Induction: 5 Reasons Why — PCP 049

Why would you want or need to be induced? We’re going to talk about ALL the reasons so you can be prepared for your upcoming birth!

This episode was inspired by my post on the WHY’s of induction, lots more info in there if you are looking for more!

Big thanks to our sponsor The Online Prenatal Class for Couples. It goes into ALL of these reasons in depth and more — you do NOT want to miss it.

I also have a free beginning class, like I mentioned in the episode that you can check out first:

Induction Reasons Podcast

Mentioned In Induction Episode

• LGA (Large for Gestational age — means “big baby”)
• Diabetes
• Preeclampsia — check out my full post on preeclampsia
• Fluid levels in your uterus (I talk about fluid levels in my free prenatal class)
• Elective Inductions — I am a fan of going the full 40
• I also answer people’s questions about inductions
  • How much pitocin is needed to put you in labor (Pitocin is one of my labor vocab)
  • If you can eat when you’re being induced
  • Are you more likely to get a C-section if you are induced
  • VBAC inductions (I have a whole post on VBAC’s here)
  • The study showing it is safer to get induced at 39 weeks.

**These are not ALL the reasons you might be induced, but they are the most common ones.

Other things that might interest you on Inductions

How to go into labor podcast (where we talk about “how long” you’re in labor)

How to say no podcast

My Pregnancy Nurse post on Inductions at 37 weeks

Vaginal Exams (if you’re wondering what the HECK I’m talking about with all the exam numbers, this post explains them)

Producer: Drew Erickson

Check out my other pregnancy podcasts:

Check out all my podcasts:

Hilary Erickson 0:00
Hey guys, welcome back to the pulling curls podcast today on episode 49. We are talking about inductions, Get the baby out of me. Interestingly enough in one of my Facebook groups somebody just asked recently Why on earth would someone want to get induced Of course you want the baby to stay in now that person was less than 35 weeks and I think we all think early on of course I won’t get induced that doesn’t seem smart. But I think as we get closer to 40 weeks, it’s so darn miserable. We start to think maybe that’s not such a bad option. So let’s untangle it.

Welcome to the pulling curls podcast where we untangle everything from pregnancy parenting Homer, teens, even some family travel because heavens knows our lives are tangled. I’m your host Hilary Erickson. This is the part of the episode where I beg you to leave a review. The problem with creating a podcast that’s for busy moms is that you’re busy moms and nobody has time for review which I 100% Get but I only need a few words, please leave me a review.

Thank you so much. Okay guys, before we jump in, I wanted to remind you about my free online prenatal class, it talks about all the reasons why you might well not all of them, because you know, I can’t mention everything, but it talks about the reasons you’d want to head into labor and delivery or call your doctor.

It’s super, super helpful also talks about common third trimester testing, which is actually what might lead you to end up being induced with some of these reasons we’re going to talk about so definitely jump inside. You can find it in the show notes, and this is episode 49. At pullingcurls.com.

This episode of The pulling curls podcast is sponsored by the online prenatal class. for couples. It simplifies understanding labor so you can have a more relaxed pregnancy and birth taught by a highly experienced labor and delivery nurse and can be done wherever you are whenever you want. No more arranging busy schedules to fit in a prenatal class, say 15%. With the coupon code untangled You can find out more at pulling curls calm and the menu under courses or in this episode show notes.

Okay, so today, we’re first going to talk about The five most common reasons that women get induced and then I’m going to answer some of your most burning questions about induction. So let’s talk about why you might get induced. Okay, so the first reason is that your baby is too big. It’s also known as LGA or large for gestational age. It’s usually done via ultrasound, although some doctors just measure you with our tape measure.

You know, when you go to your prenatal checkups, and they measure from your pubic bone to the top of your uterus, they can tell that as well as also we do a thing called Leopold’s maneuvers, which is where we just feel your belly and really skilled practitioners can really know how big a baby is without as well. So if your baby’s too big, and it just keeps getting bigger, it may not come out of your pelvis. And so that’s why we would induce you early diabetes is becoming a very frequent reason that women are getting induced, most often the lower you go at least till 39 weeks, often 40 weeks even if you’re a well controlled diabetic.

It’s basically the same reason as large for gestational age when you are diabetic, it is likely that you are growing a larger baby because of the sugar levels in your blood and so It’s just better to get the baby out. Also, there are more risks with a gestational diabetic baby.

