What Is Prodromal Labor?
Pregnancy Purgatory. Is there such a thing?
How can you be anything but positive and radiate joy when carrying a sweet life inside you?
Let me tell you, it's a thing.
At the end of your pregnancy you can feel stuck and still be ecstatic. Grateful for the gift and trapped.There can be this 'in between' of bliss and misery.
It's okay to feel that way.
I was there.
It came in the form of prodromal labor.
Prodromal labor is the start and stop of contractions that could go on for days or even weeks. They are different than braxton hicks and can come with some intensity, but the kicker is they don't pick up and go into active labor.
Instead they stop.
This time can often be confused with 'false labor', but there is nothing false about it! I couldn't stress enough the importance of learning and using the correct term, prodromal over false.
It's more than encouraging to put a name to what you are experiencing. To know that you are indeed, NOT crazy. You are NOT broken. This is NORMAL.
My prodromal labor lasted weeks, but intensified a few days before the real deal. It would always start up at the same time, right as I drifted off to sleep. It was intense, I couldn't sleep through it. I felt pressure and thought every evening....our baby is coming.
I would call my labor doula for support, only to send her back home. By the end of yet another day, I was devastated.
I was exhausted.
I was encouraged to rest whenever I could. To pay careful attention to what my body needed.
I didn't need to do any special activity to encourage active labor to begin. I needed to be rested and ready when it did.
I spent days in bed. Without being able to fully engage with my husband and children, I missed them terribly. My husband apologized every day, unable to help.
Between the hopelessness I was reminding myself that this is my body and baby working together. That I would be able to endure.
Between the moments of intense weakness...
There was strength.
Enough strength.
Another day came and went, another day of start and stop.
During the quiet of the night, I surrendered into the arms of my husband, staining his shirt with my tears.
I went to my oldest's bed and snuggled away some time, instincts telling me this was it. As I entered my own room in attempt to sleep, I welcomed the pain that I knew would come with rest..
Just a few short hours later I followed as my body labored our baby right into our arms.
Now, that's bliss.
