At times during the last days of pregnancy you may often become impatient. You may feel to induce labor on your own and evict your junior as soon as possible.
You have to remember not to try to induce labor yourself before 39th week of pregnancy, unless advised by your medical attendant. In any case, before you try to induce labor on your own, get a green light from your doctor.
How To Induce Labor Yourself Naturally?
Some of the ways to induce labor naturally are:
- Intercourse: It is one of the simplest ways used to induce labor at home.To start the labor, the cervix has to get soft and dilated. Often in a hospital doctors apply gels containing prostaglandins in the vagina for this purpose. Semen contains natural prostaglandins, which has the property to soften and ripen the cervix. So having sex with your partner is a logically correct. Besides the orgasm produced during intercourse causes uterus to contract. You should take precaution of not having sex if your water is broken.
- Castor oil: Many doctors, midwives prefer castor oil. Castor oil is responsible for bowel contractions for evacuation of stool. Proximity of the muscles of the bowels helps the uterine contraction to induce labor in natural manner. This method is advised to be followed on doctor’s instructions only, as there are chances of the baby to have the bowel movement in the uterus.
- Walking: Walking initiates uterine contractions. The upright posture allows the baby to pull down into the cervix. The pressure created by the baby makes the cervix to dilate. Be sure you do not get extremely tired while walking. Remember you need the energy to push down the baby on the delivery day.
- The other natural methods employed by many women are acupressure, aroma therapy and massage to initiate contraction of uterus.
- Diet: Tropical fruits such as mango, pineapple and kiwi contain enzymes that may induce mild contraction of uterus and dilatation of cervix.
- Nipple stimulation: Stimulating nipple is known to produce oxytocin. It is a chemical which relaxes the muscles of cervix and at the same time stimulates muscles of uterus to contract. Nipple can be stimulated with a gentle massage or with a breast pump.
- Herbs: Herbs such as evening prime rose, black cohosh, raspberry leaves all have an effective power to induce labor. Many midwives suggest the use of evening prime rose since it has properties to dilate cervix. You can try taking evening prime rose capsules or apply the oil on cervix during the last few days of expected labor date. However, talk to your doctor before using it and should not be used if there are any anomaly associated during pregnancy. Raspberry leaf is another herb which is suggested by many for inducing labor naturally. In fact few studies have suggested it can reduce the chances of Cesarean section remarkably.
- Spicy foods: Similar to castor oil spicy food is known to aggravate bowel movement. It serves two purposes; emptying bowel allows wider space in pelvis and facilitates easy expulsion of fetus. Secondly together with bowel stimulation it also stimulates the muscles of pelvis and uterus which are in close proximity to each other.