So they just want to get them out a little bit earlier, they very rarely would let you go past 40 weeks, as far as I’ve seen with gestational diabetes or type one or type two, honestly type one, they probably go early because that has even more complications and something that you’ll be dealing with your whole life. As you will know if you’re a type one diabetic preeclampsia is a reason that we see a lot of people get induced preeclampsia is a disorder where the smooth muscle in your body relaxes.

And so we see that as protein in the urine, you swell you get headaches, that is kind of the main reason that your doctor is checking your blood pressure and your urine when you go in for a checkup. So if you end up having preeclampsia, that would be a reason to be induced.

Usually preeclampsia is diagnosed though with a blood test and we bring you into the hospital and monitor you before we decide it’s preeclampsia. If you’re interested on more information about preeclampsia, I have a whole article about it that’s really helpful and useful, but I would not worry about it if you haven’t been discussing it with your doctor previous to now.

Okay, low fluid. If your doctor thinks that you might have a low flow level, they will send you the hospital for a test called an EFI. FYI, we talk about all these types of tests in that free prenatal class that I had mentioned. And so the EFI measures how much fluid is in your belly around the baby, if there’s too much fluid, it can be a problem. And if there’s too low of fluid, it can be a problem as well.

So we just like to have a good amount of fluid around the baby to cushion the cord and make sure baby is healthy and doing well. So getting an asi that is too low could be a reason for you to get induced and too high. It’s you know, it goes both ways. Finally, the reason that most women end up getting induced is an elective induction.

Now it can be elective on your side, it can be elective on the doctor side, it just means that you have decided that it would be better to get the baby out with no medical indication, it can be because your mom’s in town or your husband’s leaving town or your doctors leaving town or you’re just tired of being pregnant.

If any reason just an FYI, on an elective induction, you do fall behind anyone who has a medical reason to be induced, of course, we are a hospital and we do need to treat those who have a medical condition before people who just kind of want to be treated if that makes sense. And so if your hospital is busy, sometimes you end up getting put off Pause or hold for a little bit until we’re able to find a room for you. But an elective induction happens very frequently.

I, of course, do recommend avoiding electrical induction if at all possible, but sometimes it just isn’t. And people get induced and it is not unusual. And I’ve started a bajillion elective inductions in my time. So those are the five reasons that you might get induced. Of course, there are other reasons why you might get induced, I go into all of those in the full online prenatal class for couples, but I just wanted to give you an idea of the top five and what is most commonly seen.

Okay, let’s talk about your induction burning questions. Okay, are there different degrees of pain with pitocin if you only need a small dose versus a large dose, so pitocin reacts very differently on every single patient. Some people only need a very small dose and some people need a giant dose and of course, it varies. If you are getting induced for specific reason and your cervix is closed, they can high it is probably going to take more pitocin to get the baby going through that cervix versus someone who’s already four centimeters and the baby is low and all those kinds of things as far as the pain early in labor when the pitocin is low as we increase it just a tiny bit.

Every 30 minutes, it does get harder the higher that amount of pitocin goes for some people, some people, it doesn’t get painful. And that isn’t a great sign because it does require a little bit of pain for your cervix to open because pitocin is putting you into labor, we do need to have some pain in order to have a baby. So as we increase the level of pitocin.

Yes, it does get more painful. Okay, next burning question. Does it make labor longer if you have an induction? Now that’s hard to say? Because we’re actually we’re supposed to fill out how long the labor lasted.

And a lot of times, I’m like, I have no idea because when does labor actually start? If you listen to a podcast with my friend Mandy, she always says that labor starts in hindsight, which I totally agree. If you labor at home, a lot of times you just won’t feel well, but you’re still going about the things that you’re doing. You’re making dinner, you’re cleaning your house, you’re going to work all those kind of things and then suddenly you start to be like, Oh, I think I’m in labor.

I think I just wasn’t feeling like crap versus while you’re at the hospital you’re laying in bed, you have absolutely nothing else to focus on other than feeling like crap and so it starts like from minute one for you for You know all that time that you were feeling not so well and didn’t know you were in labor but now you are. So in general though, and deduction does take longer because Mother Nature is not on your side, but not always. So there’s my super vague answer for you.

You’re welcome. Okay, can you eat once you’re in the hospital? Oh, if you are getting a deuce it depends on how you are getting induced in general once you’re on pitocin you cannot eat although I do provide my patients I ships and juice sometimes I give them ice or popsicles or those types of things. You can have clear liquids but they do prefer that you not eat.

