Good talk with Midwife

opheliainwaders

So I had a really good appointment this week with my midwife, and found out that a lot of the things that were important to me are either standard practice with them, or with the hospital, including:

- Not inducing until 42 weeks unless there's a medical reason;

- Staying home and laboring there for as long as possible (she recommended coming in about 12 hours after water breaks, if it breaks first, but wasn't pushy about it, she just mentioned that in her experience, either you're going to start labor right away, or it'll take a full day or two, such that if it's been 12 hours with no progress, then she'd prefer to have patients come in);

- Ability to drink during labor (she did chuckle a little re: eating, and said, "You can totally eat whatever you want, but if you show up in L&D and tell me you're hungry, I'll send you home. If you show up and vomit on me, then we're good to go.");

- She's open to intermittent monitoring as long as they have adequate nursing staff on hand and/or she doesn't have more than one person in L&D at a time.  Otherwise, it would be electronic monitoring, but on and off, and with a waterproof wireless monitor (so you can still hang out in the shower, wander around, etc.)

- Moving around during labor/changing positions to push/etc;

- Delayed cord clamping.

Only thing I'm not psyched about is that they do require a hep lock (but at least that's better than an IV). Overall, I'm feeling better about this - from the start, I've been more afraid of the hospital than of the birth!

annabelle.27

That's great! Sounds like she is supportive of natural birth.

As an aside... am I the only one who ate right up until I started pushing? I keep hearing this "if you are hungry you are not in real labour" bit but I was hungry and thirsty throughout. Labour is hard work and I needed fuel. And I didn't throw it up. During my second labour, I was drinking water WHILE pushing. I know that's not everyone's experience, but if you are hungry or thirsty, please feed that need.

tokenhoser

annabelle.27:

That's great! Sounds like she is supportive of natural birth. As an aside... am I the only one who ate right up until I started pushing? I keep hearing this "if you are hungry you are not in real labour" bit but I was hungry and thirsty throughout. Labour is hard work and I needed fuel. And I didn't throw it up. During my second labour, I was drinking water WHILE pushing. I know that's not everyone's experience, but if you are hungry or thirsty, please feed that need.

I ate all through labour up until I hit transition and I chugged probably 3-4 L of water while pushing (it took 90 minutes - I was soooo thirsty). I never vomitted, and it drives me crazy when everyone says "you won't want to eat" like it's a universal truth. The freedom to eat was important to me - early labour lasted from 11 am to about 8 pm. That's 9 hours - not eating would have left me weak and starving.

sschwege

annabelle.27:

That's great! Sounds like she is supportive of natural birth. As an aside... am I the only one who ate right up until I started pushing? I keep hearing this "if you are hungry you are not in real labour" bit but I was hungry and thirsty throughout. Labour is hard work and I needed fuel. And I didn't throw it up. During my second labour, I was drinking water WHILE pushing. I know that's not everyone's experience, but if you are hungry or thirsty, please feed that need.

Definitely not me!  I ate in early labor, but that was it.  I did continue to drink though and was requesting water in between contractions during the pushing stage.  But eating was the last thing from my mind!

OP: That all sounds great!  I think you are right to just roll with the hep-lock.  My hospital doesn't do them routinely, but if they did I wouldn't have refused, not really worth the battle IMO. 

opheliainwaders

sschwege:

annabelle.27:

That's great! Sounds like she is supportive of natural birth. As an aside... am I the only one who ate right up until I started pushing? I keep hearing this "if you are hungry you are not in real labour" bit but I was hungry and thirsty throughout. Labour is hard work and I needed fuel. And I didn't throw it up. During my second labour, I was drinking water WHILE pushing. I know that's not everyone's experience, but if you are hungry or thirsty, please feed that need.

Definitely not me!  I ate in early labor, but that was it.  I did continue to drink though and was requesting water in between contractions during the pushing stage.  But eating was the last thing from my mind!

OP: That all sounds great!  I think you are right to just roll with the hep-lock.  My hospital doesn't do them routinely, but if they did I wouldn't have refused, not really worth the battle IMO. 

Yeah, I think her point was more that it's relatively rare to eat in active labor, so her advice was to eat whatever you want at home, but if you're still at the point where you want a sandwich when you get to the hospital, you probably have some time left and may not need to be admitted yet. She definitely advocated drinking as much as possible the whole time.

But hey, everyone's different! My experience thus far in pregnancy is that I'm more likely to vomit than not, so I probably will wind up puking in labor (which I guess will be better than puking in taxis and the subway, so there's a silver lining?). We'll see!

nosoup4u

tokenhoser:

annabelle.27:

During my second labour, I was drinking water WHILE pushing. I know that's not everyone's experience, but if you are hungry or thirsty, please feed that need.

I ate all through labour up until I hit transition and I chugged probably 3-4 L of water while pushing (it took 90 minutes - I was soooo thirsty). I never vomitted, and it drives me crazy when everyone says "you won't want to eat" like it's a universal truth.

I was hungry and thirsty while pushing during my second labor. I think they only gave me ice chips? And kept telling me, "you can eat when it's over!", which pissed me off. I chugged multiple pints of milk after he was born, hee hee. 

A37licia

Sounds like you have a good midwife for a natural hospital birth!

tantdylf

annabelle.27:

That's great! Sounds like she is supportive of natural birth. As an aside... am I the only one who ate right up until I started pushing? I keep hearing this "if you are hungry you are not in real labour" bit but I was hungry and thirsty throughout. Labour is hard work and I needed fuel. And I didn't throw it up. During my second labour, I was drinking water WHILE pushing. I know that's not everyone's experience, but if you are hungry or thirsty, please feed that need.

OP - That is awesome!

annabelle - I was the opposite! I was bound and determined to eat if I wanted to eat in labor but I didn't want a thing and my contractions started at 2am when my water broke and I only drank water and watered down apple juice until I delivered at 10:45pm