what effect did pregnancy and childbirth have on you?

I met a lady on the weekend who was close to her due date, and after talking a little while, I learned that this baby was to come only 11 months after her first. It got me to thinking about my own situation. Although I respect other people's decisions and keep my own opinions to myself, and as passionately as I love my daughter, I know that there was no way in hell that I could have even considered the idea of another pregnancy so soon after the first one. Obviously her experience must have been more positive than my own.

I know I've mentioned here before the traumatic experience I had with DD's birth, which pretty much put me off the idea of pregnancy again, ever! But obviously different people have completely different experiences. Personally I felt drained, scared and exhausted. I hated the limitations that pregnancy imposed, and that it took me so long to recover from the birth, as the result of a c-section and blood loss on top of such a long and intense labour. I know that DH being in the middle of study for fellowship exams at the time was a strong contributing factor to my slow recovery - I got very little sleep as I had to look after everything on my own. I had mastitis 13 times, probably due to all the stress and tiredness, but persisted with breastfeeding anyway. I also developed a hernia during pregnancy, which I had to have surgery for later. That condition prevented me from exercising sufficiently for quite some time, meaning that it took me a full 18 months to get back to my pre-pregnancy weight. And now, it seems that I've developed some kind of thyroid/hormonal problem as a result of the pregnancy. I'm getting quite annoyed with the way it's all dragging on, and in some respects resent the effects that it's had on my previously healthy, fit and surgically un-retouched body!

So it's got me to wondering - just how standard (or unusual) was my experience? I've heard that it takes around two years for a woman to get completely back to normal - that strikes me not only as true in my case, but also as a huge imposition on the body. So what about you - did pregnancy and childbirth have a negative effect on your health, or did you bounce back quickly and ready for more?!

[PrincessFiona]

This is a good question. I'm going to have to see if I can get my remaining brain cell working to think about this and come up with a good answer!

kris

[Michele]

I had pre-eclampsia/HELLP that ended in an urgent C-section at 30w5d. I am ABSOLUTELY affected by the whole experience. I want more children, but am I willing to risk all that again? I don't know. My physical being recovered faster than my emotional being. When I think about it, I still feel sick to my stomach, but when I look at Daegan my heart melts and I want to share that love with many more children.

My brief answer -- about three months to feel about 70% back to normal and then another 9 after that for the rest of it. I'll have to think about the specifics but that is off the top of my head.

I would say your experience is out of the ordinary. That is a tough go of things. :grouphug:

[Rapunzel]

Every one of my pregnancies has been different. Some were REALLY awful - none of them easy.

It is progressively harder every time for me to get up the courage to have another one. The only reason - the only reason - I have ever had to continue having children is because I sincerely feel like there are more waiting for us - to join our family (we believe in a pre-existance- an existance prior to this one).

Otherwise, I hate, hate, hate pregnancy. Period.

[PrincessFiona]

I have been through 5 very different pregnancy/births...all of which have had their own dramas and excitement...I'll spare you guys the details, but I hemmorhaged in one of my deliveries and had to have emergency surgery while the baby was swept off to the NICU..and I was able to go on and have a completely eventless next pregnancy/delivery. My pregnancy/birth with Zoe was...one long trauma for the other reasons...and somehow...I'm slowly moving on...

My pregnancies have affected my health because I've gained weight that I haven't lost. I also find that I struggle more with bouts of anxiety/depression. My body has been in the childbirth/breastfeeding mode for the last 12 years...I might just need 24 years to feel like my old self and by then...I'll be in menopause :>

I just want to let you both know though that the trauma associated with the bad deliveries can and will slowly go away....talk it out with friends who will listen to you tell the story again and again if you have to, write about it in your own private journal....

One bad experience does not mean that the next experience will be bad...and...ultimately , as weird as this sounds...a bad birth will last 24....48 hours tops...and then it's done and you can hold that little baby in your arms....

Michele, have you consulted your OB about the chances of suffering from HELLP next time around?

kris

[alison]

:thud:
Holy moly.
That's all I have to say.

Holy moly.
That's all I have to say.

Hehe, I'm glad you saw this thread, Alison! I think that part of my issues arose from the fact that I had never seen someone go through the pregnancy and birth process. I knew that birth could be bad (I'd heard the horror stories!) but I'd never really thought about pregnancy itself, or even the recovery process after birth. I'm imagining that it takes most women at least a year to get back to some semblance of themselves - longer in my case - and that is a fact that I was completely unaware of and unprepared for.

