I wonder if this was the same OB who talked me into a pitocin induction on the basis that I had been dilated to 6cm for 4 weeks, so maybe my body needed a “jump-start” to get things going (I wasn’t even “overdue” yet) and that there was “absolutely no difference between a naturally-starting labor and an induced one, and people who tell you that an induced labor is more painful have normally never had a naturally-started one, so they don’t have anything to compare the pain to. It’s going to hurt either way.” I made it through the induced labor without an epidural, because I wasn’t letting anyone near my spine with a needle.

Since then, I’ve *had* a naturally-started labor, and I can tell you with 100% certainty that it was ***MUCH*** less painful than the induced one!

Excuse me? As the woman in labor, I’ll be the judge of how much pain I’m in!

While they really ought to be trusting the Mom’s perception of her own pain, it’s nice to see them not pushing the drugs on her, either. Still, some support would be nice and belief would be nice.

They tried to pull that BS with me, too – “Well, you don’t want to get anything too soon and have it wear off when it really starts to hurt…”, because obviously as a first-time mom I’m too stupid to know what pain is. Effers, I was in the delivery room about an hour later, *then* they called in Anesthesia.

Of my two births, I only needed an epidural in the second and I seriously needed it. I was screaming, crying, I couldn’t control it–the contractions were piggybacking, etc. No clue why–I’d been having a perfectly peaceful labor, meditating and floating in the water until it just suddenly changed. I was sure I was in transition.

I’d been in labor for 9 hours when I entered the hospital (and 7 hours the day before). It was 7 more hours before they gave me Nubain so that I could think. I wasn’t even aware of my surroundings anymore by the time they gave it to me, because the baby had been in distress long enough for them (even while I desperately tried to remain calm and not show my pain, my baby went into distress from it). Another hour before I got my epidural and my labor finally progressed.

For crud’s sake, I was a natural birth mama who’d done it all before and asking for an epidural. And they were all very pro-epidural, the contractions weren’t doing anything, so I’ll never understand why they couldn’t give me at least the Nubain earlier. It made me feel more like a woman in labor instead of someone suffering 7 hours of transition

That’s funny. They told me I had to have a bag of fluid before the epidural with my second, so I let the nurse know that I might want the epidural soon so she could get the fluid in. By the time I’d received the fluid, I had ‘enough pain’ to be ready for the relief. This was with an induction.

But so sweet of the doc to ignore the mom’s wishes. /sarcasm

Sheesh, when you say ‘no, thank you’ they push it, and when you say ‘yes, please’ they hold it back.
I sense a power issue here…

Too bad we can’t give most of these doctors a taste of their own evil juice…uhm…medicine

Prior to about 5 years ago, OBGYNs relied on a study done years ago that summerized said if a woman had an epidural prior to being dilated to about 4cm and the baby was at zero station in the pelvis ( how low the baby is in the pelvis ) then this increased a woman’s risk of a C/S
d/t the uterus being more relaxed and unable to contract adequately enough bring the baby down into the pelvis.
Then about 5 years ago a woman OBGYN completed a study in New England and the results were just the opposite; early epidurals did not increase a woman’s risk of a C/S. Epidurals then became available to women on demand. Some of the old timers in OB still don’t want their patients’ to have an epidural till his patient is in active
labor; however, the majority of OBGYNs will write an order for epidural on request. What impacts on this order is the fact that there is almost always just one person from anesthesia assigned in labor and delivery. There may be two women who have requested an epidural before you or a patient had to have an emergency C/S and anesthesia is tied up in the OR in labor and delivery and usually the main OR is busy so no one is available to come up and help place epidurals. Now this is how it is in a level hospital with in house anesthesia. I’m not sure how it’s done in smaller hospitals that don’t have in house anesthesia. So many women wait until they can’t handle it any longer to request an epidural and at a minimum OB nurses need 30 – 45 minutes to get you ready for placement of an epidural. This includes making sure we have an order or calling the OBGYN to obtain one, making sure all labs ordered are on the chart and giving the requested amount of IV fluid ( usually one bag). The reason for this fluid is to keep your B/P from dropping making the patient feel faint and sometimes causing the baby’s heartrate to drop. If the unit is busy, then the nurse may have another patient that is further along needing closer vigilance by the nurse. Pain medicine is great until the patient moves into transition, close to delivery. Most OBGYNs do not want their patients’ to have pain medicine at that time since the medicine could impact on baby’s breathing after birth. The moral of the story is talk to your nurse. If you’re going natural then you and your nurse come up with a plan of care, a word or look that means you need something for pain. Let the nurse know you want the least amount of pain medicine. A nurse can always give you less pain medicine but she can’t give you more.. and for the nurse not to ask you if you need an epidural or pain medicine every time she rounds on you. If you’ve had more than one baby with a history of rapid labor, let your nurse know so she can work with you on the best time for placement of an epidural or pain medicine. Best of luck to all of you.