09/13/2024
there are so many alternative methods for pain relief during early, active, and late labor! you may prefer one method over the other or you may prefer all methods throughout your labor and delivery. with that being said, you’d want communicate your preferred pain relief methods to your Doula in order to receive the best possible support. 😊
see below for examples on these pain relief methods:
🌸 breathing techniques: focused, pant-pant-blow, expulsion, cough breath, and breathing patterns.
• focused: inhale slowly and deeply from your abdomen, and exhale slowly.
• PPB: breathing in lightly and then breathing out in a pattern of two short pants followed by one longer blow (also known as “hee-hee-hoo”)
• expulsion: speed up your breathing as the contraction intensifies, and then take a deep breath and lean forward to breathe out with a moan or a grunt.
🌸 movement and positioning: upright, rhythmic motions, walking, sitting, lying on your side, or bouncing a birth ball. your Doula may suggest moving or changing positions frequently to help progress your labor.
🌸 hydrotherapy: a warm bath or a warm shower.
🌸 massage: long strokes down the back, rub or squeeze the shoulders / neck, rubbing the hips / hip squeezes, or an automatic massage gun. pressure can be light or more firm, depending on your preference.
🌸 counter pressure: applying pressure to a specific area by using the heel of your hands or knuckles, double hip squeezes, applying weight to the sacrum, or cook counter pressure.
• cook counter pressure: support person will hold their hands somewhat flat against the mothers sitz bones and the mother will push back into the support persons hands.
🌸 acupressure: spine, feet, inner leg, BL32, and L14.
• inner leg: about 4 finger widths above the ankle and behind the shin bone.
• BL32: located in the dimple of the buttocks, apply pressure and massage downward.
• L14: located between the webbing of the thumb and pointer finger on the back of the hand.
