Maternity Acupressure

When I found out I was pregnant with my daughter I was absolutely terrified! It was a planned conception, and we were so excited, but the thought of giving birth had my stomach doing summersaults. Had I only known then, about Maternity Acupressure, I could have saved myself a lot of pain and frustration.

As the days and weeks passed, I thought more and more about holding my tiny little baby in my arms for the very first time, and more and more about what my labor would be like. I remember asking every woman I could find, who had already had a child, and asked them what labor felt like. Sharp cramps, severe pain, the worst menstrual cramp you have ever had multiplied times 100…and on and on they went. By the time I was 40 weeks, I had seen countless episodes of labor and delivery on Discovery Health, read every conceivable pregnancy magazine, Googled every question I could think of, and still was terrified.

My due date was January 8, but by December I was ready! I had gained a total of 50 lbs and was miserable. I wanted this baby out! My husband and I thought it would be awesome to have the New Years baby, so we did EVERYTHING that is supposed to induce labor naturally. From sex, to castor oil, to red raspberry leaf tea and nothing happened. I read that sex can naturally induce labor by ripening the cervix. The prostaglandins found in semen thin out the cervix to allow for dilation. The castor oil and red raspberry leaf tea are supposed to cause contractions, but all I got out of my efforts was a stomachache and frequent urination due to the amount of tea I drank...no baby!

So my due date came and went, and my doctor told me I needed to be induced because my amniotic fluid was too low. So I was induced, and it was horrible. After 9 hours of intense labor and no break between contractions, they came to me with an ultimatum. I either get an epidural (which I did not want) so I can get some rest because by the looks of it (I was only 3 cm), it was going to be a long night, OR I could stick it out with no pain management, but the Pitocin they were about to give me, would cause even more horrible contractions and they wouldn’t be able to help with the pain after the Pit. drip was started. So I got the epidural, and they rigged me up to the Pitocin. Within minutes the baby’s heart rate dropped below healthy levels, and they stopped the drip and put me on oxygen for hours. To make a long story short, I had 17 ½ hours of labor, and 2 hours of pushing until I finally got to hold my little baby girl. I vowed I would never go through that again.