Ask MetaFilter posts tagged with childbirth

Should we have our baby induced?

faustessa — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 10:57:04 -0800

What are the reasons for and against inducing childbirth in cases of gestational diabetes? I'm seven months pregnant, with insulin-dependent gestational diabetes. I really like my doctors (OB, perinatologist, and endocrinologist) and generally trust their opinions. The OB and perinatologist are both convinced that it's best to have my baby induced, while the endocrinologist disagrees, and says this practice is "old fashioned." Of course, I will keep discussing this with all three doctors (and I will continue to keep my blood sugar under excellent control, and we will continue to monitor the baby's growth, etc.) but I would like more information to use while making this decision. Most of the information I've found on the internet seems to be in the "this is what's done" versus "you shouldn't induce your baby" format, rather than giving the reasons one might choose one option or another.

Incidentally, my own birth was induced. My mom says the labor went really quickly, but she didn't give me much more information.

So, what are the advantages of inducing labor? What are the risks of inducing, or the risks of NOT inducing? If you've been in this situation, what were your experiences?

What are these maternity doctors and nurses chanting?

lemuria — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 23:38:14 -0800

[Link is NSFW: graphic childbirth.] What is the maternity staff chanting in this video? They seem to have a few different songs, one for when the woman is pushing and another for once the baby is born. The notes for the video say that they are in "an Asian country" but I don't know what language they're speaking. If you have any other information about these chants (how common they are, if there are other variations, how helpful and/or annoying it is to have a crooning chorus over your crotch, etc.) that would be great, too.

Music for wife in labor...

keith0718 — Wed, 14 May 2008 06:03:31 -0800

Music for wife in labor... What is the most soothingly beautiful music you can think of for me to play for my wife during her labor and homebirth?

Quotes or poems for a soon-to-be mother?

phr4gmonk3y — Wed, 07 May 2008 21:20:46 -0800

I'm looking for quotes or a short poem for my sister, whose expecting her first child in the next several days. Any ideas?

The hospital is making me sick.

kmennie — Fri, 25 May 2007 08:46:45 -0800

How do I make a hospital birth not suck? Suddenly midwife-less. Local hospital a horror. Bitter, depressed. What does a doula actually do? Etc, etc. I had a midwife; was going to stay home. I moved, and now I don't have a midwife. I am, so far, pretty happy with the obstetrician here she recommended, but.

We toured the local hospital's maternity ward, and, hell. I left almost in tears. This is a rural hospital with a couple of wee labour rooms straight out of Monty Python. Apologies for the length of this; I'm a bit obsessive at the moment. Of course nothing's helped by all the people who I thought would be weird about home birth having said "Fantastic idea. I would've loved to. The hospital was awful."

They're in the middle of L&D ward renovations, many of which are supposed to be completed by the time I'm ready to go (early August). It's not clear how much things will improve, though.

The hospital would like to send Mr Kmennie home, but hang on to me for 24h. Modern they are not. The OB's fine with me leaving four hours after the fact. That he and the meddlesome-seeming nurse contradicted each other a fair bit seems to suggest an adversarial position (towards the hospital) for us parents-to-be whether we like it or not.

Do I need to get all his "Sure, you can go home"-type assurances in writing? Do I need to go further than that, and bother the hospital about it before the fact?

And, can somebody explain the value of a doula here? Everyone makes them sound fantastic. The studies on them are nice. I asked the OB's opinion. "My secretary's a doula... My wife and I had one with our third child; just great... Get a doula."

I can't stand massage and have no interest in aromatherapy or anything else many of them seem to be offering, along those lines. What I would like is somebody to run interference with the seemingly meddlesome nurses and keep them and their monitor out of the room, but a few doula web sites say: that's not their job.

So I'm confused as to what a doula might actually do. The one thing I am going to look for is a labour assistant with enough training to find out how far along I am so I can stay at home as long as possible, but I don't know if that's to be found around here. If you had one, can you explain even minutiae of what she did while with you? At the moment, all I can see is somebody who'll fetch me the right variety of cold drink.

