I've read that the normal birth process produces a slight "right facial slant" in most people. However, I think the person who wrote this was a chiropractor in a "modern" society where birth is medicalized and most women give birth in an "abnormal" position (lying or reclining on their backs) which limits the ability of the mother's tail…
I've read that the normal birth process produces a slight "right facial slant" in most people. However, I think the person who wrote this was a chiropractor in a "modern" society where birth is medicalized and most women give birth in an "abnormal" position (lying or reclining on their backs) which limits the ability of the mother's tailbone to move back out of the way as baby's head moves past it. So the cross-sectional area of the tightest space a baby's head is squeezed through is reduced by one-third compared to the area when the mother gives birth standing, squatting, or "on all fours."
Another factor? Poor nutrition is utero, in my opinion, can result in cranial bones more vulnerable to mis-shaping by the birth process.
I gave birth at home all 3 times! Never on my back! And yes, most women are in crappy positions giving birth - in hospital. I even know of some people in very recent years who were on their back IN STIRRUPS 'giving birth' in a hospital. Talk about archaic. Who wants to reduce your birth canal by ANYTHING when it's such a tight space to being with?! Maybe if the docs had suggested that these women would need lots and lots of stitches afterwards and sex will never be the same again and they may have bladder issues for life afterwards, well, the women might ask about other birthing positions (like using gravity)?!?! :-D
Of course, that would require the docs to SUPPORT and INFORM the birthing mothers. And they don't want to go empowering women now, do they?! :-\
My first & last kids have some cranial asymmetry, but then again, so do I & my husband to varying degrees. However, I have an anti-clockwise twisted pelvis, but my first & third came out rotating different ways! And in fact they have different cranial asymmetry and opposite twists in their pelvises. My son kind of came out straight (I got the head out, but my midwife had to pull him out after that coz I'd run out of contractions...very long labour...). His cranials are almost perfect - but he's got a twist in his pelvis - opposite to mine (same as his Dad's).
When it comes to cranials (genetics & nutrition aside - and they're big ones), you've also got to consider what position the babies have chosen in utero (mine all picked different positions yet the placenta was always on the right!), length of umbilical cord which may determine how much/little motion is available (supposedly the cord is just whatever length it is, they haven't figured that one out yet!), what direction the baby is facing when it comes out, length of labour - as well as other factors. So I don't think there's a hard and fast rule as to what cranial (or pelvic) asymmetry you're going to get - if any. Looking at my family, genetics seems to be the biggest drawcard as to the structural differences observed (both visually & on X-ray).
But the more I study pregnancy & birth, the more I come to the conclusion that there are SO many factors to consider. I think there's so much we just don't understand. And when you look at all the bad environmental considerations for the last few generations especially (smoking, drinking, obesity, depression, endocrine blockers, polluted air etc) there's almost NO good time to have a kid ha ha! Basically, we're going to screw our kids up in some way. But modern society seems to be particularly good at screwing them up in multiple ways! :-(
Hi Robyn, The more I read you the more awesome you are!
Just to share, One of the most bizarre events for me was listening to two midwives sat in front of my wife's business end discussing which stitches would be the best to use at 3am when she had just given birth. Surreal!
Personally, I was a breach birth and my mother often commented that it was never the same 'down there' which I always thought was a bit too much information.
Your poor mother! But if you turned out OK, then the midwives/docs obviously got your chin tucked down for the ending of your breech birth! A particular woman I know who has given birth to 4 kids (2 breech then 2 headfirst) found the headfirst pressure REALLY weird after the 2 breech births! So I guess it's a bit like horses for courses, eh?! :-D
Thanks for the compliment! I would also like to think I am at least a little bit awesome :-)
Yes, healthcare discussions between professionals. They can be pretty darned weird to an outsider, I agree!!! :-D
Whilst we're on birth stories (a bit off topic), my wife wanted a home birth for No 1. After 17 hours of no progress she taken to hospital. 17 hours later - still stuck and a senior doc came in and said this baby needs to come out now. Five minutes later he was out - then they almost cooked him in the incubator whilst concentrating on my wife who was rushed to theatre - leaving me alone in what looked like a butcher's shop, holding the baby... As I said to her, at least she got a bed! I had to sit in a chair all night!
Then two days later he was rushed back in - unresponsive: her milk hadn't come in. He's 25 now and has been no bother since.
What a crazy start to life! So glad he's been no bother since that opening scene!! Sounds like all 3 of you had a rough time :-(
And I'm sorry your wife didn't get the home birth she wanted then. I hope she got it another time?