Of course I always just it’s your own body. You can decide what the heck you want to do. But you might see the food again and a lot of people honestly once you get into hard labor are just not interested in eating. So that’s something to consider. Well, sometimes if Potosi has been going for a while we will give you a pitocin break we’ll let you get up and shower and eat and sometimes I feel like that really helps your body just get all the pitocin out of its system and do a fresh start and you just feel so much better once you’ve eaten.

So sometimes that happens if you’ve had a longer induction Are you more likely to need a C section if you are induced This is a two fold question. People that are induced have higher risk because people who have medical problems are often induced and so you have to take that into account plus the elective people who just made the choice to be induced.

Yes, getting induced does have a higher c section rate. Yes, higher risk pregnancies have a higher c section rate, but it does go against your body’s natural course. So sometimes it does end up having a higher c section rate, which is why we encourage people to not have a C section it is a more natural way for your body to have a baby.

I have to be fully honest in the fact that I was 12 days overdue with my last baby. I am a big believer in waiting until Mother Nature says it’s go time but my doctor really convinced me to go ahead and be induced I wasn’t doing I was reticent to have them break my water which is one way that they can do shoe and once they did, I had the baby like two hours later, I was walking around at like five centimeters so I just my uterus is done. It’s pieced out.

Okay, we had a question about VBAC inductions, which is a little bit different than regular inductions. The main difference is that your doctor needs to be in hospital hold time and it’s a little bit more high risk. So a lot of times we’ll insert a monitor called a UPC that gives us a direct idea of how firm your contractions are and kind of how the baby is tolerating it depending on how hard the contractions are.

The main thing though, is that your doctor has to be there the whole time. And so a lot of doctors are more reticent to do a VBAC induction because it is hard for them to be there the whole time that you’re getting induced. If your doctor has an office on the hospital premises or near the campus, then a lot of times they can let you labor while they’re at the office. And so that works out well for them. If you are considering a VBAC, I would talk to your doctor about if they will induce you ahead of time just to find out and have your expectations at a certain point.

They may induce you with certain things like they might be willing to break your water but they wouldn’t be willing to do pitocin or something like that. So talk with your doctor about what they’re wanting to do early in your pregnancy if you’re hoping for a VBAC, and if you find that your provider isn’t willing to do what you’re hoping for, there’s no reason especially before 20 to 25 weeks that you can’t shop around with a provider who does seem a little more willing to work with you. Okay, final question is there is a study out there which of course, I’ve heard all about that it is safer to induce people at 39 weeks.

It is one study, the peer review Wasn’t that awesome. It doesn’t have a huge sample size. As far as my 20 year career in labor and delivery, it goes against things that I know to be true just in watching people. So I disagree with it.

A cog, which is our physicians group in the United States does not agree with the study, they still recommend that patients go towards 40 weeks and we only induce if medically necessary before then, if possible, so that study is all the rage and I’m sure anyone can find a study to support whatever they want to do with their body.

So there you go. I mean, if you really want to get a noose before 39 weeks talk with your doctor about it, there’s absolutely no reason not to. It really depends on what your cervix is. If your body is showing you that it’s not ready your cervix is closed thick and high. You know, your cervix is firm, that is not a great sign that your body is anywhere near going into labor.

But if you’re four centimeters and the baby is low, The service is soft, then that shows that maybe your body is ready and it could just use a little shove and then you’ll go into labor. So it really depends on what your body is showing you and your particular circumstances.

So I would encourage you to talk with your doctor. Also if you are miserable at whatever stage of pregnancy you are at talk with your doctor about that they might have recommendations that they can help you with final word. When you are heading to 40 weeks your main job in life is just stating Yes, your other kids might watch a lot of TV Yes, you might feel like a slob just kind of sitting on the couch all the time, but it is hard to grow a full sized human inside your own body.

So give yourself credit for that. You don’t need to be induced because you can lay around and just just stayed if that’s possible. So hang in there lots of reasons you need to be a noose lots of reasons you don’t need to be induced Big thanks to today’s sponsor, the online prenatal class for couples if you guys have any questions about that, I would love to answer it.

If you go to the page about it. There is a question mark down on the side where you can ask questions and you can directly email me through that link as well. I go all into inductions how they happen what’s Expect all those kinds of things so if you have any questions, it is a great time to get started. That course is newly updated and has awesome videos and outside materials if you have specific concerns that you can read through as well and I have to say the biggest lover of that course is the partners they are loving how engaging it is how quick it is how I do not waste your time because I am not a time waster here

people. If you like today’s episode, we’d love it if you would share, subscribe and review it really makes a difference. We drop an episode every Monday and until then I hope you have a tangle free day!

Transcribed by https://otter.ai