Massage during labour

[Dolphin123456789]

Would it just be more incredibly painful if you were to gently massage your belly during labour or if you had to have a forceps/ventouse delivery, especially in that case since the baby is already being pulled so pushing might help?

I'm not a professional but my understanding is that pushing the baby out through pressure on the belly isn't advised (it's called fundal pressure and used to be done but not any more in the UK because it caused problems for the pelvic floor and didn't really help the delivery ([www.scienceandsensibility.org/?tag=fundal-pressure])

I found lower back/sacral massage extremely helpful but didn't want my front touched. Everyone is different though.

I couldn't stand my belly being touched (actually shouted at the mw to get off me ) but dh rubbing my lower back helped a lot.

Thanks you two, glad I'm not totally mad!

I had a colonoscopy and I was very moody then because of the pain from the prep, and thinking about it, it was probably not too dissimilar to childbirth. :)