I am only 5 hours in and I am not handling these contractions very well. All I can think about is…

Epidurals have long lasting side effects and don't work for everyone. I would opt for the IV pain meds. they give you as much as you need and you can have them up until you're 7CM dilated.

@believeinbuddha

I'm definitely going to ask for that, I want to avoid the epidural completely of I can take it.

@damiensmommy1117 make sure you BREATHE through the contractions. Find a spot in the room to focus on and don't break that focus until the contraction is over. Make sure you do deep full long slow breathes because its important that you stay calm. Once you start to hyperventilate its hard to stop.

They gave me some iv meds before the epidural that made me feel amazing but, they couldn’t give me any more since I dilated way too fast & was already 7cm & they gave me the epidural but, it didn’t work lol only number my leg some after my son was born . Haha it works most of the time but, for me my labor went by too fast.

I would definitely look into it now. The IV meds my hospital offered I was told by a nurse "feels like you had a bunch to drink" well I wanted to be painless not completely out of it...

I got the epidural. The risk of them messing it up is literally soooo low. The worst I had was a headache, and I'm pretty sure it was just from adrenaline wearing off. And it was starting to wear off (by my choice) by the time I had to push so I could still feel her coming out, I just wasn't in a whole lot of pain. All I felt was pressure.