Possible Hernia?

[WhiteHorse]

I am 22 wks and feeling very sore around my navel area. My first pregnancy was twins and I got HUGE right out in front, and suffered the extremely stretched belly (jowl of the dog look, yep its not pretty). Afterwards I could see a weird bulge during working out, but that eventually went away. 19 years later I had another baby (3 years ago) and during that pregnancy I felt a little soreness, but not too bad. This time, since I am carrying/holding my DS still a lot, I am getting concerned this could be a hernia and will get worse. I am gaining much more weight this time around, and the baby seems to be riding high. Does anyone else have hernia experience? Is there some kind of band or belt that can help? Has anyone had surgery to repair one? I hear it can be done right after he c-section.

[OurLittleNest]

I have an umbilical hernia. It was visibly noticeable during my first pregnancy but caused no discomfort. I had no idea what it was. With my second pregnancy (I'm expecting the baby any day) it started to really bother me. My doctor diagnosed it early on. But it got really bad and caused so much pain that one time I had to go the ER. Apparently my intestine gets caught in the hernia and if it can't get back out on its own it can hurt very bad, and it can be serious if it doesn't get work its way out. Other times the intestine can get caught in the hernia and just find its own way out.

I had problems with the hernia until about a month ago. If my intestine got caught in there and started to hurt (which was the sign that it wasn't working its own way out) I had to lay on my back. Gravity would pull it back in. I could also push it gently from the outside in to get it to go back. So I spent a month at home this summer because it happened so frequently and it's not like you can just drop the ground in the grocery store. I eventually bought an abdominal binder and wore that around my stomach all day up until a month ago. I started wearing it at night too because my hernia would bother me at night as well. Also, my doctor said lifting anything heavy (like my 2-year-old) would make it worse. But I was able to start carrying and lifting her again after I got the binder.

My doctor said that eventually my uterus would grow during the pregnancy and cover up the hernia, blocking my intestine from getting caught in there. He said that would happen about halfway through but it didn't actually happen until I'd say sometime in late November/December. (I was due Dec. 22 if that helps.)

I will have the surgery sometime after this baby is born, definitely before I have another baby because I don't want to go through this again.