Things that can make your labor pain worse are a stressful environment, fear, lying on your back, being unaware of any natural pain relief options, not having a doula, dehydration and induction or augmentation with artificial oxytocin.

I know a lot of woman who consider pharmaceutical pain relief options while discussing their preferences for the birth. I can understand that labor can be a lot painful but what many of us fail to acknowledge is, the effectiveness of natural pain relief options. Before we move onto the options that can bring relief, let’s discuss about certain things that can actually make the labor pain worse.  Only if many of us knew about these things, the pain and discomfort that one might feel during labour can be significantly reduced. In this article, we will discuss about 7 things that can worsen labour pain.

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Labor Pain: 7 Surprising Things That Can Make Your Pain Worse

A stressful environment

There are certain things that can make you a little stressed during labour. For instance, presence of some person you dislike, a noisy environment or the midwife’s bad behaviour. This will make you more worried and you won’t be able to cope with the labour pain. For this, you must ensure that you choose people who turn out to be a great support system to you. Your birth support team should be working all together because you yourself cannot do that and have a great birth, both at the same time.

Read More: 11 Ways to Relieve Labor Pain

Fear

When one is fearful, they will also end up being tensed, which will further create problems in breathing deeply. Your body will become tight and you are likely to feel more pain. In order to avoid this, it is important that you collect all relevant information beforehand. Remember, getting informed and educated with good quality information is the best thing you can do to prevent that painful feeling. Also, you must surround yourself with great support system, which is equally important. You can read books, hire a doula, join pregnancy or birth groups and more importantly, avoid all sorts of negativity.

Read More: Pain Relief Given During Labor: Ultimate Guide

Lying on your back

This will put the weight of your baby and uterus on your back, which is not really great for blood supply. And as your uterus contracts forward, you will thus be working against gravity. Thereby, instead of lying on your back, you should rather choose upright, forward-leaning positions. Also, you should avoid reclining unless it is for a break.

Read More: 31 Natural Ways to Induce Labour

Being unaware of any natural pain relief options

A number of natural pain relief options actually prove to be effective. Thus, it is always better to rely on natural options instead of switching onto the medical ones at first. For instance, the action of deep breathing proves to be more effective than one thinks. Another one is getting into the birth pool, which according to many, made them feel relaxed and happy.

While natural pain relief options are effective in dealing with pain, drugs can completely numb the pain. However, you are certainly also not sure of their side effects and the complications they can later lead onto.

Not having a doula

Basically, doula is a trained birth support person who has the ability to change your experience from a stressful one to a rather relaxed and supportive one. It has also been proven by the studies that a doula turns out to be more effective than the hospital staff itself and even the mom-to-be’s friends and family. If due to some financial issues, you restrain yourself from hiring a doula, you can go for the second-best option, which is a student doula.

Dehydration

Being dehydrated can pose more risks than you know. When you are dehydrated, your uterus doesn’t contract as efficiently. In addition to this, your energy level drops and concentration and focus can suffer because every single thing in your body relies on water in order to function properly. You can thus keep the bendy straws in your birth bag, so that your support team can offer you the same instead of those big cups. You may also put a piece of tape around so that the straw does not move while you try to drink.

Induction or augmentation with artificial oxytocin

Now here, it’s not meant that an induction isn’t necessary. It does become important and necessary in some cases and there, you must trust your doctor and take a decision wisely. But in case, there is no urgent medical need, you can avoid an induction. While it was designed to ramp the labour up so that the baby can come out, some women still find it quite painful. Considering Syntocinon or Pitocin, then these are for those who need to get the baby out at that very moment. But once you have started, you are committed to do whatever it takes to get the baby out. Therefore, induction should only be accepted if it is truly needed.

Conclusion

It is vital that you learn more about a number of natural ways that can help prevent pain during labour. You can use a number of them when in labour and this will save yourself from a lot of pain. Apart from this, you should make sure that you stay hydrated during the birth process and remain active for as long as you can during the labour.

References

https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1056&context=sn_pubs

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1595100/