Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
Oct
2
Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
“I Should Make All Mothers Vomit For Delivery.”
“I should make all mothers vomit for delivery.” – OB who told the mother to lay down and get into position for pushing. While laying down, the mother vomited, which unexpectedly pushed the baby completely out.
There are 39 comments to this post.
first time mommy had this to say,
Oct 2, 2011 @ 11:12 am (Quote)
All you’d have to do then is sit where I can see you during my labor! =P
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I imagine this was the doctor’s attempt to lighten the mood and make the mom feel a little less self-conscious.
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BeckyJ Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 11:14 am (Quote)
If the mother knew anything about labor and delivery, she’d know it was natural to get sick sometimes, and wouldn’t feel self-conscious, just like alot of women poo when they push. 
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Tee Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 11:17 am (Quote)
While I understand where you’re coming from, I don’t agree with you. Even the most knowledgeable mother might get self conscious during birth. I’ve seen modesty come into play for a lot of knowledgeable mothers.
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Jane Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 11:22 am (Quote)
There’s a huge difference between “About 25% of women vomit during labor” and your own vomit all over the hospital gown and mattress.
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juliewashere88 Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 11:56 am (Quote)
I agree. It’s not like the Dr was seriously considering purposely making laboring women vomit. Point is, vomiting happens and this was probably a lighthearted joke that got taken seriously.
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Samantha had this to say,
Oct 2, 2011 @ 11:49 am (Quote)
I got so sick during my labor. I wished i had vomited my baby out, but I was only at 2cm. Sever pain always makes me vomit. OP I hope you hit the OB!
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Dorothy Kernaghan-Baez Reply:
October 3rd, 2011 at 1:26 pm (Quote)
I threw up OVER and OVER through my labor. Finally, it was just bile. The contractions didn’t hurt till around transition, when I had horrible back pain, but stopped throwing up. Go figure.
Lesson of that day: Don’t bully your grandfather into buying you pizza while in early labor. You will regret it.
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Jessica had this to say,
Oct 2, 2011 @ 11:54 am (Quote)
I read low blood sugar during labor can induce vomiting. So OB is saying he prefers his patients starving and weakened. If mamas were well-nourished while in labor perhaps they wouldn’t need to puke to push more effectively.
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Ashley Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 12:02 pm (Quote)
I completely agree. I feel if I had eaten I wouldn’t have been sick. It was all bile.
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Sarah Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 3:32 pm (Quote)
I went so long without eating after my first birth that when I went into labor with my 2nd I refused to go to the hospital until I’d eaten dinner. It was 16 years ago and I remember that meal like no other in my life. It was a massive plate of cheeseburger macaroni hamburger helper. It came back up just when I started to push and one of the nurses was surprised I had the presence of mind to lean over the side of the bed and told me not to worry about it.
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This is mine! They told me to get into position for pushing and I had an overwhelming need to throw up.. I asked SO to quickly grab a garbage can and they hollered NO! Go out into the hallway we have a vomit bag dispenser out there. Therefore I threw up all over myself for being told to hold it in and wait. Hubby came running back a couple of minutes later.. Meanwhile my son’s head had come out during my throwing up. Hubby handed the bag over, got sick again. And out my dear one came. lol. Then the DR said this. I laughed at first but my hubby looked at me like “seriously?” I wasn’t offended but I thought it was odd enough to share.
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Kristin Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 1:38 pm (Quote)
Those stupid vomit bags just make it easier for them to measure how mush you got sick while also being easy to clean up.
They should have let you use the trash can.
I did read that in some “primitive” cultures the midwife will make the mother thrown up to speed delivery and because the mother focuses less on the pain of delivery if she is concerning herself with getting sick.
I figured that I was probably going to be sick, so I demanded whatever food they would let me have, just so I wouldn’t get dry heaves…
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Kim Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 2:04 pm (Quote)
Lame they wouldn’t “let” you throw up in the most convenient place! With my 3rd I threw up more times than I could count (first time I ever threw up during a pregnancy). I just barely made it to the sink and tried to apologize to my nurse for the mess, but she said it was perfectly fine and got me a little pan to have close by for the next time. I still felt bad that she had to clean it up tho, since she was 30 weeks pregnant herself 
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BeckyJ Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 8:14 pm (Quote)
They didn’t “let” her throw up in the most convenient place, because vomit is biohazardous waste and they don’t want it in an open container for too long. When I went into the OB ward for being dehydrated and pukey, they gave me a vomit bag and when I asked why they didn’t just let me use the trash, the nurse told me why.
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Angelica Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 8:21 pm (Quote)
Then they should keep the stupid things in the room…. I would think that if vomiting might happen, you’d want one near the patient so they are less likely to biohazard waste all over the doc’s face while waiting for someone to grab one.
