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As a pregnant woman, you always wanna be prepared for the journey that lies ahead of you. Each of us has our own way of getting ready to be a mother and dealing with different phases, from pregnancy to childbirth. But sometimes no matter how much you prepare yourself, you might be in for a surprise at the last minute.
You start to wonder, “How come nobody brought this up?”
Have I not been reading the right books?”
Did someone deliberately try to hold this information from me?”
Should I have been talking to fellow mommies more instead of running away from them?”
Or was I so naive and unprepared this whole time?”
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I had enrolled myself in a 12-week birthing class the first time I was pregnant. I thought the class would help me prepare for what’s ahead. In fact, I thought the birthing class was the ultimate crash course I needed to know everything there is to know about labor and childbirth.
And you would think a mommy who takes a birthing class would be well aware of the fact that labor could last a long time, sometimes days. But NO. I had to learn this the hard way. Because nobody, and I mean NOBODY cared to mention that during my whole pregnancy. Not even once.
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Forgive me if I’m coming across as a scary mommy. But I really don’t wish to scare you. I don’t want to be one of those women who only have the worst things to say about pregnancy or labor. But if you don’t wish to be ignorant like me and like to have all the unpleasant facts laid out in front of you, you will definitely want to know this: ‘Labor can be very long, sometimes even 3 whole days.’
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Now, this piece of info can be frightening for all moms-to-be, and that’s probably why nobody tells you this. Also, it’s not every day that a woman has 3-day labor. It’s a pretty rare occurrence. So, why scare the mom-to-be over something that’s very unlikely to happen?
Except it wasn’t so rare. It happened to me. I was in labor for over 42 hours. I had gone into labor on a Wednesday evening and gave birth on a Friday morning. But thankfully, after going through the longest labor, I had a normal delivery which I had hoped for from the beginning. And though I had a pretty rough start to motherhood, my subsequent deliveries went smoothly and didn’t last more than 8 hours. In fact, I gave birth to my second baby in less than 3 hours after my first contraction.
So, having a really long and difficult first labor doesn’t have to be such a bad thing. It doesn’t mean your subsequent deliveries are gonna be just as tough.
Frankly, there’s no way to know. Things could go either way. See, that’s the thing about motherhood. From the moment we see those two pink lines, we plan and we plan, and for what? Nobody wants to dive into it head-first. We want to be as prepared as one can be, so we plan things down to every minute detail. Or at least that was the case for me.
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However, from one labor survivor to the next, I can tell you this much: don’t dwell too much on things that could go wrong. Sure, it might help you feel more prepared if you knew about the good, bad, and ugly side of things. But don’t let it keep you up at night. Because as a woman who had no clue that labor could go on for days, I think I did pretty well for myself. My mind and body were in for a fight, which eventually helped me deliver a healthy baby. And though I had missed out on a few important details despite attending a birthing class, I would be lying if I said it was of no use. So, prepare yourself as much as you can but also be sure to have some surprises come your way. A birthing class would help you understand your body and the whole process a whole lot better. So, instead of worrying about the unknown, do what you can and seek all the guidance you need from your trusted tribe of resources which includes your doctor, midwife, friends, family, specialists, books, and websites.
