Massage is a necessity for the overall health of your body.
Pregnancy
Pregnancy effects your body in a multitude of ways. Below are just some of the ways massage can help you adjust to your new changes and feel great:
Bodywork during pregnancy helps:
- Reduce stress, promote relaxation, facilitate transitions through emotional support and physical nurturing
- Reduce edema and blood pressure, relieve varicose veins, and increase blood and lymph circulation
- Relieve stress on weight-bearing joints (ankles, low back, pelvis)
Labor Support
Benefits of Professional Labor Support include:
- Length of labor reduced by 25%
- Oxytocin (Pitocin) use reduced by 40%
- Use of narcotics reduced by 30%
- Forceps reduced by 30%
- Epidurals reduced by 60%
Post Partum
Postpartum Massage helps:
- Improve breastfeeding
- Reduce musculoskeletal tension and pain
- Increase time spent with baby
- Decrease postpartum depression
- Promote recovery from cesarean birth, including healing of the incision
- Contribute to rehabilitation of abdominal skin, muscles and organs
- Facilitate postpartum emotional, physiological, and family adjustments
- Promote structural realignment of the spine and pelvis, and reorganization of movement
Studies
Recent medical journals have published positive results from massage therapy during pregnancy. The results tell it all:
- Reduced anxiety and improved mood
- Better sleep
- Less back pain
- Reduced norepinephrine levels (stress hormones)
- Fewer complications in labor
In addition, one of the most exciting findings shows that women massaged during pregnancy had babies with fewer postnatal complications and a lower rate of prematurity. Scientific fact behind what your intuition already new: a healthy mom who takes care of herself is better equipped to care for a child, even in utero.