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Heather P Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 9:13 pm (Quote)
Yep this. I’ve never been in a hospital delivery room that didn’t have something to vomit in handy.
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BeckyJ Reply:
October 2nd, 2011 at 10:31 pm (Quote)
Well, that’s what one would think, but it’s not like that in some hospitals. :/
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Layla19 Reply:
October 3rd, 2011 at 8:22 pm (Quote)
I think I’ll request them in advance. Then, if they refuse to have them in the room, they can’t get annoyed when I puke all over the floor. “I *told* you it was going to happen, Nurse Who’s-it.”
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Jess Reply:
October 7th, 2011 at 11:01 pm (Quote)
Haha….SERIOUSLY! Vomit is a biohazard and we can’t have it in an open container. So instead we have NO container in the room, and now the biohazard is all over the floor? Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. If sanitation is the concern, common sense says the trash can would have been MUCH better…..but since when has common sense prevailed over policy in hospitals?
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Aron Reply:
October 3rd, 2011 at 12:52 pm (Quote)
I think your nurse might have been feeding you the party line. As a doula and almost-finished nursing student I have yet to be in any room where vomiting was likely without a handy pink basin in arms reach. If it’s a situation where we need to pay attention to a person’s intake and output then we just measure, dump, rinse and repeat. If we don’t need to measure, then we get to skip that step. In the unlikely event that no big pink basin is there, then any receptacle (including the trash can) will do as long as it helps keep the patient from vomiting on him/herself. I think your nurse just didn’t want to have to deal with the extra work of cleaning a basin and wouldn’t admit it.
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Emily Greenhalge had this to say,
Oct 2, 2011 @ 1:01 pm (Quote)
While this was obviously a joke, and pretty lighthearted at that, it follows a pattern some OBs seem to gravitate toward. “Women tend to labor faster after their water breaks, so we’ll break their water.” “Pitocin works to increase contractions during labor, so we’ll use it to start labor.” “We can catch the baby a lot easier if the mom labors in the lithomy position, so all women should labor in the lithomy position.” “Some women poop during labor, so all women should have an enima.” “Some women tear during pushing, so we’ll give all women an episiotomy.”
It is just a joke, but it’s a joke based a little too much in truth. Not that the doctor was one of “those,” I’m sure he wasn’t. It’s just something to think about.
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Lil had this to say,
Oct 2, 2011 @ 1:50 pm (Quote)
I’ve felt sick at the transition point, and the midwives have to go grab a cardboard sick bowl, I’m a lousy aim at that point in the labour, so glad we don’t have bags here!
The thing that strikes me with the OP’s story, is it sounds like Dad missed out on some of the birth because he was sent off to get a bag for the OP. Personally, I’d say that was the midwife/L&D nurse’s job, or even the OB’s if he want’s to make himself actually useful! The NHS is so worried we’d all steal their precious cardboard boxes (which are so very useful as they double up for us giving urine samples in too! So you can see the attraction of nabbing a those for home huh?!), that they are kept away from us and can only be provided by medical staff! When giving birth in hospital, I’m only allowed one person with me, and I’m blowed if I’m gonna let my husband be sent off on errands to leave me alone with a room full of medical staff! Or the opposite, as if they don’t think/believe you’re about to deliver, they usually leave you alone until it’s obs time!
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My OB ordered me a clear liquid diet because she was “afraid of vomit”. I ate all my fiance’s food, and the nurses’, and my friends’. The only time I thought I was going to throw up was when she cut me. I tried puking on her, and couldn’t. Now I’m wondering if I couldn’t simply because I ate everything in sight. Next time around, I’m ordering pizza.
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Seriously – barf bags in the hallway? That is lame. When you need to vomit, you need to vomit! And, while I am at it, WHY do the nurses try to get moms to barf in those tiny emesis basins? They never hold enough and spill too easily. I get trashcans and bedpans to put in strategic locations in case my clients barf – and they do – so I can grab something quickly.
On a side note – the only labor I ever barf during was my oldest son, and his was my fastest labor, too. Not sure there’s a connection, but I always felt that I vomited because my body was so overwhelmed with the intensity.
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Amy K. Reply:
October 17th, 2011 at 11:24 am (Quote)
hear, hear!
When I was in labor, I asked my husband to hand me the trash can in my hospital room when the nurse tried to give me one of those tiny kidney bowls to throw up into. Even Wikipedia knows that those are stupid containers to use for vomiting.
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That would involve letting her eat Doc.
Vomiting does sometimes indicate that labor is close to being done, but inducing vomiting will not have the same effect.
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