a home birth midwife around 25 w. Home birth was never in my mind or cards. My last 2 were traumatic and subpar hospital births w awful care providers. I dove deep and felt home birth was really actually something we could do. It ended up being a very empowering, and redemptive birth for me and our family. This isn’t a debate about home vs hospital, just sharing where we stood with it.
My care team consisted of a midwife, a midwife assistant, and a doula. I had hired my doula early on in my pregnancy to be my fighter for when we went to the hospital. I was unsure if switching to a home birth made it pointless to have a doula, but she was amazing. My midwife is very hands off and let’s mom lead the birth. She makes everything V normal and I love that about her.
Labor kick off. Went trick or treating with my 2.5 year old, while my 10 year old went with her friend. We got home, got the kids to bed, I layed down at 10pm. I wake up at 1145pm to light cramps and a weird “slam” into my pelvis. I try to reposition, eat a banana, walk around, take a pee(had bloody show), but the cramping kept coming. After about 15 min, they were non stop, 4 ish min apart. I woke my husband and told him I think I’m in labor and I’m going to shower and see how I feel. Said he should rest. Jokes on me, I called the midwife after the brief shower to let her know, and after realizing I couldn’t talk though them and they were so close, she said she was on her way(she lives about 45 min away). I was kind of in shock. This was an hour after I woke up w a cramp or 2. Now all of a sudden I can’t make it upstairs lol compared to my last 2 labors, it felt like just skipped early labor, which is a mind f. As I’m waiting for the midwife and doula, I’m in my living room on hands and knees bent over the side of the couch managing the waves. I didn’t actually use a timer but they were still V close, 3-5 min apart and moderately intense. I used my hypnobabies breathing technique to manage at this point. My 10 year old daughter and husband were by my side, givin
... keep reading on reddit ➡Hiya, mama! I write to you from the other side - I'm 2 months PP with the most wonderful, perfect little boy I could possibly imagine. I was a long time lurker on this page, and got so much camaraderie and support here while I was going through pregnancy.
I didn't expect to ever pop up to say any of this, but then, I didn't expect my birth story to go the way it did.
Here's the long and short of it, for people who don't care to read: You can't control everything. I know that sounds really common sense-y, but for whatever reason, I personally forgot that as I anticipated birth. I wasn't one of those people who had a detailed birth plan, and I was aware that things might change from what I thought beforehand to what I needed during. All I knew is that I wanted to really reduce interventions - in part because that's what I felt was right for me and baby, and perhaps moreover because, if I'm honest, doctors and medicine completely terrify the crap out of me. (To moms who choose various other paths - mad respect. You know you, and you will make the right choices for you!)
In the end, I wish I had prepared for the fact that you can't control what actually happens during labor. My little guy decided to make his arrival in an impossible presentation. No matter what I did or what I felt like I could endure, vaginal delivery wasn't possible. For whatever reason, I never considered the possibility that those interventions would be beyond my control - a matter of necessity and not choice.
So, if you read no further, and you're still expecting, I guess my takeaway is this: have some small part of your brain prepared to accept the reality that this isn't in your control. That the things you aren't planning on are still possibilities, no matter how much you don't want them. I had the opposite of what I wanted my birth to be, and it wasn't for lack of willpower or trying!
And, if you're curious about the actual birth story:
At 38.5 weeks (after a pretty normal pregnant apart from a full 38.5 weeks of morning sickness and puking), I went in for a normal, routine appointment on a Thursday. My blood pressure was borderline high - 143 / 79. It had been inching up in tiny amounts over the past two weeks, and my midwife was concerned that the trend would continue. She ordered all the labs to check for signs of pre-E (luckily there were none) and, when I reported that I'd been feeling pretty regular contractions, ordered a non-stress test. All was well with
... keep reading on reddit ➡I don't want to step on anybody's toes here, but the amount of non-dad jokes here in this subreddit really annoys me. First of all, dad jokes CAN be NSFW, it clearly says so in the sub rules. Secondly, it doesn't automatically make it a dad joke if it's from a conversation between you and your child. Most importantly, the jokes that your CHILDREN tell YOU are not dad jokes. The point of a dad joke is that it's so cheesy only a dad who's trying to be funny would make such a joke. That's it. They are stupid plays on words, lame puns and so on. There has to be a clever pun or wordplay for it to be considered a dad joke.
Again, to all the fellow dads, I apologise if I'm sounding too harsh. But I just needed to get it off my chest.
Posting in honor of my due date!
