I would like to have a med-free VBAC but plan on delivering at a hospital. I spoke with my OB today and am feeling bummed. Essentially she said that if I want a natural delivery I need to stay at home as long as possible because if I come to the hospital it is essentially policy for them to do an epidural and continuous monitoring because it is a VBAC. She said if I show up at 8cm, they obviously wouldn't push an epidural on me so to try to stay home as long as I can. I plan on staying home as long as possible and laboring there anyway, but heck, I've never done this before, what if I think I'm almost ready and I show up and am only 4cm. I understand I can refuse the epidural and continuous monitoring, and I plan to, but by nature I'm not an adversarial person so I was hoping for more of a supportive situation.
If you had a natural birth VBAC was your OB ok letting you labor without continuous monitoring etc? Wondering if this is pretty much standard policy with VBACs or if it is my OB/hospital. On a side note, one of the reasons I chose her was that I heard she doesn't rush to c-section. With the boys she would have delivered vaginally even if baby B was breech (they were both transverse so I had to have a c-section anyway).
Re: XP: In hospital natural birth with VBAC?
I think continuous monitoring is standard everywhere for VBAC. Does your hospital have telemetry (wireless) units?
Having an epidural as standard for VBAC is bullsh!t, frankly. There's no reason for it other than making it easier for the provider. I would definitely push back on that one, and outright refuse it (or have your DH or whoever you're with refuse for you).
I had a med-free VBAC in the hospital, and my MW knew I wasn't planning on an epidural. Luckily, I showed up pushing, but they still strapped me to a monitor and put a saline lock in me (and did a really bad job, bc I was in the middle of labor). I remember my MW definitely pushed the "show up in when you're pretty far along", too.
Have you thought about hiring a doula, or even a montrice? A montrice is usually a home birth MW or nurse who acts as a doula at the hospital, but she's also qualified to do cervix checks. That way you could labor at home and be assured you're far enough along when you get to the hospital.
DS2 - Oct 2010 (my VBAC baby!)
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My Med-Free VBAC was two years ago, so I'm not sure if much has changed.
My OB (who was super supportive) also told me to stay at home as long as I could. His words were 'give us the least amount of time to ruin it for you.'
I got to the hospital at 2am in some serious labor. I was only at a 6 when I got there. I was given a non-negotible heplock (which sucked as they couldn't get it in right) and I was tethered to the monitor. I was able to sit/stand/lay/birth ball with the monitor on, but the problem was that baby didn't like it and kept trying to get away. Every time he shifted the nurse would have to come back in an readjust it, which he hated. So he would try to esacpe the monitor and throw me into another contraction. That was hell.
I kept having to 'use the restroom' just so they would take the damn thing off and leave me alone for a few minutes.
Luckily Babe was born at 4am after only 20 minutes of pushing so I was only stuck there for 2 hours.
After the birth the on-call OB and the nurses gave me a really hard time about the pitocin to deliver the placenta. I gave in and I do regret that as the after pain were intense and really served no purpose but to hurry up the placenta delivery so they could move on. I also tore pretty badly from his hand and elbow position during delivery and while they did numb the area prior to stitching, I did feel the end of the stitching and asked for more meds and was told 'oh, we're almost done anyway.' Then the gave me IV drugs I didn't want.
It was worth it and I'll VBAC again, but DH and I will be more forceful about what we want and don't want. And I'll still labor at home as long as I can.