why we feel pain in labor and pain relief methods

ok i may be asking a dumb question here, but with the placenta, do you have to have that injection?
or can you just be left alone and it will be birthed onits own?
this is one part that really confuses me and nobody seems to want to talk about it.

also, i haev read where is hospital the midwives and doctors break your waters for you to onset labour into the nect stage... if you leave them intact will labour stall or will it happen on its own with them breaking when the body is ready to progress...

sorry if these are dense questions, i am trying to get info so i can have a drug free birth.... and want to know what the body does NATURALLY when left alone..

Hey Lisa

they are great questions!
you can choose to have your placenta birthed without the injection (which is synthetic oxytocin to help the uterus to contract and push the placenta out)...this method takes anwhere from 5-30 minutes or so for the placenta to naturally peel off the uterus wall and for you to push it out...which isnt like pushing your baby out, more like a feeling of a fullness in your vagina, and with a little push, or sometimes a cough, the placenta plops out :)
many Drs prefer you to have the injection...to decrease the risk of postpartum bleeding...but if you have not had any complications in pregnancy or labor to suggest that you may be at risk for this...then you dont have to have it...but do let your doctor know in advance, and write it in your birth plan so the midwives at the hospital are aware as well

yep its true that breaking your waters van help move labor along, and sometimes this is necessary if your labor has been overly prolonged and you are tired. Generally speaking though the body will move at its own pace...which is the pace which is perfect for you and your baby

once you have anything done at all to you in labor...intervention...it sets off a snowball affect (called the cascade of intervention)...basically one thing gets done...then another...then another

hope this helps...feel free to ask any questions...I LOVE talking all things, belly birth and baby

x

I will be putting up a blurb on why we feel pain in labor tomorrow (Monday)...so let me know if there are any burning questions :D

thanks for that its exactlywhat i needed!!

Natalie, thanks a heap for doing this. It's much appreciated by all :D

ok I know its not Monday...but special treat for me...the inlaws are bathing the kids :)

so why do we feel pain in labor?

first the definition of pain...an individuals interpretation of a sensation (basically)...so everyone feels differently

as a basic rundown...the history of childbirth is not a pretty one, and it is this that has set the seed for fear (and in some cases for good reason...think early christianity and midwives being burnt at the stake) for society

the fear surrounding childbirth helps to initiate and set in place the fear-tension-pain syndrome...which Kelly talks about in detail in one of her articles...but simply put...
if you are frightened...you become tense...and when you are tense adrenaline is released...fight or flight response (remember back to how adrenaline affects labor)...and then we feel pain

we need oxygen so that the uterus can work to its full potential, and also to keep our baby happy :)...if we are fearful, our breathing becomes short and tense, decreasing our oxygen levels leading to an unhappy baby and a oxygen deprived uterus...leading to pain (as the uterus struggles to work...leading to disrupted and prolonged labor) and dips in the babies heart rate with every contraction (fetal distress)

the uterus does not hurt in labor...but the cervix has lots of nerve fibres...and the sensation of the cervix opeing, stretching and being pulled up can be painful for some women at the peak of a contraction and in transition, and for others it is simply 'intense'...again remember that intact waters cushions the impact of the babies head on the cervix decreasing the intensity sensations expereinced by the laboring mother

I'm of course not saying that you will not feel pain...but every experience is different, and everyone interprets the sensations differently...this is why hypnobirthing is effective as it trains the mind to interpret the sensations as a postive experience and calms and relaxes the laboring women to allow the body to work as effectively as it can...

what are everyones experiences of contractions?

for myself...my first labor was pretty difficult...I was fearful and had a very medical expereince, and a good dose of PND. I worked hard to release my fears with my second pregnancy and had the amazing birth I wanted...yes it was intense but it was good intense...it was even enjoyable...I have some great shots of me smiling and looking rather serene (B&W of course :)) in the bath with my support team working around me

I hope that this helps :)...you can do it Gracie...as Kelly said surround yourself with a fearless support team ;)

next post will be on natural pain relief methods...any requests?

xx yogababy

this is so informative and helpful and inspiring to read - thank you :) From someone who is not even pregnant with their 1st yet, it's really helping me to not be afraid of anything....
rather be informed and that will help prevent me from having fears... if we are educated then we are less likely to be fearful hey....

Natalie, you could write your own book!! :)

thanks Renstar...that really means alot...in fact I have been busy writing my own book, on all things yoga for belly, birth & baby...just not quite sure what to do with it :)

Thanks for all the info yogababy! i have a couple of qn's.

I am already waking in the middleof the night with butterflies in my tummy. I know this is the feeling from adrenaline, but it not b/c i am anxious, it is b/c i am SO EXCITED! i can't wait to experience the whole thing. Does what you are saying mean i should try not to get too excited when i finally go into labour? I might start to feel anxious about being too excited and make the whole thing worse! LOL

One other qn, re syntocin for third stage. Someone (an OB) said to me there is a VERY small risk that vessels in the cord may not do what they are supposed to and bub could bleed back into the placenta without anyone knowing. What are your thoughts on that?