Anyway...since you told me yours, I'll tell you mine :-)
I had a 40-hour labour from the waters breaking to birthing the placenta for my first. 24 hours of NO cervix dilation. Like a hospital would be fine with that. Ha! Then when everything was moving along, I had 4 hours in stage 2 labour with NO urge to push. Cervix was completely open and I could literally feel her head that whole time. Like a hospital would be fine with that either! Ha! BUT bub was fine. Heartbeat was good. Turns out there was a rather short cord and we had to wait until her highly-placed placenta detached from my uterine wall before she wanted to come out...and then she birthed herself, corkscrew-style! A bit of blood, too, but it was just from her placenta naturally detaching. I was fine. She was fine. She showed more patience in her birth than she's ever shown in life thus far ha ha! I can but hope she'll re-learn that virtue!
But imagine if I was in hospital and they'd used forceps and yanked her out at any point. Eeesh.
Second birth was 34 hours from beginning to end. Again, 24 hours with NO cervix dilation. In hospital I believe that would be 2x C-sections by now, right?! Anyway, the contractions ramped up something crazy (perhaps I shouldn't have have pressed so hard on all those acupressure points for labour whilst I had a closed cervix?!) and by the time he came, I was in the birthing pool, exhausted. My son had an even shorter cord than his older sister (WTF!) but at least his placenta was down low, not up high! He tried for an early exit 10 mins before I birthed him and all he succeeding in doing was strangling himself, scaring the shit out himself, literally, inside me (eeew), and partially detaching the placenta. So of course lots of blood again (I was dizzy on & off for 3 months after having him, think I might've been borderline for needing a blood transfusion!?) and I managed to birth his head before I ran out of contractions. So my midwife had to pull him out (nothing to it, he was right there ready to come out!). And then it turns out because of the cord issue, my son is borderline cerebral palsy - but you wouldn't know it now. We've done so much work and he's really good! He needed a manual adjustment a day after birth to his T4 vertebra - and then he lifted his (seemingly dead) left arm right after that which was super cool to see. I love the power of the Adjustment. He really banged himself up trying for his fast exit. Just as well his Mummy is a handy Chiropractor and also knows what to do, even under massive stress.
So no, not an 'ideal' birth - but for me, it sure beat having a C-section.
3rd birth was quick as, easy as pie, 4 hours from first contraction to birthing the placenta - and I had to wait 1 & 1/2 hours for that! So a 2 & 1/2 hour labour. Amazing what happens to your body when you quit gluten & dairy and stop poisoning yourself before you even get pregnant! :-D
Birthing stories, eh? They can be so wild!!! So glad I had my 3rd and got to experience a somewhat 'textbook' labour/birth! I think 40 hours down to 4 hours was a pretty good record ha ha!
Hopefully your wife had less crazy births for any subsequent children?! But....how did the other kids turn out? Nuts or nice?! :-D
I've read that the normal birth process produces a slight "right facial slant" in most people. However, I think the person who wrote this was a chiropractor in a "modern" society where birth is medicalized and most women give birth in an "abnormal" position (lying or reclining on their backs) which limits the ability of the mother's tailbone to move back out of the way as baby's head moves past it. So the cross-sectional area of the tightest space a baby's head is squeezed through is reduced by one-third compared to the area when the mother gives birth standing, squatting, or "on all fours."
Another factor? Poor nutrition is utero, in my opinion, can result in cranial bones more vulnerable to mis-shaping by the birth process.
I gave birth at home all 3 times! Never on my back! And yes, most women are in crappy positions giving birth - in hospital. I even know of some people in very recent years who were on their back IN STIRRUPS 'giving birth' in a hospital. Talk about archaic. Who wants to reduce your birth canal by ANYTHING when it's such a tight space to being with?! Maybe if the docs had suggested that these women would need lots and lots of stitches afterwards and sex will never be the same again and they may have bladder issues for life afterwards, well, the women might ask about other birthing positions (like using gravity)?!?! :-D
Of course, that would require the docs to SUPPORT and INFORM the birthing mothers. And they don't want to go empowering women now, do they?! :-\
My first & last kids have some cranial asymmetry, but then again, so do I & my husband to varying degrees. However, I have an anti-clockwise twisted pelvis, but my first & third came out rotating different ways! And in fact they have different cranial asymmetry and opposite twists in their pelvises. My son kind of came out straight (I got the head out, but my midwife had to pull him out after that coz I'd run out of contractions...very long labour...). His cranials are almost perfect - but he's got a twist in his pelvis - opposite to mine (same as his Dad's).
When it comes to cranials (genetics & nutrition aside - and they're big ones), you've also got to consider what position the babies have chosen in utero (mine all picked different positions yet the placenta was always on the right!), length of umbilical cord which may determine how much/little motion is available (supposedly the cord is just whatever length it is, they haven't figured that one out yet!), what direction the baby is facing when it comes out, length of labour - as well as other factors. So I don't think there's a hard and fast rule as to what cranial (or pelvic) asymmetry you're going to get - if any. Looking at my family, genetics seems to be the biggest drawcard as to the structural differences observed (both visually & on X-ray).
