8 reasons for a postpartum check with your osteopath
I treat lots of women during pregnancy but it’s important to remember that after childbirth it’s vital that you look after yourself and achieve the best recovery. I recommend a post-partum check in the first couple of months after delivery but it’s fine to come at a later date. Here are eight reasons for a postpartum check:
- Improve your alignment to optimise healing
It’s very common to experience malalignment following pregnancy and delivery, particularly if you’ve had certain kinds of intervention (e.g. episiotomy, tear, C-section, forceps). Continuing with this malalignment will force other joints to compensate and eventually you’ll notice the effects of this compensation. That’s why I recommend that you are checked for any problems quickly to avoid longer term issues.
- Look after your back
You shouldn’t just accept back pain during or following pregnancy. Too often I hear that back pain is part and parcel of having a baby or breastfeeding. But just because back pain is common, that doesn’t make it physiologically normal. It’s usually a sign that you’re out of balance; a post-partum check can identify and then treat the source of back pain and discomfort.
- Protect your pelvic floor
After childbirth, an altered environment in your thoracic/abdominal and pelvic cavities can place excessive pressure on your pelvic organs and pelvic floor. Although many women think that they just need to do more pelvic floor contractions, this is NOT the answer. To improve function, downward pressure of your organs onto your pelvic floor must be reduced by improving the mobility of your visceral system (your organs), increasing the mobility of your musculoskeletal system and lengthening certain muscles. This is a key part of post-partum treatment and a much bigger topic that I will go into in more detail on another post.
- Learn to breathe optimally
Any sort of traumatic delivery means that you may not be breathing optimally and if you’ve spent the last 10 years or so sitting at a desk, your breathing may well have been affected well before you became pregnant. One of the most frequent and immediate benefits I see is that people can breathe much more freely after a treatment. This alone makes us feel SO much better.
- Relax
We often don’t know we are even holding tension until it’s no longer there and we feel transformed. If there is ever a time to help your body to deeply relax it’s after having a baby. Stress is caused by ‘stressors,’ which disrupt your homeostasis and may originate from various sources such as hormonal variation, physical stress, surgery, intestinal dysbiosis or changes to your work/rest rhythm. These can be cumulative and left untreated or unresolved can lead to disruption of your hormonal, digestive and immune system health. My treatments help to soothe and aid relaxation at a time when we often feel we need all the help we can get. They are targeted to get to the root of maintaining factors within your body.
- Get your feet working again
It’s very common to see women post-delivery (and in pregnancy) with collapsed arches. The answer is NOT to put an insole in your shoe to make your foot EVEN lazier – you need to get your foot working again. I will be telling you much more about this topic in a future post as I have SO much to say about feet. Most of you will already know that I am a complete advocate of being barefoot, so watch this space.
- Get ready for exercise
You may have had an extended break from exercise during your pregnancy and in the first few weeks after your baby has been born. Before you start exercising again, osteopathic treatment can ensure that you have good balance in your body so you can avoid injuries as you begin an exercise regime.
- Prepare for future pregnancies
You’re still out of alignment and holding tensions where you shouldn’t be and then you get pregnant again – no surprise then that the PGP (Pelvic Girdle Pain) you may have experienced towards the end of your last pregnancy rears its head much earlier in this one? PGP is a consequence of the malalignment of the pelvis which leads to certain muscles compensating for others. This results in stiffness of some tissues and overuse of others and it is often the tissues experiencing overuse which start to suffer from repetitive strain. If you address any malalignment after your first pregnancy, the better prepared you are for any future pregnancies