It is not uncommon for the cervical ripening to take up to 24-36 hours!! It is also not uncommon to use different techniques to ripen the cervix. You may feel contractions during this process. If the contractions become painful, you will be able to request medication to relieve your discomfort.
Cervical ripening often happens on its own, naturally. Some women may benefit from assisted cervical ripening. This may come in the form of medicines, devices or procedures to ripen the cervix before labor begins.
Most of the effacement happens in the early stage of labor, when your cervix is dilating from 0 to 6 centimeters. This stage generally lasts 14 to 20 hours or more for a first-time mom, but (of course) all timelines are individual.
As you get closer to your due date, your cervix may start to dilate without you knowing it. Dilation is a gradual process that, for some can take weeks, even up to a month. Others will dilate and efface overnight. Here's what's going on as you progress through labor and how to visualize the opening of your cervix.
Some women have all the signs and don't deliver for a few more weeks. Others have no signs, then they efface and dilate overnight and give birth the next day. Once the cervix is 100% effaced and fully dilated to 10 cm, it's time to push and deliver the baby.
Some women may reach 100% effacement within a few hours. For others, cervical effacement may occur slowly over several weeks. The same applies to dilation. It is not uncommon for a woman to be 1–2 cm dilated a couple of weeks before going into labor.
Dilation is typically gradual, but the cervix can widen rapidly over 1 or 2 days. A few different factors can influence how quickly dilation occurs. In this article, learn how to dilate more quickly before and during labor.
Female reproductive system
As pregnancy progresses and you prepare to give birth, the cervix gradually softens, decreases in length (effaces) and opens (dilates). If you have an incompetent cervix, your cervix might begin to open too soon — causing you to give birth too early.
Side-lying release
Not only can this position be used to help engage the baby into the pelvis and to encourage cervical dilation, but it can also be used during labor to help ease discomfort.
Try being upright
One of your biggest allies is gravity. When you are upright—standing, sitting or kneeling—the weight of your baby presses on the cervix, encouraging it to open. An upright position may also help get your baby into the best position for birth.
During effacement, you may experience new symptoms or not notice any physical changes at all. Possible signs of effacement include lower abdominal cramping, pelvic pressure, Braxton Hicks contractions, increased vaginal discharge, and loss of the mucus plug.
You can't feel your cervix thinning, but you might pick up on a few cervical effacement symptoms. When your cervix effaces, you may feel pressure down there, Thiel says. You might also notice an increase in cervical mucus or discharge. “It may feel kind of crampy,” Cackovic says.
Checking for dilation does not induce labor unless the exam is used in conjunction with one or more common labor induction methods. A common intervention that may be offered during a cervical exam is called a “membrane sweep,” which is a procedure that can be performed if you are at least one centimeter dilated.
- Consistency: Your cervix begins to soften as is prepares for labor. Someone who is not close to labor would have a “firm” cervix, and feels like the tip of your nose. Eventually it starts to soften until it feels more like your cheek, making it easier for other parts of the process to occur.
Try a birthing ball
Rocking, bouncing, and rotating your hips on an exercise ball or birthing ball also opens the pelvis, and it may speed up cervical dilation.
As the baby's head drops down into the pelvis, it pushes against the cervix. This causes the cervix to relax and thin out, or efface. During pregnancy, your cervix has been closed and protected by a plug of mucus. When the cervix effaces, the mucus plug comes loose and passes out of the vagina.
Medical cervical ripening
Medications also can be given to help induce softening and dilatation of the cervix. Oral or vaginal suppository drugs, such as misoprostol and other prostaglandins, are also commonly used to ripen the cervix.
The cervix generally needs to be dilated to 10 centimeters before it's ready for the baby to pass through. Your cervix can be dilated to a couple of centimeters for a few weeks before delivery. This softening can cause the mucus plug to be dislodged and come out.
Discharging a brown or pink-tinged mucus is an early sign of cervix dilation. Effacement of the cervix causes small blood vessels to break. This causes the mucus to appear as pink or brown. It's important to seek medical advice about vaginal bleeding.
Your cervix looks and feels different when it's in the fertile stage of your menstrual cycle. You can use this information to detect ovulation. It's easier than you may think. When your cervix is high, soft and open, you are getting closer to ovulation.
Before labor, the cervix is typically 3.5 to 4 centimeters long. As labor begins, the cervix starts to soften, shorten and thin (efface). You might feel mild, irregular contractions or nothing at all. Effacement is often expressed in percentages.
According to Brichter, sitting on an exercise or birthing ball in neutral wide-legged positions prepares the body for labor by increasing blood flow, opening the pelvis, and encouraging cervical dilation. You can also try birth ball exercises such as circular hip rotations, rocking, and gentle bouncing.
If your water (aka “amniotic sac,” “bag of waters” or “membranes”) hasn't broken on its own when you arrive at the hospital, and you're five or more centimeters dilated, your OB might recommend bursting the bag by hand—especially if your cervix seems to be making slow (or no) progress.
During the active stage of labor, your cervix dilates from around 6 cm to the full 10 cm. (The last part of active labor, when the cervix dilates fully from 8 to 10 cm, is called transition.) This process takes about 5 to 7 hours if you're a first-time mom, or between 2 and 4 hours if you've had a baby before.