Planned C section - Thursday!!

So we've got our planned Csection happening Thursday, we booked it 2 and a bit weeks ago after 2 failed ECV's.

I've never been admitted to hospital, never had any sort of surgery, so I am absolutely shitting myself!!

Any stories on their planned sections? Because I am so anxious I cannot stop crying over it😥

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Hi mama! I have a friend that had a planned c section for the birth of her son this best January and she said it was an amazing experience. Everything was very smooth during the C-section and she said she would "10/10 recommend a planned c section."

Good luck to you!

Honestly elective c sections are nothing like the horror stories.

You'll only be in theatre around an hour and baby will be out in first 10/15 mins... the rest of the time flys by! All being well they'll probably discharge you the next day.

The only pain I felt was a few seconds sting for the needles and the recovery was achey but totally manageable on paracetamol and ibuprofen taken religiously for 2 weeks. I was able to carry him in car seat briefly the next day. Got down to change him on the floor. Was putting washing in and wiping spills on the floor a few days later... it's all doable slowly and carefully.

We were out walking week 2 and visiting family. Week 3 I drove.

Happy to answer any questions here or privately. Xx

Hey 😊 I had a planned csection on the 1st September, which was a Friday, I was discharged Saturday and back to doing the school run on Monday! As long as you take your pain relief, you'll be fine xx

I had a planned section a week and a half ago. Like you, never had any kind of medical procedure and was quite scared when having to go for a section. It was a brilliant experience, really calm and positive and I felt relaxed and happy throughout.

The morning of the section, the surgeon and anaesthetist came to see me. Both were really lovely and talked me through things and answered questions. When they were ready for us, they brought us our scrubs to put on. Our allocated midwife came to meet us and she walked us to the theatre. She was also lovely and chatty.

They weighed me outside the theatre 🫣 then walked us in. There were 8-10 people in there, all smiley and saying hello. My husband put on our playlist - songs from our wedding. They sat me on the operating table and put the cannula in my hand. I didn’t love this bit as I’m not great with needles but they’re such experts and do it day in day out it was really straightforward. They then did the spinal…

I was scared about the spinal but they numbed my back with a local anaesthetic first so I didn’t feel anything- didn’t even know they’d done it until they said to quickly lie down. It felt like stepping into a hot bath - lovely! They then checked it had worked by spraying ice cold spray on my legs and up the sides of my body. They then did the section - I could feel some tugging but no pain, just a bit weird. Our baby was born moments later. At all times, the midwife, 3 anaesthetists and a nurse were watching me and answering questions/taking photos. Once our baby was born, I had skin to skin so the stitching up afterwards was no issue. Recovery has been fine so far. Definitely a lovely birth for me.

If you want music, download it to your phone as we had to go on airplane mode so some of the songs didn’t work.

I loved having music to help me relax and focus. I also used deep breathing and tried to focus on the excitement of meeting our baby to distract me.

The team were amazing. Warm, friendly, relaxed, caring and clearly experts. I had complete confidence in them and they made us feel so calm throughout.

I had a c section monday. I had the same experience as Amy above in terms of process as such. I cannot say how positive, lovely and incredible the experience was! It was so calm and everyone was experienced, knowledgable and caring towards myself, my husband and my baby. We was informed of every step along the way.

We did choose to have a gentle c section so the drape was dropped when he was lifted out and he was able to come straight to me for skin to skin. The midwife clamped the cord and my husband was able to cut the cord and the drapes went straight up for them to continue the procedure. All in all it took around 45 mins- an hour for it to be finished.

The after care has been amazing. I am on regular oramorph, paracetamol and ibruopen which has kept the pain under control. I've been able to get up and walk this morning around 11-12 after 24 hours approx. X

in our community

Oh my God, oh my God I hope this is not true!!!! I’m kind of scared

I’ve been throwing up and taking a shit all night!!! I just hope that it’s not what I think it is

Small head reported following 20 week scan

Has anyone else had it flagged that their baby is in the bottom 5th percentile for head size?

They said everything was fine whilst we were in the scan and then I got a phone call the next day saying that it’s on the small side and we’re being referred to a paediatric specialist at St George’s. Has anyone else had this and how did things go??

Would you bring 9 week old to a family party of 35+ people?

These are also people who will want to pass the baby around and get a turn to hold him. He just got his 2 month shots two days ago

Exercise 6 weeks after c section

What movement did people start to introduce? I won’t do anything too vigorous until I’ve seen the pelvic physio as I don’t want to compromise anything that may have been extremely weakened through pregnancy! But just wondering what types of classes/movement people started off with?

Induction experience

I just wanted to share my experience with being induced as I wasn’t sure what to expect and thought it may help others.

I opted for the foley balloon which was inserted at 8am Saturday morning, I had to stay in hospital due to hypertension and protein urine however usually you can just go home once this has been done. The insertion of the balloon was not painful, was slightly uncomfortable as there was slight pressure. I actually found having the cervix checked prior to be worse (again not painful at this point just uncomfortable) The balloon had little effect and after having it removed I was still only 1cm. Removal also was pain free and hardly even noticeable.

I then had my first dose of the gel and definitely noticed a difference, I started experiencing period like cramps almost immediately however they were light and manageable. After 6 hours I had another cervix check and although my cervix was soft it was still only 1cm and was only open at the front. I had another dose of the gel and felt an increase in pressure and more intense cramping where I now required pain relief (codeine). After another 6 hours I had another cervix check and I had now dilated to 2-3cm however was still quite difficult to get all the way through so a third gel was recommended which I agreed to.

Almost immediately I noticed the difference and was in considerable pain, I had paracetamol and codeine however the contractions had now become intense and a lot closer together (around 3 minutes apart). After a couple of hours I had my last cervix check and was 4cm and taken down to the Labour ward to have my waters broken and an epidural.

I had been in my room for approx 20minutes when my waters broke by themselves and I was now 10cm and actively pushing…. There was no time for the epidural and my beautiful girl arrived into the world within 2 minutes of pushing.

All in all I would say the cramps/contractions were manageable up until the third gel where it became pretty unbearable however it was for a very short time a gas and air helped take the edge off. The worst part about any of it was actually the later cervix checks where after stimulating the cervix my contractions were at their most painful.

If I had to be induced again I would skip the balloon and opt for the gels immediately as thy had a quicker effect and I would have been out a lot sooner if I had done this to begin with.

One more thing, I’ve never believed when people say “you forget the pain once they’re here” but I can honestly say this is true. It’s been 4 days and I would do it all again in a heartbeat.

Anyone else experiencing this?

Gave birth (vagina) 5 days ago and yesterday morning and this morning getting lot of pain in my right bottom side and lower back