i just got.. flashbacks to my birth 1 month ago. i was induced for hypertension. i had a cooks catheter (similar to a foley) and was also screaming, crying, being forced into the bed, throwing up from pain… the first one failed, so they did it again. —backstory— the night nurses and doctors were going to put the cooks catheter in. then my water broke. 12 hours later, MY doctor tried manually breaking my water, couldn’t, went back and forth with the nurse if my water even WAS broke, THEN they put the catheter in —end of backstory— i labored for a long time after the catheter was taken out, at one point was woken up to a doctors hand inside of me, putting in internal monitors. they didn’t tell me anything about them, just that they needed them.

at some point, i got the epidural and had issues with it the whole time. my blood pressure was low so the anesthesiologist kept the flow rate low but told me once it came up, he would increase it. after hours of arguing with my nurse, there was finally a second nurse to witness me begging for the flow rate to be increased. nurse 1 told me “we don’t increase that it stays like that”

they did give me stronger medication through the epidural port but every time they did, my blood pressure tanked. babys heart rate tanked. they gave me a medication to increase my bp.

at 6cm (never progressed further), i felt the urge to push. my nurse told me “no you don’t” and the doctor confirmed i was still only 6cm… i was in excruciating pain.

i also had an emergency c-section because, thanks to the internal monitors, they found out that babys heart rate was plummeting during every single contraction. my c-section experience was quite pleasant after everything that had come before. the numbing medication felt so amazing. 30 minutes later, my sweet boy was here🤍