Thank you to everyone who has shared your very personal experiences with me so far. I appreciate it very much. I am constantly amazed by how strong women are - how we are prepared to put ourselves through this, many of us even more than once - out of love for someone whom we haven't even met. I hadn't realised the strength of our sex before going through childbirth.

[Vanquisher]

For me, birth was the easy part. It was pregnancy that was sheer hell. It took me 6 years to do it a second time and a hope that it wouldn't be as bad as the first. It was.

My body isn't the same. I haven't recovered. I don't think I ever will. I got cavities I had never had, and I gained so much weight and stretched my body in such a drastic way, that I will forever have scars from that. At 20 years old my body was wrecked in such a way where I, even if I ever lose all this weight, will never be able to be in a bikini again. I don't have this pressing desire to do that, but I wish I had the option. My kids were worth it.

Will I do it again? Not in a million years for a billion dollars. I spent 9 months with each child in pure hellish agony. Picture your worst case of food poisoning ever. You coudn't leave the bathroom. I tore my esophogus, I vomited blood and bile and nothing. I was awakened in the middle of the night on several occasions just to throw up. My dentist said, "If I didn't know better about you, I would wonder if you had bulimia." I was hooked up to IVs, on bedrest, in horrific pain (at the end with both kids I had horrible hemorrhoids for several weeks that even OxyContin and Xylocaine cream, hot pads and icepacks couldn't touch), hemorrhaged, had sciatica, had preeclampsia. I spent 9 months in bed becoming a beached whale because the only thing that quelled the nausea for brief moments was a steady stream of food. The Zofran helped me not to vomit all the time, but I still felt nauseated. I had skin cancer and mohs surgery.

Now I am allergic to things that I wasn't before. I am shorter. My body is a road map of scars, sagging skin, and the remnants of two pregnancies.

My kids were worth it. It took me a while to love them though. I had to get over my resentment toward them with each of them. I will never do it again, ever, period. If I decide I want more kids in the future, I will adopt. Plenty of children need homes without my needing to be pregnant.

[Michele]

Michele, have you consulted your OB about the chances of suffering from HELLP next time around?

I kinda got a wishy-washy answer from my regular OB....not the high-risk guy I saw for Daegan's birth. Factors that lower my chances: subsequent pregnancies don't usually get PIH/HELLP, no clotting disorders/genetic reasons for HELLP. Factors that raise my chances: full HELLP syndrome (not just PIH), HELLP before 32 weeks gestation, no clotting disorder/genetic reason to treat to 'prevent'. Some places online ( not always the best sources) quote anywhere from 30%-70% chances of HELLP again. I'm guessing it's probably somewhere around 50%?? I wasn't cautioned against getting pregnant again though.

I don't think I'd get as sick as I was the second time around. I know what to look for. I know to trust my body and my 'gut' better. And I know I'll be screened earlier with 24h urine proteins instead of dipsticks.

My fear is getting dangerously sick at 20-23 weeks gestation. The LSU NICU doesn't take babies less than 23-24 weeks gestation. Can I handle losing a child to save my life? That's a hard question for me to answer. And I know you were faced with the same question Kris.

And then maybe all this worrying is for nothing, as I'll have blissful full term pregnancies/babies. I can hope right?

[migirl]

I think like everything else in life, everyone has different experiences with pregnancy/childbirth/motherhood - some are good, some not so much...

I really, really enjoyed being pregnant. I had a textbook pregnancy up until the very last week when I developed pre-eclampsia. I was admitted to the ER, transferred to OB where I was immediately induced, and then (long story short) ended up with a c-section.

I was nowhere near prepared for what those first few weeks would be like. I saw my good friend the other day who just had a baby 3 weeks ago, and she seemed like she had it so ... together. It made me think back to what I was like when Jack was 3 weeks old, and made me wonder why I couldn't get it together the way she seemed to be. I think I had a touch of PPD, and was completely whacked out on hormones and lack of sleep.

Anyway, with Jack at 15 months' old I'm just starting to get comfortable with my role as a mother. We're talking about trying to conceive our second child soon, but the very thought of having to care for a newborn while chasing after a very busy toddler completely overwhelms me. How do people do it? I have no idea, I guess I'll find out.

