optimal fetal positioning - is it worth it??

[Nik72]

Have spent all morning lying on my front over a bean bag to try & get this recalcitrant baby to turn from posterior - is it really worth spending the next 7 weeks getting carpet burns on my knees?? Does anyone think this works or had any experience? Mind you, at least I don't get as much back ache lying my front....
Any advice gratefully received.
Nik

No idea but DS1 was posterior, I did OFP with DS2 and he wasn't. It certainly doesn't do any harm!

I did it with dd, 15 mins on all fours a day and she was the right way up to pop and did so fairly speedily

Thank-you - looks like it's worth persisting then! Have been doing lots of swimming & walking too AND borrowed a ball thingy to bounce around on so if I end up with a posterior labour at least it won't be through lack of trying!!

having given birth to both types I'd say persist - I did do OFP with all my pregnancies and had pretty easy first stages and straightforward second stages too, apart from my last one, where ds turned OP at the end of the first stage. It made pushing baby out much harder than it had been with my first two.

Nik72 - I will definitely be trying this with my current baby (due March), having had a classic 3-day long back labour with dd 2.5 years ago! Having said that, I did read some research recently which cast doubt on whether OFP was effective or not. I think basically there hasn't been very much good controlled research on this. But my view is it can't do any harm, and is certainly worth a try.

I spent lots of time on all fours wondering if it was worth it. I didn't lean back for about 6 weeks!! Unfortunately I still had a backache labour, but lots of people find it v effective and boy, is backache labour to be avoided (!) so I would definitely do it again next time.

my labour was backache but lasted for only 8hrs40mins start to finish! so it doesn't have to be slow! as per below I used the positioning method.

Nik72, my baby was posterior for weeks until last thurs. I did a bit of half-hearted forward leaning/making sure my pelvis was higher than knees when sitting etc, but it just didn't budge. the thing that appears to have helped was a session with a reflexologist last week (i'm 38 wks). it was the first time i'd had it done and TBH though it was v pleasant while she was working on my feet, i had low expectations. however, about 3 hrs later i felt loads of activity and baby whooshing around and then pre-labour pains which settled after about 5 hrs. MW visited the next day and confirmed that the baby had both rotated into anterior position and started to engage.
so, maybe worth a try.
of course, it could always be a coincidence.

I have said many times.... A 1st OP labour is not the same as a 2nd OP labour... First OP labour is usually very very long.... 2nd OP labour has far more chances of turning OA (anterior) during labour. This is mainly because the uterus produces the 2nd time around much more efficient contractions from earlier on so they are often much shorter labour and babies turn during labour.

My first child was posterior and they thought she was the other way around, so they dont always know tbh! She had to be turned maunally when I was about to deliver.

2nd child also went posterior but I had an elective section with him for other reasons

agree with soupy, it is worth trying

That's interesting about the reflexology as I was thinking of having some sessions once I'm on maternity leave - have a very strong family history of going overdue & i'd heard it can help. I think the baby's in an OK position at the moment as the back is on the left and lots of kicking on the right but it's early days...presumably if it's posterior at the start of labour then you should do all the positioning stuff in labour?
I must sound totally neurotic about this...sorry. My mum had a very difficuly time with an OP labour and had rotational forceps but it was the 70s so she was labouring on her back in bed on a drip. She's still quite traumatised as she didn't get any pain relief for the forceps.