Head's Down, Thumbs Up! On My Way To Home Birth

That was what my first grade teacher would call out before we played Seven Up, which was my favorite game at that big-kid school. (Well, not the homebirth part).

This time, I mean something entirely different......THE BABY TURNED! HER HEAD IS DOWN!!!
Thumbs up, as in, "fantastic." Head's down, as in: her head is down. Capish?

I am so excited that she's finally decided to go along with the program.

While she was turned the wrong way, I did some research and found http://www.spinningbabies.com/. It was very helpful and gave me lots of information as well as recommending the exercises/positions I tried, like the inversion I showed as a video example in one of the last posts. Some of the information on baby position I got from this picture that I borrowed from them. The caption above this picture is

Head Down Is Only Half The Story

I didn't know this. I've heard of "posterior"babies that give you lots of back labor. That's when the baby's occiput (the back of the skull) is facing your back, so you see the baby's face as it comes out, instead of the back of the head. It's a little harder and usually more uncomfortable to push this baby out.

The ideal baby position is LOA, "Left Occiput Anterior". This means that the baby is lying along the left side, with the occiput facing the mother's front (not posterior).

I believe that my little princess is in that ideal position, but I am not sure. At least her head is down, though.

If your baby is head down, but in one of the other positions, SpinningBabies has some exercises/positions that are supposed to be helpful for getting the baby to move. I am going to rest and trust that all is well unless I get an indication of something otherwise.

If at all up to us, we would like to have our baby one week from yesterday, on August 16th. Don't laugh, we've chosen a delivery date in the past, and it worked just fine.

I'll keep you posted!

From a very soon to be mama of 5.