I got up to use the bathroom at 1:40am on the morning of 38+5 and felt a big gush of fluid. I called the midwife on call, who told me I could stay home for up to 12 hrs and see if contractions started. They ended up starting basically right after I got off the phone, around 2am, but were pretty mild and spaced far apart, so my husband and I stayed in bed. He fell back asleep and I drifted in and out for the next few hours.
Around 6am I was awake and contractions were getting more intense, so I woke up my husband. I'm really glad we had taken a pretty intensive childbirth class; he was calm and supportive and we labored at home for the next 4ish hours. We got in the shower for a while, used the birthing ball, and for a lot of it it just felt good to lean over the bed while he pressed on my lower back. I tried to eat a little, but ended up vomiting whenever I tried, and my appetite was pretty much gone so I gave up on that. By around 10am, my contractions were about 3 minutes apart and lasting for about a minute, so we decided to head to the hospital. I was surprised by how rapidly I got to that point; I'd been mentally prepared to be at home for a long early labor since this was my first birth.
The drive to the hospital took about 20 minutes, and I used a TENS unit on my back to help with contractions while I couldn't move around. We got into triage and I was already at 6 cm, which I was pumped about- my goal had been to get to the hospital around 6 cm. Our doula came and met us in triage and stayed with me while my husband went to park the car and grab our bags. We got up to a delivery room pretty quickly, and things got really intense. I'd been tentatively planning to try an unmedicated birth, but was going to see how things went once I got more into active labor. The physical intensity of the contractions was pretty unreal- it's hard to put into words how it felt getting from 6 to 10 cm. I am so grateful for the care team I had during labor at the hospital- for most of the time it was me, my husband, our doula, the midwife, and the nurse in the room. Everyone was super supportive, really gentle with me, had great ideas on how to position and get through labor. The lights were dim, the room was quiet. I labored for a while in the bed, then got in the shower and knelt over the birthing ball while my husband sprayed water on my back. I was no longer really able to interact with anyone; I felt very in my own space gettin
... keep reading on reddit ➡Do your worst!
I'm surprised it hasn't decade.
For context I'm a Refuse Driver (Garbage man) & today I was on food waste. After I'd tipped I was checking the wagon for any defects when I spotted a lone pea balanced on the lifts.
I said "hey look, an escaPEA"
No one near me but it didn't half make me laugh for a good hour or so!
Edit: I can't believe how much this has blown up. Thank you everyone I've had a blast reading through the replies 😂
If we know that it's best for the baby to be occiput anterior (head down and facing your back), why isn't it standard practice to either feel for the baby's position or do an ultrasound during labour, especially stalled labour? Is it that the technology isn't there yet? I'm genuinely curious.
Several of my friends have had extremely long, excruciating labours because the baby was stuck in the wrong spot, but staff didn't seem to realize until the baby either crowned facing the wrong way, or until they finally got a c-section because labour had stalled. Recently, a friend's painful, multi-day induction failed because it turned out that her baby's head was asynclitic, stuck in her hip instead of her pelvis. If they'd done an ultrasound earlier, she could have just had her c-section earlier.
Why isn't there a standard protocol on how to deal with what seems like a common problem?
It really does, I swear!
Because she wanted to see the task manager.
They’re on standbi
Pilot on me!!
Nothing, he was gladiator.
Dad jokes are supposed to be jokes you can tell a kid and they will understand it and find it funny.
This sub is mostly just NSFW puns now.
If it needs a NSFW tag it's not a dad joke. There should just be a NSFW puns subreddit for that.
Edit* I'm not replying any longer and turning off notifications but to all those that say "no one cares", there sure are a lot of you arguing about it. Maybe I'm wrong but you people don't need to be rude about it. If you really don't care, don't comment.
What did 0 say to 8 ?
" Nice Belt "
So What did 3 say to 8 ?
" Hey, you two stop making out "
I won't be doing that today!
Where ever you left it 🤷♀️🤭
[Removed]
This morning, my 4 year old daughter.
Daughter: I'm hungry
Me: nerves building, smile widening
Me: Hi hungry, I'm dad.
She had no idea what was going on but I finally did it.
Thank you all for listening.
You take away their little brooms
There hasn't been a post all year!
It was about a weak back.
It’s pronounced “Noel.”
After all his first name is No-vac
What, then, is Chinese rap?
Edit:
Notable mentions from the comments:
-
Spanish/Swedish/Swiss/Serbian hits
-
French/Finnish art
-
Country/Canadian rap
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Chinese/Country/Canadian rock
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Turkish/Tunisian/Taiwanese rap
There hasn't been a single post this year!
(Happy 2022 from New Zealand)
Nothing, it just waved
Him: I can explain everything!
(It's his best joke yet I think)
Bob
When I got home, they were still there.
