Prenatal/Perinatal Bodywork
Spinning Babies® Aware Practitioner
Prepare Your Body For An Easier Birth
As a Spinning Babies® Aware Practitioner, I am equipped with the knowledge and skills to help you take a proactive physiologic approach to preparing your body for birth in order to make birth easier for you and your baby with prenatal/perinatal bodywork. Spinning Babies® techniques can help to create balance in the pelvis and encourage your baby into an optimal position for birth.
Breech Birth Options
Depending on your unique situation, you may not have to have a cesarean birth just because your baby is breech. If certain criteria are met, you may be able to birth your baby vaginally with me as your midwife. I am not an expert in breech birth, but I have some experience, and am have also completed Breech Without Borders training. I believe that breech birth skills should be kept alive, as they are quite limited in many hospitals.
As well as the option to deliver vaginally, you may be able to turn your breech baby to a head-down position using Spinning Babies® techniques.
Abdominal Therapy
A More Comfortable And Balanced Pregnancy
Abdominal Therapy (AKA Arvigo® Therapy) supports the physical changes experienced by women during pregnancy. As the baby and uterus grow, additional strain is put on the uterine and pelvic ligaments and pelvic floor muscles. With regular massage, the uterus stays well-positioned, receives good blood supply, and grows strong and resilient.
Abdominal Therapy normalizes pelvic alignment allowing the uterus to guide itself to optimal positioning in the pelvis. Digestion and respiration during pregnancy are also improved with this prenatal bodywork.
Abdominal Therapy practitioners around the world have repeatedly found that their clients experience significantly shorter and easier labors. Midwifery-based practices that have integrated Abdominal Therapy into their care have reported positive differences in birth outcomes as evidenced by more efficient contractions and shorter labors.
It is advisable to begin working with your Abdominal Therapy practitioner as soon as possible to provide you and your baby with the maximum benefits these sessions can offer you. Ideally you would schedule six to nine prenatal sessions and a six week postpartum session as well.
Origins Of Abdominal Therapy
The Arvigo® Techniques of Abdominal Therapy as taught by Dr. Rosita Arvigo, DN, are the legacy of an unbroken chain of knowledge handed down from generation to generation of midwives and traditional healers in Central America. This therapy is founded on an ancient Maya technique of abdominal therapy that helps guide internal abdominal organs into their proper position so that organ functions are supported and enhanced. It is an external, gentle and non-invasive massage to the abdomen and lower back.
Abdominal Therapy benefits women throughout the child-bearing year by enhancing fertility and conception, supporting structural changes and alleviating discomfort, providing optimal birth position for baby thereby easing labor, birth and postpartum recovery.
At your initial session, you will be taught SELF-CARE MASSAGE which adds to the therapeutic benefits of your session when you perform it at home. Pregnant moms report enhanced wellness benefits when they do their self-care massage regularly.
Wellness Benefits Of Abdominal Therapy At-A-Glance By Body System
Reproductive
- Strengthens uterine ligaments
- Decreases ligament discomfort
- Enhances optimal functional alignment of all reproductive organs
- Supports optimal fetal alignment
Musculoskeletal
- Decreasese chronic muscle tension, restores balance to overstretched muscles and ligaments
- Improves pelvic alignment, addressing sciatic and pelvic pain
- Improves sacrum mobility and alignment to facilitate an efficient birth
Circulatory
- Improves blood flow to mother and baby
- Improves blood flow to pelvic floor muscles
- Improves lymphatic circulation and decreases incidence of edema (swelling).
Respiratory
- Releases tension in ribcage and diaphragm, making it easier to breathe more deeply
- Reduces rib pain
Nervous
- Increases oxytocin, suppressing tension and anxiety and cultivating confidence for mother and her love for her baby
- Supports emotional healing of past traumas
Digestive
- Helps with digestion, reducing nausea and heartburn
- Improves absorption of nutrients.
- Improves elimination
Empty Arms, Empty Womb
I offer a complimentary Abdominal Therapy session to any woman who has lost a baby within 6 weeks of the loss.
