Basically you have to choose an interventionist or non interventionist route.
My preference in these situations is generally non interventionist. Nature tends to sort itself out more successfully than human intervention when it comes to these issues. But, there are plenty of exceptions. People tend to feel a desire to actively help, and struggle to keep their hands off; they just want to do things, but it tends to cause more harm than good. The opportunity to soak is certainly good, but if she is being forced to spend an hour per day in an environment she isn't choosing, it's just as likely to stress her out as it is to help, especially if you're just repeatedly doing the same thing despite not getting a result.
It's difficult to make the judgement without seeing her, but personally I'd be inclined to keep handling to zero and just leave her alone to rest and recover unmolested. Generally snakes in this situation do pass the eggs, but sometimes they don't.
Again, I can't see her some I'm having to use some guesswork, but if I was going to intervene in a situation like this, assuming she's a large snake (a 16 year old Diamond likely is) I'd probably be lubing up a sexing probe with petroleum jelly and gently working the lubricant into her to allow the eggs to slip out. This is a very delicate procedure and if you make an error you can cause a life-threatening injury. Some people will try to massage the eggs out, you can try that if you want, but again, it's very dangerous. If you do this, don't be tempted to force them, just give a gentle push and if they're not moving, don't force them.
There are definitely exceptions, but I generally observe that the more pushing and prodding and hassling and molesting that people do, the more likely the result will be bad, and when people just stay hands off, the result is usually good. Vets in situations like this generally go for surgery, which generally does save the snake's life, but not always, and after such surgery complications are not uncommon and there is a very high chance that the snake will have problems if she's ever bred again. Compare this with a higher rate of success with the non interventionist method (doing literally nothing) and obviously no complications.
At the end of the day, your snake and you have to make the decision.
My female laid a mix of 8 good eggs along wth 12 non fertile ,hard(calcified?) eggs 6 days ago. She clearly has 3 eggs retained that won't seem to come out. I've been giving her warm 1 hour soaks daily and I'm not sure what else to do. Any breeders out there with advice I would really appreciate it, im worried she could die soon. I'm in a rural area and there are no herp vets just regular ones who I doubt could help.
