Physical preparation for a Natural Birth
Here at Natural Birth Co when we discuss the preparation required to birth naturally we look at this from 3 aspects:
Preparing Mentally
Preparing Physically
And Preparing your Partner
Today we are going to break down PHYSICAL PREPARATION for birth.
The intention behind Physical Preparation is to get the body in a position where:
Labour is as comfortable as possible
Labour continues progressively and efficiently, baby moves down and the cervix opens in a continuous manner, without obstructions/stalls
The body can physically support you with strength and endurance to move intuitively
When Preparing Physically for birth we include:
Building mobility in the joints within the pelvis
Building balance in the ligaments and muscles, that surround, and are within the uterus and pelvis
Building strength in the legs and glutes
Maintaining mild core work to reduce abdominal separation, and improve postnatal recovery
So lets break these down further explain exactly WHY is preparing these aspects necessary for a natural birth.
Building Mobility in the Joints within the Pelvis
When we simply use our joints this encourages:
Lubrication
Flexibility
Mobility
This allows for not only a more comfortable pregnancy…… But when it comes to birth, and the pelvis changing shape around the babies head, this allows the joints to move easier and therefore the bones to get out of babies way easier, but this also allows this movement to be less painful during birth for the mother.
If our joints are IMMOBILE during pregnancy, not only will the joint movement during birth be more intense and painful for the mother, but also have less ability to be able to actually move out of the way, potentially decreasing the space baby has to get out of the pelvis.
So how do we get the joints moving?
As I said, they simply just need to be used and moved in all sorts of ways
How we do that here at Natural Birth Co is through Yoga, Pilates, and Body Balancing as we manipulate the legs in all sort of ways and positions, however, other ways to get this movement in pregnancy is through activity such as:
Walking including steps, gutter walking, beach walking.
Swimming
Make sure the movements you do are pregnancy safe and if you have pelvic girdle pain make sure you are not triggering this pain further.
Building balance in the ligaments and muscles, that surround and are within the uterus and pelvis
The ligaments have 2 main roles in labour:
Position
Guidance thorough flexion and rotation
The ligaments being balance is what allows your body to have an efficient and progressive labour
It is what allows your contractions to progressively descend your baby through the pelvis
Place head pressure on the cervix
Allow the head pressure to open the cervix
And babe to continue to decend and nuzzle their way down through flexion and rotation to be born within the appropriate time for your individual pelvis and body
Body balance is absolutely essential for a normal, efficient and progressive birth and this is one of the many reasons our NBC mamas have amazing birth experiences.
When the body isn’t balanced
Firstly baby can start in a suboptimal position for your pelvis
This may result in a delay of labour starting
The baby not being able to engage and descend in the pelvis
Baby potentially being Breech, transverse or posterior which any of these will greatly impact your vaginal birth birth experience
The baby can get stuck within the pelvis- this may be with or without the head being misguided into an awkward position to the side (asynclitic) or the head tilted off the chest (deflexed)
When this happens this can wedge babe into the pelvis, preventing their gradual descent
Preventing the cervix pressure therefore not openning the cervix
This lack of descent/cervical opening leads to long, tiring labours that will very potentially not progress and lead to an instrumental birth if the cervix is open but baby isn’t descending, or more likely a C-section due to bubs not descending
Needles to saythe body being balanced is SO important
With our NBC mamas we do this mainly though our Pregnancy body balance workshop which is a group of movements including yogic postures, ancient midwifery techniques, and chiropractic techniques. We also intentionally include alot of our body balance techniques into our yoga flows.
Building strength in the legs and glutes
When I am caring for a labouring women who wants to have a natural birth, but ‘Taps out’ to a birth she doesn’t desire it is usually for 3 main reasons:
Physical exhaustion
Mental exhaustion
Unable to cope with pain in labour
Have strength and fitness in the legs and glutes leading up to birth really increases the endurance and resilience you have physically during your labour allowing you to maintain an intentionally active labur for MUCH longer than if your legs and glutes were unfit.
The way we build this fitness in our NBC mamas is mainly through pilates and our Body ablaance workshop where we do alot of strength focus on the legs and glutes, and some through yoga in the stronger parts of the practise.
Other way to do this is honestly just through squats and lungs (If no pelvic girdle pain) at home! NOTE more than walking is required for this type of pregnancy fitness- walking is amazing for mobility but with this topic we are talking proper strength in the legs and glutes which si accumulated with lungs and squats and other types of body weight exercise.
NBC does not recommend doing intense weights in pregnancy especially when not under the guidance of a professional pregnancy specific personal trainer/ PT.
Maintaining mild core work to reduce abdominal separation and improve postnatal recovery
Honestly this component is not super relevant to a natural birth as such but more so for your postnatal recovery!!
The physio mamas would appreciate this addition being in here hehe
Birth is one things but just wait until you reach motherhood. You will be wishing you did all you could to bring more ease and grace to the process as possible.
Do you future self a a favour and maintain your core fitness during pregancy to improve your postnatal recovery!
This does not look like crunches by the way!
Be sure to be receiving very specific pregnancy advice when doing core exercises! (instagram reels does not count- many of the peeps doing these are not qualified or have thorough training on this topic).
What can Prevent you from Preparing Physically/Make it difficult
Pelvic Girdle Pain (PGP)
I would recommend first and foremost seeing a Womens Health Physio during your second trimester in ALL PREGNANCIES (see a list of who I recommend HERE). However if you are experiencing PGP they are absolutely essential. PGP is not only uncomfortable for your pregnancy but can be a good indicator to use that there are ligaments and muscles that are out of whack which can great impact your natural birth experience as explained above!
2. You have general pregnancy discomforts, inflexibility, lack of strength
This can make it really difficult to actually start. However long story short the longer you leave it the harder it is going to get and the less time you have to fix it before birth.
The answer here is simple… You just have to decide to start. Just start. Just put the clothes on, just leave the house, just drive there. Then you are already here you may as well do the class!
There is no one else stopping you but your own mind.
You need to decide… Do you want to have a natural birth? Do you want to prepare yourself in all the ways you can for this? If the answer is yes then the only thing stopping you in you.
Just start
3. You have other kids
I totally appreciate this makes it difficult. If you are the type who can apply themselves from home- Find an online version of classes/exercise routines! Our Body balance Workshop is online and we have yoga classes coming online soon (have a geeze around our website and you should find them).
Ask around and see if you can start a child minding routine. One grandparent on Monday nights- then hubby can get home from work in time on Wednesdays. Maybe even do a double class on one of the days to get it all done! We always have our pilates first followed by yoga and actually get many super motivated dedicated mamas come for 2 classes in a row.
At the end of the day if you value something enough you can usually make it work- try thinking outside of the box and evaluating your values.
Watch the video version of the podcast HERE.
Listen to the podcast here (https://www.naturalbirthco.com/pregnancy-podcast) or on any platform you listen to your podcast from.
