What daily preparations are you doing for labour? (If any)

[HarderToKidnap]

I'm 34 weeks tomorrow and thinking about what sort of things I need to do to prepare my body and mind for labour. This is DC1 and I am pretty committed to a drug-free home birth, although open minded of course. Are you doing anything specific to prep for the birth and afterwards?

From 34 weeks I am going to:

sit on birth ball twice a day for twenty minutes
do an inversion every day (spinningbabies.com/techniques/the-inversion)
perineal massage every day
listen to hypnobirth CD/practice hypno breathing
yoga DVD twice a week
try and do aqua fit once a week
regular sex

From 36 weeks:

colostrum harvesting
raspberry leaf tea

Anyone else doing anything?

Sorry to hear about your experience Edwinbear. Altho I birthed DS naturally without the epidural the experience of 3-4hrs intense pain was very traumatising, & I actually ended up in ICU for 24hrs due to retained placenta & PPH & had 2nd degree tear with small rectocele, so all sorts of shit can happen without epidural - more likely due to syntocinon overstimulating the uterus than the epidural. I had an hour of pushing & couldn't feel where to push even tho I hadn't had the epi. Some women just don't have that sensation regardless & I think it is more common with back2back babies. But if you are stuck with no progression for over a day what choice is there?

Getting back to OP's point, one good point of prep would be to attempt to get baby into an ideal position first although there are no guarantees it will work or baby will stay there!

I guess the point is then do the prep for yourself and your confidence, but at the end of the day, none of us know what our experiences would have been like if we'd not prepared or opted in/out of epidurals etc.

Also re colostrum harvesting, aweseom fine do it - but I wasn't able to freeze my milk at all, due to an enzyme being present (relatively common) that meant if I froze it, even immediately, it would be off upon thawing....Also, don't you produce the amount of colostrum your body needs for the baby then your milk comes through once your baby is ready for it? Am not sure I see the point - not trying to be obtuse, am just a bit confused.

I'm kinda sorry I read this thread and now feel like I need a shower. WTF is a perineal massage? And what's colostrum?

Google may be your friend, Helen... Two rough explanations:
Colostrum-first lot of milk made for newborn baby by your body. Day 1-3 sort of stuff. Perineal massage - rubbing your bits with oil to soften them up in the hope of reducing likelihood of tearing in labour.

Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

Why are these not spoken of until you get pregnant and they throw all this horrible stuff at you? :o

lol im still shocked at your list OP wow!
im 36weeks with no2 and so far the preparation i have done is wash the baby clothes and make the bassinet,
Haven't packed my bag or anything, I do however walk to pick dd (agesd 3) from kindy 3times a week as im so huge im trying to prevent myself from getting any bigger!
I personally wouldn't even consider doing any of the things you are doing... BUT in saying that 1st baby is very exciting, 2nd baby is still exciting but your so tired from looking after 1st child that you dont have as much time to think about it and you just want it out :)

ah ha, I have a new thing on my list after dragging DH to labour pain relief through massage session - he's under strict instruction to give me a 20min massage every evening now to help loosen my pelvis from the SPD and make labour easier...brilliant, everything else can frankly be crossed off if he does this!