My first induction happened to be the birth of my fourth child. I was diagnosed with Cholestasis (ICP) at 34 weeks and my planned home birth turned into a planned hospital induction at 37 weeks.
I wasn’t dilated only 1cm upon starting Cervidal, but after a couple hours I started having regular contractions and had to make an effort to breathe through them.
After about 4 hours, my water broke and trickled with most of the contractions. Feeling optimistic I was checked and was 4cm. I felt really content that I was progressing.
Unfortunately the next few hours were super tough as I hit my pain threshold. Was checked again and wasn’t progressing.
Instead of letting myself feel defeated I decided to get an epidural even though I originally wanted a natural pain med free birth. The epidural was not working on my right side but I didn’t give up on altering positions to try to get the meds to work. Nurses assisted me 4 times to shift. At this point I could hardly move around from pain and exhaustion.
By the fourth movement I was able to feel some relief. The anaesthesiologist was able to increase my dose and I was now fully relaxed. I got to actually sleep for a couple hours and I felt so thankful.
Just before the fourteenth hour, I had the nurse check me and to her surprise I was at 10cm. Pushing was so easy and only took me under 10 mins to give birth.
I got a happy peaceful ending to my challenging induction. My biggest lesson learned was to listen to my body and instincts. My labour and delivery nurses and staff were absolutely amazing to my surprise and really did help me through my labour more than I thought.
I was able to ask for help throughout and actually get it.
