Healthy Birth Practice # 6

"Keep Mother and Baby Together: It's Best for Mother, Baby and Breastfeeding."

Throughout most of human history, mothers and babies have stayed together from the moment of birth. When a newborn is placed skin- to – skin not only is this the first time a mother and her newborn can meet and bond, but it’s helps the natural progression of breastfeeding and hormonal release.

The familiar sounds, smells, and tastes, and the perfect warmth of your skin helps your baby know they are safe and sound.

Experts now recommend that right after birth, a healthy newborn should be placed skin-to-skin on the mother’s abdomen or chest and should be dried and covered with warm blankets. Any care that needs to be done immediately after birth can be done with your baby skin-to-skin on your chest.

With Skin to skin, your baby more easily transitions to breathing, stays at just the right temperature, and learns instinctively how to nurse. In fact, scientists have discovered that unmediated babies who are held skin to skin and undisturbed in the hour after birth need no help at all to start nursing. They scoot and crawl up the mother’s belly, find the nipple by sight and smell, and latch on all on their own!

The more time spent with skin-to-skin contact in the first days after birth, the stronger the benefits. One amazing benefit is a greater mother-baby attachment. Women who hold their babies skin to skin after birth care for their babies with more confidence and recognize and respond to their babies’ needs sooner.

Research studies have compared babies who have skin-to-skin contact in the hours after birth with babies placed in a bassinet or wrapped in blankets. The studies found that babies held skin to skin do better in many ways.

Benefits for Babies Held Skin to Skin after Birth:
• They have more stable temperatures.
• They cry less.
• They have more stable blood sugar.
• They breastfeed sooner, longer, and more easily.
• They have lower levels of stress hormones.
• They are exposed to the normal bacteria on the mother’s skin, which may protect them from becoming sick due to harmful germs.

Keeping your baby close makes the early hours and days of birth safer and healthier for you and your baby. After 9 months of growing and nurturing your baby, keep them near – hold them close, gaze upon them and soak in every moment of them.

Healthy Birth Practice #3

Bring a loved one, Friend or Doula for Continuous Support.

As humans, we are social beings. We like to be surrounded by people we know and trust, who care for us and encourage us.

Women benefit from good support in labor.

Research confirms that the better the support women receive, the easier their labour is and the more satisfied they will be with their birth experience.

One of the best ways to get quality continuous support is by hiring a doula. A doula is a woman who provides support during labour. They provide informational, physical, and emotional support.

Good labor support is not watching the clock and playing on their phone or watching TV. It is making sure you are not disturbed, respecting the time that labour takes, and reminding you that you know how to birth your baby. Your helpers should spin a cocoon around you while you are in labour—create a space where you feel safe and secure and can do the hard work of labor without worry

Healthy Birth Practices # 2

Walk, Move Around and Change Positions Throughout Labour.

Movement in labour serves two very important purposes. First, it helps you cope with you increasingly strong and powerful contractions, Second, it helps wiggle your baby into your pelvis and through the birth canal.

When allowed to move freely during labour, women instinctively respond to their powerful contractions. Walking, swaying, squatting, rocking, rubbing and changing positions during labour. 

Research supports that movement may help shorten labour, can provide effective pain relief and can decrease the likelihood of having a cesarean (Storton.S (2007) "the coalition for improving maternity services")

Healthy Birth Practices # 1

Let labour Begin On It's Own.

Last week I introduced you all to The Lamaze 6 Healthy Birth Practices, each and everyone is important in the role of Labour and Birth and can help improve outcomes for mother and baby.

For many women, the last days and weeks of pregnancy can be very uncomfortable and emotionally difficult. We are anxious to meet our babies and hold them in our arms. Aches and pains may become more bothersome. Sometimes, minor problems or worries arise,and mothers may feel pressure to induce their labour—even when it would be safer to wait.

Letting your body go into labour spontaneously is almost always the best way to know that your baby is ready to be born and that your body is ready for labour. In the vast majority of pregnancies, labour will start only when all the players—your baby, your uterus, your hormones, and your placenta—are ready. Naturally, labour usually goes better and mother and baby usually end up healthier when all systems are go for birth. Every day of the last weeks of pregnancy is vital to your baby's and body's preparation for birth.

If your labour is induced (started artificially), it becomes a medical event and proceeds quite differently from spontaneous labour.
It’s important to remember that induction is forcing labour to begin before the baby and mother’s body are ready.

Let Labour Start on Its Own - Here's How:

• Know that your "due" date is not an expiration date. Only about 5 percent of moms give birth on their due date. Instead of a day, think of it as your due "month."
• Take a childbirth education class such as Birthability's, Learn how to have a safe, normal and healthy labour, learn about induction and informed decision making.
• If your care provider suggests an induction, ask questions. Is it an emergency? What's the risk in waiting? What are the alternatives?
• Hire a doula who can provide resources and information on labour and local care providers and birthplaces.
• Remind yourself that every day your baby is still on the inside is one more day she needs to grow and develop. 
• If you end up needing an induction, learn how you can keep your labour as normal and healthy as possible.

The Lamaze Healthy Birth Practices

The Lamaze Healthy Birth Practices

The Lamaze 6 Healthy Birth Practices, have you heard of them?

Years ago Lamaze became widely known as a ‘method’ for birth, teaching a breathing and coping style that came to be known by its name.

Lamaze today is a ‘philosophy’ of birth, founded on 6 Healthy Birth Practices that are designed to encourage women to trust their bodies, reduce fear, and have a healthy and safe birth for mother and baby.

The Lamaze Healthy Birth Practices are the foundation of Lamaze. These Birth Practices are designed based on years of research to help simplify the birth process with an informed approach that helps alleviate fears and manage pain. Regardless of baby’s size, your labor’s length and complexity, or your confidence level, these care practices will help keep labor and your baby's birth as safe and healthy as possible.