Natural Ways to Induce Labor – Maternity Acupressure

By the time your pregnancy is full term, you might consider natural ways to induce labor. Waiting for your labor and delivery to start can make you feel anxious. However, once you are “past due”, not only the wait can make you anxious, but also you OB-GYN, if he or she starts to talk about inducing labor at the hospital.

If you are past due and want to avoid being medically induced, you probably are eager to try any of the natural ways to start labor. Yet, no matter how impatient or desperate you may be, it is important not to just rush out and try anything. Sometimes, well meaning people may give false advice and you may wind up trying something that is potentially harmful when all you wanted to do was start labor naturally. A great example of this is natural herbs, either in tablet or a tincture form. Many people suggest taking herbs for self inducing labor, however without knowing the risks or the exact amount to take. Taking herbs in an attempt to induce labor but without good knowledge of what you are doing may cause more harm than good.

Therefore, when it comes to considering whether you should induce your labor naturally or choose pharmaceuticals, such as Pitocin it’s your advantage to educate your self. There are some rare pre-existing medical conditions that could require medical induction in a highly controlled environment. It’s, however, important to carefully consider the potential risks, as compared to the benefits, that phramaceutical labor induction may have to the mother or the baby. There are many natural remedies for encouraging the labor to start naturally and they could help you to avoid the medical labor induction.

First, you should realize that many natural labor inducing remedies are effective, when used appropriately. Therefore, they should never be used unless you want to avoid medical labor induction, and should not be attempted without the approval from your midwife or obstetrician. Secondly, some natural labor inducing remedies may not be as safe as commonly thought. In fact, just because a medicine or remedy is “all natural” doesn’t mean that it is without harm, risk, or side effects.
Shortly, natural doesn’t always mean safe. However, some techniques, such as maternity acupressure, have actually been proven to be safe by modern science and have no side effects.

When you are past 40 weeks pregnant and might need to induce labor, some natural ways to induce labor have far less risks when compared to drugs like Pitocin. Safe natural labor inducing methods include maternity acupressure, walking (when are in condition that you can walk), sexual intercourse (when your membranes have not ruptured), and gentle breast stimulation. These methods help to start labor through different mechanisms.

Maternity acupressure might be the most studied method regarding how effective and safe it is. A vast number of midwives and doulas use acupressure for labor because of its benefits and also because it has been proven to be safe for the mother and the baby.

Maternity acupressure has helped great numbers of other pregnant women wanting to naturally induce labor to naturally bring on their labor.
Read more about the maternity acupressure guide.