I am so glad to see information on pushing and when to do so
in your journal. With the birth of my first child I did not
know better and was told to push since I was "at a 10." My
baby and I were definitely not ready. The results were a
very oxygen deprived baby (the L&D nurse also coached me to
hold my breath and push to a count of 10 and beyond). I also
broke blood vessels all the way down past my waist, both
eyes were black and swollen shut, and I also broke all the
blood vessels in my eyes (I had no whites at all for over a
month). It also did long term damage to my pelvic floor and
gave me problems with incontinence for two years, even with
faithful kegel exercises. All this could have been avoided
by waiting until I had the urge to push. I never did
experience the urge to push even as my son came out!
The second time around, I was a Bradley Natural Childbirth
instructor and I knew better. My midwife never did do a vag
exam and I pushed only after the urge hit and worked with my
body--no long pushes or breath holding. There were no
bruises on me or my baby this time and I had a rather easy
pushing stage. This was so much better!
-Anna Matsunaga
Tacoma WA
Reprinted from Midwifery Today E-News (Vol 2 Issue 25 June 21, 2000)
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