Chiropractic and Pregnancy

 

A healthy birth

Pregnancy is a natural process for all women. The expecting mother should feel as little discomfort during her pregnancy as possible. During pregnancy, the mother will release a series of hormones into the body, enabling the body to deal with the growing baby. Many of these hormones act on soft connective tissues, including muscles, ligaments and skin, allowing these structures to become more lax and, in doing so, allowing the baby to grow.

Due to this, problems can arise in many pregnant ladies, because the muscles and ligaments that are affected in the body by these hormones is not always a good thing. The reason for this is because the main stabilizing structures of the spine are the muscles and ligaments, and when these become more lax, there is less stability in the spine and therefore more chance of spinal injury.

It is also important to remember that the expecting mother will notice a large increase in the curve of her lower back (lumbar spine). This occurs in order to compensate for the increased weight at the front of the body. Similarly, in order to maintain the body's centre of gravity, the mother naturally arches her lower back more. In doing so, increased pressure is placed on the discs, nerves and muscles in the lower back which can create lower back pain.

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Structural changes during pregnancy

The birth canal

The birth canal is made up of two identical pelvic bones. These two pelvic bones make three distinctive joints that join together to form the pelvis. As in any joint in the human body, these joints are designed to move when the body needs them to.

As the growing baby gets bigger, it puts an increased amount of stress on these three joints, with the end result most commonly being misalignment of the sacroiliac joints (seen either side of the spine in the diagram).

This misalignment results in two possible outcomes. Firstly, the joints affected have large amounts of pain receptors situated in and around them, so any misalignment of these joints can cause a large amount of lower back, buttock and groin pain. Secondly, misalignment of these joints will also change the shape of the normally smooth circular birth canal and, in doing so, decreases the overall size of it. The end result is that the newborn baby, who has already got a very small opening to move through during birth, has an even smaller birth canal. This can potentially cause more stress to the mother and baby during the birth process, as more force may be needed by the obstetrician to deliver the baby.

How can chiropractic help?

Firstly, your chiropractor will carefully analyze your spine and pelvis to find out exactly which joint is responsible for any misalignments. Your chiropractor will then gently correct them, reducing your pain as well as allowing the pelvis to be in its optimum position so your baby can comfortably manoeuvre into the vertex position.