[Sheherezade]

I had easy pregnancies and easy deliveries. I'm only posting this so that the non-parent women out there don't totally freak out reading this thread. :> It feels like bragging. (Sorry!) I'm not sure if "easy" is the norm or difficulties are common. I know I was lucky to have a resident OB in the house. Even though his services were unnecessary and he was as absent as all resident spouses, I was an insider in the department and knew that DH would make sure everything happened that was supposed to happen.

First baby: I had a vaccuum extraction because he got "stuck" --but that was only a few seconds of activity. I labored for 10 hours. The epidural only took on one side. I went home in 24 hours. The worst part was that DH kept chatting with everyone he works with instead of paying any attention to me. It was like delivering at a cocktail party.

Second baby: I labored overnight (around 5 hours?) in the hospital by myself. (DH was at home with DS.) I'm actually better at these things alone. DH came in at 6 am, had coffee and I started pushing. Three pushes and that was it. Very easy, and no meds since I was turned off the epidural from the first experience. Painful labor, yes....but pain you could handle. Not the passing out, seeing stars stuff till the last hour. Again, I went home in 24 hours.

Both DS and DD had AB incompatibility high bilirubin levels and had to be on bili blankets at home for three days. That freaked me out with number one - but it's really a minor inconvenience and I was ready for it with DD. Besides, I think those daily visiting nurse visits to check the bilirubin levels were great for kicking off breast feeding success. Both my babies were also over 9 lbs....so I've got me some birthin' hips I guess.

I wouldn't have more now by choice -- but that's because I have worries about post 40 baby issues. I know things can go wrong in pregnancy and delivery, but I haven't worried much about it. Ignorance is bliss. Besides...the vast majority of DH's OB experiences went well. Only rarely did something go horribly wrong. I think it's not the norm.

I am...of course.....heavier than pre-pregnancy. I tend that way anyway and have always struggled with my weight. I have some strange issues with one hip that I blame on my second pregnancy. Sometimes it just feels "off" and I can't get comfortable when driving very long distances. These are very minor costs for the kids, though.

I was nowhere near prepared for what those first few weeks would be like. I saw my good friend the other day who just had a baby 3 weeks ago, and she seemed like she had it so ... together. It made me think back to what I was like when Jack was 3 weeks old, and made me wonder why I couldn't get it together the way she seemed to be. I think I had a touch of PPD, and was completely whacked out on hormones and lack of sleep.

That sums up how I felt after my first. I had a long a difficult labor and was just completely wiped out. That and having a hard time breastfeeding made the first month a challenge. One month wasn't a huge turning point it just got a little better after that. I got into more of a groove from the second to third month.

I can break my recovery into the 3 month and one year chunks of time but what happened over those three months varied. Where I am now happened sooner and more easily with the third than the first.

Right after Anna, my second daughter, was born, I said "wow, I could do that again." And it wasn't -- hey lets have another baby right away but more of a surprise and confidence that I *could* do that again and that the difficulties of the first had something to do with circumstance rather than a flaw on my part. (Although I know that subsequent deliveries tend to be shorter).

[Rapunzel]

OK, as much as I moan and groan about my pregnancies, I should say that my deliveries are easy (so far).

A lot of my problems with pregnancy come from three sources: 1)When I am pregnant with a girl (or girls) my smooth muscle completely shuts down for the last half of my first trimester (like clockwork) - this means that during three of my pregnancies I have spent six weeks with incredible constipation (I know, TMI) and have had impactions (trust me, you never, ever want that). 2) I gain an unbelievable amount of weight on average - we're talking over 50% of what my normal body weight is gets added on! For three of my pregnancies that has meant a weight gain of between 60 and 70 pounds! Gaining that much weight - that percentage of my existing body weight - in such a small time period wreaks havoc on me (diabetes, eclampsia) AND it hurts like the dickens (my joints ache, my back spasms from carrying all the extra weight, I just have all of this pressure resting on my bodyparts). 3) Migraines. With all of my other pregnancies the migraines I can get STOPPED cold turkey. But, this pregnancy has had the opposite affect - bad, bad, bad.

So, that long paragraph is my my moan and groan. Now that that's out of the way let me just say that when it comes to delivery my body *so far* has done very well. I have a reliance on induction and epidurals that I have down pat - and it works well for me to this point.

