Pregnancy brings many changes in your body that you have to cope with! Some of the symptoms experienced at this time are aches, pains, and extra stress that is uncalled for. Here, the skills of an osteopath can assist in alleviating the pains and stresses.
Let’s explore more about visiting an Osteopath for pregnancy.
Osteopathy An Alternative Therapy
Osteopathy is an alternative therapy that acts on your body’s tissues and bones. The areas where the therapy acts on are your joints, muscles, and spine. It aims to optimize your nervous, circulatory, and lymphatic systems, promoting overall well-being and stress reduction.
The Osteopath pregnant women follows a non-invasive approach stroking your joints, muscles, and spine lightly with the hands. But the osteopath doesn’t limit themselves to these areas only, their approach is holistic and reaches every part of your body.
Visiting An Osteopath During Pregnancy
Visiting your Osteopath during pregnancy has some inherent benefits. These benefits are discussed below:
Mitigating back pain: Due to a bulging belly, the distribution of weight becomes uneven, while your posture can droop a little bit. This brings back pain. The back is not accustomed to bearing the intense weight around your stomach and has to work harder to cope. Several medical reports suggest that around half of women experience back pain during pregnancy and postpartum.
An osteopath assists in achieving the correct posture and finding relief by manipulating your back, legs, and middle. They make you do a few light pregnancy-safe stretches in home settings when back pain is experienced.
Facilitating sound sleep: In pregnancy getting a good night’s sleep can become a problem. As the belly begins to get bigger, it disrupts your normal, natural sleeping positions. The added pressure on body and mind makes pregnant women struggle to get a restful night’s sleep. Statistical reports indicate that 46-78% of pregnant women cannot sleep properly throughout pregnancy, while 80% are inflicted with insomnia in their third trimester.
Your Osteopath pregnant women can help with your sleeping problem. By realigning your spine and body an osteopath helps improve your sleep pattern. Moreover, they can also recommend certain lifestyle changes that further enable you to sleep and live better during the pregnancy period.
Mitigating ligament pain and Plantar Fasciitis: As the baby grows in your belly the ligaments and muscles are stretched around the middle. That leads to pain in the tummy area, medically termed round ligament pain. Moreover, the weight you’ve gained often brings severe pain in your feet, especially when walking, medically termed Plantar Fasciitis.
Osteopaths have the skills to manage both the round ligament pain and Plantar Fasciitis, by helping reduce the inflammation in that area. They can guide you in performing light stretches you can do at home to relieve the pain and strengthen your muscles.
Relieving heartburn: Heartburn and acid reflux are common conditions during pregnancy. It can play havoc with your sleep and everyday comfort. According to medical reports, heartburn affects 22% of women in the first trimester, 39% in the second trimester, and 72% in the third trimester. Some relief can be experienced by taking an antacid, but the underlying problem cannot be treated.
Your osteopath can help repair your esophagus to restore its function. This muscle doesn’t close completely, causing heartburn. The manipulation of the muscles in your esophagus performed by a trained Osteopath can relieve the heartburn and the discomfort.
After you have given birth to your baby, your body needs to be retrained to acclimate to the new conditions. An osteopath pregnant women can assist in this period.
Assistance with back/shoulder pain: Due to breastfeeding and frequently lifting the baby leads to wrong posture, causing back and shoulder pain in most women. Your Osteopath can recommend some alternative therapies, like massage, to help you find relief.
Assistance with breastfeeding: Breastfeeding is an art that needs to be learned. An osteopath can be consulted to learn proper positioning and latch. Moreover, you can follow their recommendations for a diet that assists optimal milk production.
Sum Up
A trained and experienced osteopath can support you during your journey of pregnancy and after. Scheduling regular visits to an osteopathy center near you can help make the pregnancy journey smooth and comfortable.