But the more I study pregnancy & birth, the more I come to the conclusion that there are SO many factors to consider. I think there's so much we just don't understand. And when you look at all the bad environmental considerations for the last few generations especially (smoking, drinking, obesity, depression, endocrine blockers, polluted air etc) there's almost NO good time to have a kid ha ha! Basically, we're going to screw our kids up in some way. But modern society seems to be particularly good at screwing them up in multiple ways! :-(
Hi Robyn, The more I read you the more awesome you are!
Just to share, One of the most bizarre events for me was listening to two midwives sat in front of my wife's business end discussing which stitches would be the best to use at 3am when she had just given birth. Surreal!
Personally, I was a breach birth and my mother often commented that it was never the same 'down there' which I always thought was a bit too much information.
Your poor mother! But if you turned out OK, then the midwives/docs obviously got your chin tucked down for the ending of your breech birth! A particular woman I know who has given birth to 4 kids (2 breech then 2 headfirst) found the headfirst pressure REALLY weird after the 2 breech births! So I guess it's a bit like horses for courses, eh?! :-D
Thanks for the compliment! I would also like to think I am at least a little bit awesome :-)
Yes, healthcare discussions between professionals. They can be pretty darned weird to an outsider, I agree!!! :-D
Whilst we're on birth stories (a bit off topic), my wife wanted a home birth for No 1. After 17 hours of no progress she taken to hospital. 17 hours later - still stuck and a senior doc came in and said this baby needs to come out now. Five minutes later he was out - then they almost cooked him in the incubator whilst concentrating on my wife who was rushed to theatre - leaving me alone in what looked like a butcher's shop, holding the baby... As I said to her, at least she got a bed! I had to sit in a chair all night!
Then two days later he was rushed back in - unresponsive: her milk hadn't come in. He's 25 now and has been no bother since.
What a crazy start to life! So glad he's been no bother since that opening scene!! Sounds like all 3 of you had a rough time :-(
And I'm sorry your wife didn't get the home birth she wanted then. I hope she got it another time?
Anyway...since you told me yours, I'll tell you mine :-)
I had a 40-hour labour from the waters breaking to birthing the placenta for my first. 24 hours of NO cervix dilation. Like a hospital would be fine with that. Ha! Then when everything was moving along, I had 4 hours in stage 2 labour with NO urge to push. Cervix was completely open and I could literally feel her head that whole time. Like a hospital would be fine with that either! Ha! BUT bub was fine. Heartbeat was good. Turns out there was a rather short cord and we had to wait until her highly-placed placenta detached from my uterine wall before she wanted to come out...and then she birthed herself, corkscrew-style! A bit of blood, too, but it was just from her placenta naturally detaching. I was fine. She was fine. She showed more patience in her birth than she's ever shown in life thus far ha ha! I can but hope she'll re-learn that virtue!
But imagine if I was in hospital and they'd used forceps and yanked her out at any point. Eeesh.
Second birth was 34 hours from beginning to end. Again, 24 hours with NO cervix dilation. In hospital I believe that would be 2x C-sections by now, right?! Anyway, the contractions ramped up something crazy (perhaps I shouldn't have have pressed so hard on all those acupressure points for labour whilst I had a closed cervix?!) and by the time he came, I was in the birthing pool, exhausted. My son had an even shorter cord than his older sister (WTF!) but at least his placenta was down low, not up high! He tried for an early exit 10 mins before I birthed him and all he succeeding in doing was strangling himself, scaring the shit out himself, literally, inside me (eeew), and partially detaching the placenta. So of course lots of blood again (I was dizzy on & off for 3 months after having him, think I might've been borderline for needing a blood transfusion!?) and I managed to birth his head before I ran out of contractions. So my midwife had to pull him out (nothing to it, he was right there ready to come out!). And then it turns out because of the cord issue, my son is borderline cerebral palsy - but you wouldn't know it now. We've done so much work and he's really good! He needed a manual adjustment a day after birth to his T4 vertebra - and then he lifted his (seemingly dead) left arm right after that which was super cool to see. I love the power of the Adjustment. He really banged himself up trying for his fast exit. Just as well his Mummy is a handy Chiropractor and also knows what to do, even under massive stress.
So no, not an 'ideal' birth - but for me, it sure beat having a C-section.
3rd birth was quick as, easy as pie, 4 hours from first contraction to birthing the placenta - and I had to wait 1 & 1/2 hours for that! So a 2 & 1/2 hour labour. Amazing what happens to your body when you quit gluten & dairy and stop poisoning yourself before you even get pregnant! :-D
Birthing stories, eh? They can be so wild!!! So glad I had my 3rd and got to experience a somewhat 'textbook' labour/birth! I think 40 hours down to 4 hours was a pretty good record ha ha!
Hopefully your wife had less crazy births for any subsequent children?! But....how did the other kids turn out? Nuts or nice?! :-D