What is actually happening to your body when it goes into labor?

Question

LIKE WHAT'S GOING ON WHEN YOU ARE HAVING CONTRACTIONS AND WHEN YOU ARE DILATING? HOW DOES ALL OF THIS FEEL?

Answer 1

Most of the time painful...Your body is trying to relax the cervix to open and flatten out to 10 cm (about 5 in.) and to relax the pelvis to open also. For most it is a very painful proceeds but not all. But my friend didn't have any pain until she was almost at 7 cm, when her water broke. A great book about labor & delivery is: The Thinking Woman’s Guide to a Better Birth by Henci Goer.

Labor is a hard thing to describe because everyone’s is different. Mine was long...I was induced at 41 weeks (which I found out later was not late! Average first pregnancies are 41 weeks 1 day & you can pass that by almost 2 weeks safely!) I went in at not quite 1 cm at 11am. I didn't reach 10cm until 4:40 am...I pushed for almost 2 hours, then had an emergency c-section. At 6:34 am my 8lb 14 oz boy was born.... My recovery was very painful, almost more painful than labor. And long. But my friend I described above, got to the hospital at 7 cm with he water broke around 1:30 am by 4:15 am she was at 10 cm & pushing by 5:15 her 8lb 14oz girl was here. She went home the next day. I had to stay a week at the hospital, & couldn't have my baby in my room unless I had a visitor or a nurse to hand him to me, since I couldn't get up, and because my room wasn't a private room my husband couldn't stay the night...I was alone most of the time & suffered greatly with postpartum depression... My friend’s recovery was quick! She is already back to work here baby was born 12/27/06… She is at about 5 weeks postpartum. Here breast-feeding went well, where as mine did not because against my wishes the hospital gave him a bottle giving him nipple confusion.

I guess the point I am trying to make is that all of it is different for each & everyone!!!

Answer 2

Well there is several ways to tell if you are in labor the most likely one to happen is back labor that is where you can barely stand, walk, lay, or move, it hurts so bad you have to cry, that starts in the back and moves to the front, and the contractions are very hard you can feel it, you can also feel the stomach and it will tighten and loosen while you are having the contractions, secondly for contractions there is the ones where there is very little pain but you can feel the stomach tighten and loosen and there is less movement of the baby, and you have little comfort in between the legs whien moving, thirdly there is the front contractions where is hurts like the first but you can't move your legs and when you do move them it feels like something is falling out or your pushing on something in between the legs, fourthly for your dialating the contractions get harder and harder that is dialating, and then the water breaks on most occasions once in awhile it won't break it might have to induced, if you are having any of these symptoms please go straight to the hospital.

Answer 3

how it feels is a harder question to answer then what's going on. Your uterus has contractions which can be mild to severe, and this will eventually cause your cervix to dilate. As the cervix dilates, the baby's head gets pressed further down onto the cervix, allowing it to thin and dilate more. Eventually it's the combo of contractions and cervical dilations that gets you into labor.
Contractions without cervical dilation is NOT labor.

Answer 4

Every pregnancy and body is different and feel things a little differently. I have had 3 children. Contractions feel like Braxton Hicks contractions that are getting harder and closer together. It feels sort of like your body does when your whole entire body heaves really hard when you're throwing up. That kind of involuntary squeezing of every muscle really hard trying to get something up/out. If you have an epidural (I've done it both ways) you don't really feel the big HEAVE of the contraction that you would naturally have the urge to bear down with. In that case they sit there and say "OK, you're having a contraction now so push". I would compare it to the contractons of a severe stomach virus. The kind where you have stuff coming out of both ends. You want to push whatever's in there out, so you do.

Answer 5

the bottom half of your stomach feel like its tightening up and then releases for about 5 mins, then the tightening comes back again. Dilating feels like someone stuck a toothpick up your wazoo.

Answer 6

It hurts a great deal. for some it's worse than others. Your uterus is contracting and your cervix is slowly opening (dilating).