Water broke or Pee?

[Theoretica]

Well I'm not sure if my water broke last night or if I tinkled the bed a little

About 5-6am I woke up with a little 'gush' of fluid. Now to be fair, I had already woken up an hour before and had to pee, but ignored it because DH and DD were sprawled on me and it would take too much work to get up. Yep. I was that tired LOL! Anyways it felt like I'd just peed a little. So I got up to go to the bathroom and peed quite a bit more than usual, I definitely had a FULL bladder.

Went back to bed, woke up a few hours later and sat up, and had a wet spot on the bed where I sat up. Hmmmm.

I'm laying down for now and going to see if I get any more leakage, if I do I'm calling my midwife. No contractions AT ALL going on, so that concerns me if my water broke? I'm 41wks.

Any ideas?

[umsami]

Smell it. Urine is usually unmistakable in odor.

Amniotic fluid doesn't smell like urine at all IMHO.

[thebigfam]

Amniotic fluid is also a little slippery....so feel it

[MaerynPearl]

whether or not you get more, I suggest calling your midwife. I am sure she has PH strips she can test you with and let you know for certain if it was your water or just really watery discharge.

(or pee)

my water only ever breaks during transition so I do not have personal experience with it...

but my moms water broke with my youngest brother on a water bed and she was convinced she peed herself, until she smelled it... then she was convinced the waterbed sprung a leak (she was only 35 weeks along, PROM was far from her mind at the moment)

[RedOakMomma]

My labor pattern, twice now, is for my water to break and then nothing happens. Nada. I usually have to wait for hours for contractions to arrive and organize, and in that time I do a lot of birth ball sitting, A LOT of walking, etc. Gravity is your friend when your water breaks and nothing happens. Don't let yourself get worked up about nothing happening for a while--it is totally and completely normal.

For if it's amniotic fluid or pee...amniotic fluid has a slippery, liquid soap-like feel to it. It's thicker than pee...at least in the way it feels on your hands. Pee, whether it has a smell or a color to it or not, feels much more like water.

[Theoretica]

My mw does have ph strips so she said she can come test if I want her to, she's in a meeting so it'll be a bit.

I'm voting that it's my water breaking, slippery is very accurate and when I lay down and sit up I leak a little more.

My other pregnancies never had the water break until RIGHT before time to push, so this is just odd to me. Is it normal for NOTHING to happen then? If my water broke and I'm not contracting...that seems strange LOL

[MaerynPearl]

Originally Posted by Theoretica

My other pregnancies never had the water break until RIGHT before time to push, so this is just odd to me. Is it normal for NOTHING to happen then? If my water broke and I'm not contracting...that seems strange LOL

Its not... abnormal lol... but its not necessarily good either. If you go too horribly long between water breaking and baby coming you could risk a really bad infection... but for now I would not worry about it. I would let the midwife worry about that and you try not to worry. Worry is not beneficial!

If it turns out to be your water, I would suggest (and likely your MW will too) trying some of the natural induction techniques, such as walking a bunch or nipple stimulation to strengthen what contractions you may be having and not feeling (totally normal for a woman who has been through labor before to be in labor and not feel it!)

[mckittre]

Contractions might just start on their own too. That sounds like exactly what happened with my first baby. Woke up to water breaking at 3AM and no contractions, but contractions were going strong by 5:30AM without me doing anything, really.

[jcregan]

My water broke 3am with my first - lots of liquid, no question about what it was for me! But I did not start contracting on my own... One problem might have been the hip/back problems I had and so could not really walk much etc. to try and get things going.

I was using a mw at a hospital and that evening we started pitocin but now I would probably try to wait at least until the next morning to start inducing. A couple hours of pitocin and my body kicked into high gear and baby came only a few hours later.

Some ladies I know have had success with acupuncture for labor induction (but these cases were after there due dates and not with water breaking first) but it might be an option to try.

It sounds like your water broke to me!

[DivineMrsM]

my water broke like that both times. with my first, they induced me with Pit. second time, i used a double breast pump and went into full active labour in 15 minutes, baby born in 3 hours.

[Adaline'sMama]

My water broke and I didn't have my first contraction until 7 hours later. Good luck Mama!