Ok this is really dumb but do normal contractions tighten the belly exactly the same as BH do??? Or are they more specific to one are of the belly?????
I get BH all the time and my whole tummy goes rock hard from top to bottom but I can't remember if this happened when I was in labour with Iz. The answer is probably so obvious - "duh Tan of course they do" but I thought I'd ask anyway.....
I found that for me, it was tightening across my whole belly, but the pain I felt was way down low into my pelvis, just like where you would feel a normal period cramp, but also like it was inside my vagina kwim? I could see my whole tummy tightening with them which is pretty cool to watch because if you're being monitored and you watch the peaks on the monitor as well as your belly, you can see it getting tighter and tighter and tighter before it peaks and ebbs away. But it is still a completely different feel to a BH cx.
i cant remember seeing my belly tighten or anything, i just know it felt like the worst possible period pain imaginable lol, my labours only lasted about 3hrs though. The last time i was in the labour room the nurse actually told me to be quiet coz others in the ward were trying to sleep, stupid cow
I personally really only felt it in my cervix area. It felt to me like really painful, sharp period pain. Well I like to think of it as excruciating AF pain, but everyone is different.
For me it was really low, like a band down across the front of my tummy and like peiod pains but amplified. Whereas BH were a tightening of my full belly.
lol... first hand? it's just like my BH's, which are painless tightening sensations across my tummy, but with the addition of what feels like low down heaviness. I know exactly what it is - it's my cervix opening. Once it's fully open, then the body switches to pushing down, which I can't tell you about yet, but give me a couple hours!
It did tighten my whole belly like a BH, but once i had the sensations of the cervix opening (like a chinese burn, way low down in my pelvis) i didn't feel the tightening anymore, because the cervix sensation sort of took all my attention.
My real contractions felt like a band around my belly and back tightening then peaking and slowly loosening. Pre labour pains felt like really bad period pain only kind of in between my hips then in my back too and was there, to some extent, pretty constantly. I thought my prelabour pains were labour pains, but when labour started properly, it was totally a different feeling and more painful. Nothing like BH for me at all.
I never felt braxton hicks but had a tight tummy quite a bit late in the pregnancy.
As for labour, my labour was really low down like just above the pubic bone. I don't remember it taking over my whole abdo. I don't think it happened. My labour pain was so low that when I talked to the midwives (3 times over a few hours) they kept telling me it was only pre labour yet when I arrived at hossy with that same pain I was 6cms dilated. When on the phone they also told me it couldn't be real labour as the contractions were only lasting 20 to 30 seconds. They were wrong.
I can't remember if my tummy tightened with the contractions.
Thanks ladies! I just couldn't remember and because I get BH that tighten the whole belly I was wondering if the same would happen this time around. I was induced too last time so this will be a whole new experience getting to see what my body does by itself! Amazing! Whoo hooo!!!!
REALLY dumb question about contractions....
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3 hours mmm might put in my order for that! 
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