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| Back pain/abdominal pain? |
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Question:
I am 36 weeks 2 days with baby #5, and
my back killing me. I was not sleeping in a funny position that could
hav caused this pain. Its a constant dull throb in my lower back. Any
tips on how to relieve it?
I don't remember this much back pain with
any of my other kids. I am in agony. Friday night it was killing me,
I could barely walk. I had laid down most of the time during supper (we
were at a relative's house) and it felt better after an hour or two of
rest. but now, today it started hurting bad when I was already resting
on my left side lying down.
I am positive its not from constipation,
as I take lactulose regularly. and I was able to go to the washroom
normally. I do not have a bladder infection, my OB had recently
checked.
Answer:
Try applying heat to the lower back, either with a hot water bottle or one
of those wheat packs you can heat in the microwave. A hot water bottle holds
heat longer so might be better. That's about the only thing that really
works for me, and I have a spinal prolapse on the lumbar/sacral junction on
top of being pregnant!
Apart from that, perhaps a visit to the physio might
be in order. They will most likely apply heat and do a gentle massage to
ease the pain. That's all they do with me when my back hurts during
pregnancy. Don't know how expensive that is where you are, though... Do NOT
apply those heating gels/sports gels/whatever they're called. The heating
agent in them is capsicum powder (like the stuff police use to spray people
to subdue them) and you're not supposed to use it in pregnancy.
It also sounds like my back labor pains. That was the
hardest part of the labor for me, finding out that my back hurt worse than
my front. I got dull, creaky, achy pain in my lower back that was constant
on one level with "spikes" corresponding to contractions.
Later on the back
pain faded and I had abdominal pain instead when I had contractions. The
abdominal pain really did come and go with contractions, it was either on or
off. The back pain I got at first was more like constant pain with
"twinges".
Do a google search for "back labor". IME, I think she did rotate at some
point to anterior and the back pain went to regular pain. I certainly did
change positions a lot. The water bath was fabulous for the back pain, as
was having DH apply counter pressure. I think actually the midwife took
that over b/c DH wasn't doing it right, but I was too out of it to care.
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