What else might I be planning to make it less sucky? (And, that said, I'm not going to get nuts about anything going exactly as planned.) This is our first; first-hand experience is badly wanting. The hospital's clearly not big on dignity/privacy, or even birthing chairs/balls/etc; there's not much beyond a bed and just one (too bad if somebody else is there) tub. (Creepy leg-immobilizing attachments were well within view, just beyond the massive Baby Bothering Box. The irony is that this is a low-tech rural hospital; if there's any real problem, I'll be immediately fired off to the city. Where I'm tempted to go in the first place, but: I like this OB, and I like being a very quick drive, for the go-as-late-as-possible idea.)

new baby, insurance & leave

luriete — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 16:02:44 -0800

My wife and I are in the process of adopting a child and I have some questions about insurance and leave from work. My employer - part of the state government - offers a special paid family leave program, plus I'll be using lots of saved vacation & sick time as bonding leave. After that, I'm covered by the state's own family leave law (we're in California). My wife works for a local jurisdiction that has opted-out of paying into SDI - which is unfortunately legal! - so she cannot take paid bonding leave, although technically she can't be fired by taking unpaid time off with the baby. Today, her employer met with folks from AFLAC to hear about their short-term disability insurance plans, and we found out they covered care / bonding leave for biological birth but not for adoptive parents, which is sad (but I assume, since "new adoptive parent" is not a protected class, perfectly legal). Does anyone have any knowledge of private disability plans that do cover adoption leave?

How do I deal with an painful pubic bone?

echolalia67 — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 19:36:54 -0800

[PregnancyFilter] My pubic bone really, really hurts! I am about 34 weeks pregnant, and in the last week or so my pubic bone has become very tender and sore. How sore? It hurts the same way that a fractured bone does while it is healing. It aches, throbs and makes walking around or being on my feet for any length of time really uncomfortable and difficult. I'm pretty sure that it's due to my pelvis begining to loosen up in preparation for childbirth. My question is, what can I do to alleviate the pain?

What's it like to give birth?

twirlypen — Fri, 19 May 2006 17:36:52 -0800

What is it like to give birth? I'm male, and one of the side affects is that I'll never get pregnant. I'm wondering what it's actually like to give birth to a whole new person. I'm specifically interested in the emotional experience of it, what it's like to have a person grow from practically nothing inside you and then to come out into the world. It seems like a pretty incredible thing, and since I'll never be able to do it myself I'm hoping some people who have will be able to shed a bit of light on what it's like.

Can a healthy baby be born from an unconscious mother?

dobbs — Tue, 18 Apr 2006 16:07:09 -0800

Must a woman be conscious during childbirth? According to Wikipedia, during C-sections minimal anesthesia is used. Is this due to general risks of anesthesia or is the woman being unconscious a health risk for the child?

Basically, I need a scenario during which a woman DOES become unconscious during delivery but where both her and the baby are fine afterwards. That said, the *greater* the risk that the child not be fine (but the child still being fine within the realm of possibility) is the best scenario for my purposes. (This is for a fiction piece.)

Suggestions on what process/procedures would take place to arrive at my ideal scenario?

How do you know you can mentally deal with pregnancy?

agregoli — Wed, 22 Jun 2005 11:16:17 -0800

Here's my question - how do women know that they'll be able to DEAL with being pregnant? I sometimes think I want to be pregnant and have kids some day. But I worry that I'll get pregnant and then be so squicked out from having another being moving around in my body that I'll go crazy. Like, literally crazy. Do hormones just squash that feeling, or do some women go beserk with the feeling of being pregnant? Has anyone here hated pregnancy? I want honesty!

I get that the end result makes it worth it, and that in retrospect it isn't that bad.

I try to ask this of people but they act like I'm crazy already for even asking or that they'd be traitors to their children if they say they wouldn't go through it again.

What book(s) on babies worked for you?

Mrs. Green — Fri, 27 May 2005 06:10:28 -0800

What book(s) on babies and the childbirth experience worked for you as a first time parent and why? I remember a thread some time ago (can't find it now) that discussed the different baby books available and what people thought of them. The "What to Expect" series was not popular, which surprised me. Since I can't find the thread, what book(s) worked for you? Why?

Question number 7537

tristeza — Wed, 26 May 2004 15:25:12 -0800

Was your toddler present at the birth of his or her sibling(s)?

Question number 6537

brettski — Thu, 15 Apr 2004 07:50:39 -0800

Anyone have any thoughts (experiences) on natural ways to persuade an overdue baby to make it's appearance? (and yes I know that one...!)