With my first labour i was quite fearful and really had no idea how the body worked at all during labour. I ended up having gas for most of it just to knock myself out of it so i wouldn't really feel much and i also had pethadine. For my second though i went in there knowing so much more and i was scared about the birth itself(for other reasons due to having such a bad experience last time) but i wasnt scared of the contractions at all. Yeah it hurt but i went almost 30 hours without pain relief and that was with a posterior labour. I did end up having an epidural in the last 7hrs but only because i was so tired(and labout kept stopping and starting) not because of the pain. For my next one i am planning a homebirth which will hopfully help with the stopping and starting business(labour would start up again soon as i got home after been sent away from hossie)

Having this knowledge you've given us too i think will help me a lot aswell. Thanks again!

great Q's

its great to be excited...all those postive vibes going to your baby, and giving you wonderful anticipation and positive reinforcement...its pretty hard not to get excited, and really normal...a little bit of adrenaline is fine, and excitement quickly settles as you immerse yourself in the work of labor...im talking totally out of control fear

Ob's are great for complicated, difficult pregnancies, labor/births...I guess you could say having an OB is an insurance against an unknown major hiccup...but...they are trained in all the things that could go wrong, when this so infrequently occurs. It is rare that a baby bleeds back into the placenta...and not really a good enough reason to enforce a medical 3rd stage...in fact it is so much more likely that everything will go fab...as long as you avoid the pokes and prods of well meaning professionals trying to 'help' :)

xx

Ummm, sell it to BB members and other doulas???
Seriously, do you have a publisher in mind, or would you self-fund for the first run and see where that takes you? There are loads of independent publishers that you could approach - how about Sarah Buckley's publisher? Or a women's brand like Virago (tend to be more female oriented titles)?
I used to be in publishing, but it was educational and I never got far with it (promises from the higher ups never materialised cos I was too precocious!), so I'm only giving very generalised ideas. My GF published using a UK publisher, and she's here (it's a professional relaxation CD and guide that her a her colleague devised - both psychologists), so it doesn't even have to be a local publisher.
Anyway, thanks for the posts, they have validated and confirmed everything I learned for my own birth experience, and why it was such a good one to have as a first :)

Hey Mayaness

I have self published 2 yoga manuals...so was going to go the same way with the bigger version...its just getting it out there :)

Maybe you could use the manuals and some excerpts of your new book to present to a pub company? That way they do most of the work in getting it out there. Meanwhile you could still do a small print run and sell on BB while someone else sources other markets!
Oooh, you could approach the ABA - they recognise that better birth= better BFing experiences! Between ABA and BB, you'd sell heaps of books!

thanks so much for your encouragement Mayaness...I really love what I do, and it really gives me confidence when I am told that I am doing ok :)

I was just about to post an apology for going way off topic!
The reason your proposed book excites me is that I read widely before even falling pregnant and the only book I read that actually had a description of the uterus' role and a diagram of what it looks like was my Marie Mongan HypnoBirthing book. That's ok, except it's American, and we need Australian perspectives of these things.
Honestly, I'd purchase your book and loan it out to my preggy friends! they were skeptical of my rendition of events until I had Oscar and could report that 'it works' ( :rolleyes: ). The less books by Kaz Cooke (about how awful childbirth really is), the more about empowered birthing, the better :)

I will be posting a blurb about natural pain relief later today...with particular attention to HypnoBirthing...please feel free to request any info :)

xx yogababy

Alrighty ... I'm adoring all this info ... I went away and had a good think, and now I've come up with some wonderfully curly questions for ya ...

I fully appreciate how vital but oh so detrimental adrenaline is ... but what if, (through a lifetime of dealing with two anxiety disorders) you've trained and honed this silly gland like a well oiled machine, strengthened it to be half the size again of a normal adrenal gland and now due to the fact that it's linked to the involuntary system it can now secrete far more cortisol/adrenaline than the average woman wants or needs???

I've spent many, many, MANY years learning to cope with it's after effects, using cognitive behaviour therapy and positive self talk, but due to the involuntary nature of the darn gland the only way you can stop it shooting first and asking questions later is to desensitise yourself to the stimuli, and as this is my first PG I can't do a truckload of labour runs until I teach my body it's all good! :lol: Watching the birth process does diddly squat for me as I'm only seeing it from the outside looking in and my body needs to feel all the twangs and twinges many times over before the darn gland gets used to it.

I've managed to stall the TTC process with all this excess adrenaline, and because we're having a remote homebirth I REALLY don't wanna stall the labour process with all this excess hormone, but how on earth do you stop an involuntary gland????

Hope that makes sense ... sometimes I find it hard to get all my thoughts in a row ... I talk better than I type sometimes ... ;)