Giving birth: Techniques for birth - Pushing

You can do much to help your partner during birth. Let her push in the way that feels most effective for her. Remind her to relax. Encourage rest between contractions. Don't pull back too far on her legs. Tell her when you see baby's head. Ready camera. Wait to start pushing until you feel the urge to push or until your health care provider asks you to try to push. Sometimes your body will rest after your cervix is fully dilated and before trying to push your baby out. This resting phase may last several minutes to an hour. It is usually all right to wait.

If you need to start pushing before you have an urge to do so, try squatting or kneeling. This will widen the pelvic outlet and add gravity and pressure. As the second stage of labor progresses, your urge to push will probably get stronger.

Some women don't feel an overwhelming urge to push (medicines can sometimes inhibit or mask this, too). Your nurse or health care provider may tell you when a contraction is coming and instruct you when to push. Many women have the urge to push as a feeling of "bearing down" or a feeling like having a bowel movement.

To get used to the feeling of how to push, think of directing your pushing toward pressure on your perineum. Ask your nurse or health care provider to hold a warm washcloth on your perineum or place two fingers in your vagina and press toward your rectum. That can help you "aim" your pushing.

Your nurses and health care provider will suggest positions and ways you can adjust the bed and pillows to make yourself more comfortable and to make your pushing most effective.

Try tilting the bed slightly downward and using pillows behind your back.
Try holding your legs apart yourself or pulling back on them when you push.
See Positions during labor and birth.

Tips for pushing

Relax your perineum
This will reduce the chance of tearing and the need for an episiotomy. Warm compresses and gentle perineal massage may increase your comfort and help stretch your perineum.

Relax your mouth -- this helps your pelvic floor relax. When you clench your jaw, your perineum automatically tenses, too. Try it - you'll see.

Push down, out and away
Straining makes your face red, your eyes bloodshot, and your neck muscles taut -- these signs indicate that you are directing your pushing toward your face. This is hard on your body and is not an effective way to push.

Use your abdominal muscles to push DOWN, OUT and AWAY. While you do this, relax your pelvic floor, the way you do when you are trying to urinate faster.

Make some noise!
This is hard, physical work. You don't have to do it quietly. Grunt, moan, yell, make I'm-working-hard-to-get-this-baby-born noises.

Screaming or shouting, however, will not help your pushing efforts. Instead, try to make low, deep sounds that might help "aim" your pushing efforts effectively.

Lift and hold your legs, but use care
It is often helpful during birth to lift and hold your legs back while you push. However, certain medicines used during labor and birth can lessen your awareness of how far you are stretching your legs and make it possible for you to damage your muscles.

Don't pull your legs further back than you can when you are not medicated. Ask your nurse for guidance.

Your labor companion can help
Pushing is hard, physical work, and it's helpful to hear encouraging words from someone who believes you can do it. Let your labor companion know the kind of words and actions that encourage you. Your labor companion can also help physically support you in the various pushing positions you try.

How your baby is born


Cervix thins and dilates during labor. As your baby moves through your pelvis, her head usually rotates to face down.		As your uterus pushes your baby through your pelvis, her head begins to show, or "crown."		Most of your baby's head is born. As her shoulders move through your pelvis, she begins to rotate again.		Your baby's head and shoulders are born, and the rest of her body slips out.