Water is known as the midwives’ epidural due to the pain relief benefits! If you are wanting an unmedicated birth but need some extra support, try laboring in a shower or tub! Each option has different benefits and individual preferences–Roxanne and I each preferred a different option at different points in our labors!
In this blog, we will break down what your two main options are with hydrotherapy, some helpful tips, and share our personal experiences laboring with water!
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Hydrotherapy: Shower and Tub
Water has incredible benefits for labor pain relief! You can either use a shower or a tub to utilize hydrotherapy in your labor. I preferred the shower during my labors, while Roxanne preferred the tub.
Depending on your birth location, you may have limitations on what is available. Some birth suites do not have a tub, so understanding what is available at your birth location before birth can help you better plan for your labor comfort measures. We include a labor comfort plan in our childbirth education course so you can better prepare for your labor comfort measures in birth!
Tips for Laboring in the Shower
I preferred to labor in the shower during my births! I found the running water and being able to bear weight in my legs to move most beneficial for my pain relief. I personally found that being in a tub create a sense of floating away and I felt very out of control with my contractions, so being able to stand on my feet in the shower was helpful for me!
When laboring in the shower, you can be in all sorts of positions: standing, facing toward or away from the water, all fours, half kneeling, and so on! You can even bring the birth ball into the shower to sit on if you prefer to have a comfortable seat, but some showers will have a seat installed for you to sit on, as well.
You can either attach the water hose to the wall, and have it run directly onto your belly or back, or your partner can navigate the hose to run on your back or belly. The key with the shower is that you can MOVE and the running water on your body helps to release endorphins!
Bonus tip: have your partner pack swimsuit or clothes they don’t mind getting wet so they can join you in the shower as you labor! Your partner could also take off their clothes, but it may make the labor team uncomfortable to find the non-patient naked in the shower without warning.
Tips for Laboring in the Birth Pool or Tub
The next hydrotherapy option is to take a bath or use the tub. Being able to submerge yourself into a tub creates a sense of weightlessness that can help with labor pain!
Roxanne found that being able to put her belly into the water helped tremendously with her labor pain, so a deep tub or birth pool can be more helpful than a more shallow tub.
If your tub is shallow, or you prefer the feeling of running water, your partner can pour water on your belly or back during contractions! This is a common thing that I will do at births as a doula to increase the effectiveness of the birth tub for labor pain!
With the birth tub, you need to monitor the temperature of the pool to ensure that it stays warm enough–after some time it will start to cool off, so you may need to refill it by adding more hot water, use an external water heater, or switch to the shower that you can control the water temperature quicker. Once the water loses its heat, it starts to lose its pain relief properties, so keeping the water hot is important. If you are going in and out of the birth pool, you can also use a cover on your tub to keep the warmth in the pool!
But what if it is too hot? How can you tell? If you are sweating, the water is probably too hot! You can also use a thermometer to assess the water temperature with your birth team!
Childbirth is NOT the most painful experience of your life!
Childbirth is not the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced in my life–not even close–but it is not exactly painless either! It is purposeful pain–you can anticipate it, it is intermittent (aka you get breaks), and it is necessary pain–but this doesn’t mean you don’t need some support from your team!
In our childbirth education course, we break down various comfort measures (and give tips for your birth partner to know when to offer different options) so you can find relief from your labor pain!
The shower and tub are two amazing labor comfort measures that you can utilize easily during your own birth!
Prepare for Your Birth
There is so much involved with preparing for your birth! And so much information out there to weed through to figure out what best suites your individual needs as a family. You have one resource telling you epidurals are evil–and others telling you that you just need to do what your doctor tells you.
But what about your preference as an individual?? Your unique experience is important! We would love to support you with our childbirth education course as you navigate your individual pregnancy and birth preferences by educating you on your options, when you may want to opt in for certain interventions and when you may want to choose another option–so you can feel confident to choose the best option for YOU.
If you are feeling confused on how to navigate fitness throughout your pregnancy–because again this is another area where there is a lot of contradictory information–we got you with our prenatal fitness programs! We have trained exclusively in-person prenatal clients at our gym located in Aberdeen, North Carolina, plus thousands of online prenatal clients. You can trust our expertise with our programming to support a strong and comfortable, as you intentionally prepare for birth!