BIOMECHANICS FOR BIRTH

So, I attended this full day workshop at the weekend called ’The biomechanics of Birth’ and WOW what an eye-opener!

The first question was "How can one woman give birth to a baby in a ‘back to back’ position completely comfortably while another woman is experiencing great suffering during the very early stages of labour, with a baby that seems to be in more of an optimal position?”

There are many factors to take into account here from the Mother’s medical history, to occupation, hobbies, and recent or not so recent accidents and/or fractures. It is not always about the positioning of the baby, but can actually come down to the alignment of the Mothers pelvis.

There are gentle and effective manoeuvres that can be used as solutions to an uncomfortable, prolonged labour, called labour dystocia, before medical interventions are even considered.

What I discovered this weekend is that an in-depth greater understanding of the pelvis in all of it’s magnificent, yet complex glory is not actually taught in student midwifery!

The workshop was taught by Molly O’Brien who has been a midwife for over 20 years, and her skills of being able to bring comfort to a mother suffering with labour dystocia has almost been seen as some kind of magic or witchcraft (which it is not!)

She is sharing her incredible biomechanics for birth methods with many, many birth workers just like me, to increase their knowledge, teach these valuable techniques within our antenatal classes and even support mothers physically, if we are a Doula or Midwife.

This is by far the most amazing workshop I have ever participated in. I cannot wait to get started.