10 Things That Will Fail To Induce Labor, But Will Make You Rage

Hello, you. I heard that you are nearing the end of this magical pregnancy. Is the glow waning? Can you hear your feet swooshing every time you take a step from the water weight? Are people stopping you to tell you that you look “done?” If not, don’t worry, you will get there before any of these things will help you to naturally induce labor.

These are things commonly popping up on the ol’ Google search for ways to get the labor party started. I know this because I Googled it daily and waited for new ideas. I got furious when the sites all had the same answers. The same worthless answers that didn’t work yesterday were not helpful today. I raged against the stupid ideas (not so stupid that I didn’t try) and vowed to share with the world how they were wrong.

1. Eggplant Parmigiana

Well-played eggplant dealers. This is obviously an extremely elaborate hoax to get women to eat eggplant. There are stories upon stories on the internet about women eating this and then going into labor. I don’t buy it. Hey, internet, I want to give birth not lay an egg. You’re not fooling me. Side note: I didn’t try this one. I raged because I didn’t know what an eggplant was, and it made me feel like I was already failing at mothering.

2. Acupuncture

I went a couple days after my due date. I asked the lady if she could get the show on the road with this baby, and I might have asked what the chances were it was going to work. In hindsight, it was a somewhat dimwitted question. Her answer was, “I have a 100% success rate. I have never had anyone stay pregnant forever.” She was correct—I was not pregnant forever.

3. Oregano and/or Spicy Foods

If you don’t like these foods, don’t torture yourself. It’s really not worth it. If it works, at best you get to go and give birth with indigestion and a tummy that you aren’t sure about. If it doesn’t work, you just cost yourself one night of rest while your body tries to figure out what to do with this mess you just fed it. Hint: It’s probably going to be gas (at best).

4. Bouncing on an Exercise Ball

They say that if you bounce on one of those large balls it could get the baby lower. Maybe you can bounce that baby on out. Or maybe not. Because it kind of just made me have to pee a lot. I think I learned why they test to make sure it’s amniotic fluid when you say your water broke.

5. Stairs

I did them one at a time, I did them two at a time, and then I sat on them for good measure with my chin in my hands. My non-scientific yet ragerific opinion is that I might just as well sit on the stairs the whole time.

6. Twerking

Now adorable pregnant ladies dance while in labor? I was a refrigerator. My hips don’t lie, and what they were saying is “I still can’t dance. Why would you think that I would be able to dance with this added weight and shape when I couldn’t dance before? Are you going to do something about how my bladder can’t seem to let me even walk (let alone twerk) without leaking?” I am raging against having to be cute while miserable.

7. Scrubbing the Floor

Lies. Did the men come up with this bs? Sure, let me get down and scrub around the toilet since your aim is so bad. Hey, let’s cross our fingers that you can see better to catch the baby than you do to hit the inside of the toilet bowl.

8. M&M’s and ‘Transformer’ Movie

This one was not on Google. This was my ace in the hole to get my first labor started (at 37 weeks.) I thought for sure that with my second it would also work. I’m not sure if it was because Megan Fox left the franchise or what, but it didn’t work a second time.

9. Walking

Yeah, yeah we get it. Moving is good. The theory of gravity works to move things down. Every time I would have some Braxton Hicks, I would walk. Do you know what would happen then? They would stop. I don’t know, maybe my body is broken. Or maybe walking is bullshit. If I ever get pregnant again, I am taking a Segway everywhere. Take that, walking.

10. Bumpy Car Ride

Nope. Obviously these people have not ridden with my husband. The bumpy car ride caused me sea sickness and not labor. There was much fighting over how a person could make a passenger sea sick on land. I stand by it. I know what it feels like to be green around the gills, and that was it.

I sincerely hope that you have better luck than I did. If I may borrow some logic from my acupuncturist: You will 100% have this baby at some point. It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, but hopefully within two weeks from now. I’d say pretty likely in a month. I will lay money on you having had the baby by six months from now.