Maria Aviles: During pregnancy, your body is in a constant state of change. That can mean pain and discomfort. Here are some natural pain-management ideas that can offer welcomed relief.
Nurse Patty Yelton: For pain management, we like to recommend that there are several methods that they can take. First of all, we try and stress that minor aches and pains in pregnancy is perfectly normal and not to panic. Sometimes we get mothers and new mothers that come in and say, "Oh, my God, I had a pain in my hip bone or in my pelvic area. What could that be? Is there something wrong with my baby?" First of all, there is generally nothing wrong with the baby.
Dr. Stephen B. Polstein: Well, the great thing about treating pregnant women is, we already know what the condition is, and then we just got to make it comfortable for you.
Renee Dracakis: What brought me to the practice was during my pregnancy, I had pretty much sailed through with no ailments and had done very well up into the eighth month. Within the last week, I started having this severe lower back pain. I really had no apprehension about coming to a chiropractic medical therapy.
Dr. Stephen B. Polstein: Pressing the pelvis together, kind of gluing it together.
Renee Dracakis: He did help me tremendously with some manipulation. He explained what my ailment was.
Nurse Patty Yelton: Usually they can do some visualization. Some nice, warm baths help. Some stretching exercises, a lot of times in early pregnancy, they have something that's called round ligament pain. It's in their pelvic area, but it's just the ligaments that are trying to stretch out as the uterus grows to accommodate the growth of the baby.
Nurse Debbie Levy: You can also take a whirlpool. The problem with whirlpools is not the action of the jets but the temperature. As long as you take a bath at a normal temperature, it's perfectly safe during pregnancy. Heating pads work really well. A very simple and inexpensive way to make a heating pad is to take a tea towel or a dish towel, rinse it, wring it out till it's almost dry, put it in a gallon Ziploc bag and put it in the microwave for two minutes. It makes an excellent heating pad.
Renee Dracakis: Oh, baby, you're the best.
Nurse Debbie Levy: Another thing is just to get your husband or significant other to rub your back or massage your legs. Sit down and stretch and those things usually work very well.
Nurse Lana Wertz: Massage, massage therapy is excellent. Heat, ice; those are some ways, stretching, exercise, yoga.
Laura Alexander: Being pregnant is such a life-altering time period in a woman's life. Yoga, it feels good in our bodies. When we're pregnant or have children or have jobs and relationships, this is simply a time to just tune into what your own body is doing, to be calm, to be still, to breathe, to stretch, to feel good. And that's always something you want to do more of in life.
Erin Williams: Probably during pregnancy, I really tried to reserve specific times for to prepare for relaxation. When I was having those times of anxiety or having times where-- and just pain in my back, then I would try to do yoga.
Julianna Thomas: During labor, being able to focus, because it's very hard to sort of get everything that's around you out and really focus in. And I think using the sound and some of the relaxation techniques that we learned really helped me during labor.
Laura Alexander: One of the very yoga ways to approach labor is to approach this as one contraction at a time. Women can only do something about the contraction they're experiencing.
I would absolutely recommend yoga to other moms-to-be.
Nurse Patty Yelton: There are a lot of new studies out that shows that acupuncture can be one way to relieve some stress and pain. We have some acupuncturists here in the areas that are starting to work more with women that are pregnant.
Dr. Warren Cargal: Chinese medicine has been around for approximately 2,500 years. And Chinese medicine is essentially about balancing the body's energies. Well, pain can either be tendomuscular pain or it can be more organic, organically derived. So in our practice, we see a lot of pregnant women, and it's not unusual that it's more tendomuscular pain, pelvic pain, low back pain, swelling, edema, muscular pain in the arms and things like that. And so that's treated fairly specifically. By that I mean it's treated, specific to where the pain is, is how we manage that.
Nurse Patty Yelton: Get out to do some moderate exercise. Walk, swim, just to get moving because when you sit down too long, you're going to have a few aches and pains.
Angie Haddad: It helps the joints and muscles that you use every day and are stressed by pregnancy. It's a wonderful thing if you have triple sleepy -- I have a lot of participants say, "This class helps me to sleep." And that could be a big problem when you're pregnant. Just the buoyancy of water -- you've been achy all day. Your back hurts. You get in the pool and all of a sudden, it's almost like magic. It just kind of escapes you. It's a nice release.
Rocio Marquez: Think about it. It's all pregnant women, just swimming. We all talk about the same things, "What are you going to name the baby?" and "What are you feeling?" or "How many weeks are you? Is it a boy? Is it a girl?"
Tracy Prator: I get to talk to other girls that are going through the same thing. And there are some of us that this is our second, and some of us, this is our first. So I feel good trying to -- and like sharing my experience with my first one. And I think sometimes new moms are nervous about, what's going to happen and maybe talking to other people that have already been through it makes it a little bit easier. They know what things to expect.
Female Speaker1: Come to swimming. Get into the water. You lose that weight. You release all the stress.
Female Speaker2: You can really relax, feel good, and you get that socialization you don't always get in a regular aerobics class. That's a real benefit.
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