overdue?

[Teejay]

I am four days (ok, so only four days) past my due date, and trying to remind myself that it means nothing really... my first child was 8 days over, and just fine.

Has anyone else gone over, and what sort of response did you get from your caregiver? Mine has been great so far. (I was dreading a struggle over induction -- not that it's not sometimes needed, but I want to wait a decent time before interfering). However, she did an extra ultrasound and all looked well, so she said she was happy to wait.

This is all bizarre because the baby "dropped" at 32 weeks and has had a lot of false labour, was showing every sign of coming early, and now...! I am really interested to hear about other people's experiences regarding "due dates".

[sophie]

Hi Teejay
You've probably given birth by now....
I was just 1 day overdue with my first, and 5 days overdue with my second. 5 days doesn't sound like much but at the time they were an eternity! I think if you have a history of being way overdue, like 2 weeks, then it will be more likely to happen again. I think many doctors get nervous about letting a pregnancy proceed past that point, I guess it depends on your maternity carer. One thing I think though is not rushing into an induction as I know of many people who have had difficult labours when induced, with lots of intervention. Lucky you, about to have your baby! I wish you all the best.

[Alicia]

Hi! I was due this last sunday, and still no baby. Now friends are telling me to take castor oil. I asked my midwife about it and she doesn't recommend it becasue it'll give me the runs, and I could throwup as well...not a great beginning to labor! I was just wondering if anyone out there had any good luck with castor oil, and if any one tired it and had no luck. I'm not too set on taking it. I'm only 3 days over so hopefully he'll get here later this week. *fingers crossed*

Thanks-
Alicia :)

[Erin Pavlina]

Don't take castor oil. It will just make you sick while you're in labor. No fun at all...

[Christa]

I took a tincture of blue & black cohosh & it got my labor going with dd #2, but I was ready to go. My water had started leaking & I knew that they would want to give me IV antibiotics if I went too long before the baby was born with a partially ruptured water.

I was induced with #1 & would never do it again. They nearly killed both me & the baby by giving me the max dosage of pitocin together with cytotec for 3 days. Angelina got stressed, her heart rate dropped, she had a bowel movement in utero & inhaled a bunch of it causing her to need to be intubated to get her breathing after she was born. I hemhorraged due to the overstimulation of my uterus. I was less informed than I would suggest, though, going into it!

[frenchie]

Oh wow Christa!!! That's so scary.....I'm glad the both of you came out healthy! I can't believe your doctor was so irresponsible......I'm so floored. My son was 3 weeks overdue. My Dr. and I had a disagreement as to the proper EDD. There was only *1* day that I could have possibly gotten pregnant..ummm, try the ONLY day we had sex that month. The ultrasound said my EDD was Feb 4th, but based on the only day we had sex, it was Jan 25th. At any rate, my Dr. allowed me to go 14 days over my EDD before inducing. Needless to say by the 7th day I was in a major panic, because it was already 2 weeks past my first date. I was in tears every day for the last week....and FINALLY my son decided to come. I had tried walking for miles, nipple stimulation, red raspberry leaf and hot baths.....finally I got the urge to mow the lawn, and that night I went into labor. I was to be induced the day my son was born.....LOL I think the lawn mowing is what did it!!

[Fiona]

At the risk of soounding controversial, I was induced with my second child and really enjoyed my birth experience. (Although I have to say, it was nothing like Christa's experience which sounds awful.) I was induced 2 weeks after the due date, by which time I felt more than ready to have my baby. I had one lot of Pitocin and a few hours later my labour was in full swing, with my son born about four hours after the first contraction. I was happy to have a quick labour - I didn't want a repeat of my first labour which had lasted 32 hours. Although the contractions were strong and painful, I didn't have any pain relief but felt happy that things were moving along quickly and that the labour would be relatively short. I take the point that babies usually come when they're ready - perhaps I was lucky with my experience and possibly my son was nearly ready to come anyway.

Fiona

[Christa]

Yeah, Fiona, I certainly have heard of people having much easier inductions than I did :)! I can't imagine that they would induce anybody if they all went the way mine did. I was just irritated b/c my CNM was joking about rupturing my uterus with the cytotec & I found out later that cytotec can do just that. I really don't think that Angelina was ready to be born yet b/c my cervix was very "unripe." I also felt that they didn't adequately inform me of the risks & complications of what they were doing. I didn't know that manually forcing my cervix open (which they also did when the pitocin didn't open it) would hurt so much either, b/c they never mentioned that it would hurt!

Angelina was 11 days overdue when they started the induction & it took 3 days to get her out, but I am glad that I didn't wind up with a c-section as least & she & I both are fine. They did do an u/s before they started the induction & there were no signs that anything was wrong. I definately would have given it more time if I were in that spot again. Tessa, fortunately, showed up right on time, although my (different) CNMs were willing to let her go quite a bit past her EDD given my first experience.