And, truly, I cannot complain in the department of "getting my body back". Every time - every time - I have been able to get my body back to prepregnancy shape with work.

Sure, I have a lot of excess skin on my abdomen and I will always carry those silvery scars on my breasts and thighs from rapid expansion during and immediately after pregnancy but I do work my way down to a prepregnancy size and weight every time and I have grown to love my body after having so many kiddos pass through it.

And, let me say, it IS work - sometimes very hard work - to get my body "back" - but it is something that I dedicate myself to. And, it does take longer to get it back every time. With my first I was back to prepregancy size about two months post-birth. With my second (twins) it really took about nine months to get back. With my third (back to singletons) it was easily six months. And, with my fourth it was a nine month period before I could put on clothes I wore before having children. This fifth pregnancy I am completely expecting it to take a full year to work my way down to a size and weight that I was at prior to pregnancy. And, the fact is that I will still have a bit of excess skin and those scars to show for it.

So, there are good and bad things for me. I truly do have to get up the courage to get pregnant again - every time. My pregnancies ARE hard and it is VERY HARD to "take my body back" after all of that trauma. I know that I can get through these things - it's just a ton of hard work and endurance.

But, something that I have learned is that every woman's body is different and every pregnancy is different. I have friends for whom pregnancy was hard one time and a breeze another three or four times. Some toughed out through three, four, five or so pregnancies and then said, "NO WAY!" to having anymore. Some women I have known in my life have had six or more pregnancies that were mostly easy and light on them.

Similarly every woman's body behaves differently post-baby. Some women really do just have their bodies go back into pre-pregnancy condition every time (but, honestly, that really is a small minority of women in my experience). A lot of us have to really work at getting ourselves back. A lot of women never figure out how to get that process going in their own bodies and are frustrated because they never fully "recovered" from pregnancy.

I did mourn the "loss" of my original body after my first child. My breasts changed dramatically, my body became softer, things sagged just a bit. I wasn't a perky, hard-bodied young woman with a concave abdomen and hips jutting out anymore! It was hard - very hard - to come to terms with those scars, that extra skin, the complete change in the consistancy of my various body parts. And, I'd say it wasn't until after my second pregnancy and childbirth experience that I ended that mourning process. At that point I was sooooo thankful that I could just get my body back- period - after a pregnancy. That, and the distance of time (What did I look like before all of this again?) really helped take care of any sadness or sense of loss with myself.

Every woman has to assess her own health - physical AND mental - before she can determine if she thinks another child is something she can or will do. It's impossible for us to really compare ourselves to each other with pregnancy and childbirth because we are all so incredibly different and none of us can truly "control" what our bodies do - or don't do - during this extreme experience.

[houseelf]

My MIL, a former labor and delivery nurse, always offers the following wisdom about pregnancy: "Once you've been lived in, you aren't ever the same".

True, true. For me, my pregnancies have been on the better side of the continuum if you compare mine against these experiences! (HOLY COW, people! These are awful stories) Mostly I suffer from bone-tired exhaustion (think: flu) and need about 12 hours of sleep a night which is annoying, but doable. My deliveries have both been above twenty hours, but the epidurals have cut the pain.

For me, however, it is those first few months with baby that are the hardest, especially when there is another child around that desperately needs attention with all the changes. It takes me longer to find equilibrium than others. I'm always amazed to see these new moms out and about. That takes me months to get my crap together and feel any sense of normalcy.

For me, the absolute most stressful thing for me about infancy is the fact that both of my children have absolutely refused to take the bottle in my absence for hours on end. They were both ardent and passionate breastfeeders. Leaving my kids with an alternate caregiver is beyond stressful for both the baby and the caretaker (and whoever else is about). I've tried everything: having grandma and dad give the bottle, hundreds of dollars worth of various rubber nipples, waiting it out, etc. It is uber stressful when you are the sole food source for an infant. I need a break occasionally. This has also made my transition back to work incredibly emotional. Not only do I have to leave my baby, I know that the baby is really unhappy and the caretaker will be stressed for awhile until things work themselves out. Eventually, however, I have learned that even the most ardent BF baby takes a bottle.

If I have the temerity to go for a third baby, you'd better believe that I'm introducing a bottle regularly before the recommended four week mark. This is even though I don't plan on working. I need to know that I can get a break if I need one without incurring psychological damage to both of us.

Kelly