Written by Annalisa Barbieri
Co-founder of iwantmymum.com
First published The Independent on Sunday, January 05

Growing up, one of my childhood games would involve trying to find the scars on the back of my father’s head. They had been made by forceps. His birth had been highly traumatic; both he and his mother had nearly died and he had been pretty much wrenched from her body after three days in labour. This much was family folklore. As I grew up I became aware that my father nearly always had quite terrible head and neck pains, despite taking a plethora of pills and seeing headache specialists from all over the world. I only made the connection that it might have been his birth that caused this after I, too, had a baby.

It’s easy to forget that during childbirth, a baby labours too; the pressures of labour can be equivalent to two bags of cement. These pressures are absorbed by the baby via their head, back and pelvis. The head consists of 22 bones; at birth these are still fairly soft and made of cartilage and membrane; as a baby is born they slide over each other and collapse inwards, it’s called moulding. When the baby takes its first breath and cries the bones open up and “pop” to a degree - into place. This is all entirely normal and our bodies are made to cope with it.

But problems can occur if the head has been unduly compressed by vontouse or forceps. Even if a birth is “natural” but the labour is prolonged, very forceful or very short, this can cause problems. During labour, explains osteopath Amos Heller, the baby takes the pressure in its cranium and pelvis and through the spine, that’s how it should be. But in a prolonged labour there is a much longer period of head to pelvis compression in the baby, the head is pressed against the cervix and pelvic bones of the mother and the pelvis is compressed down by the forceful contractions of the uterus. If the cervix then doesn’t dilate at an even pace the child gets concertinaed all the way through the spine. This compression can be sustained and held in the child’s body after birth and sometimes for many years.

This “held compression” can manifest itself in many different ways: you may have a colicky baby, a poor sleeper, one who possets a lot or regurgitates, or has constipation; they may have ear infections and glue ear (compression of the cranium can affect drainage of the middle ear), scoliosis. A child may be very uncomfortable because all the physical elements throughout the body have been compressed and rotated and are not functioning in a comfortable expanded space. Literally a baby that isn’t at ease in its own skin. (These problems can also occur after a short labour because then, everything happens so quickly and forcefully.)

My daughter’s birth happened after 36 hours of labour. She endured very strong contractions, induction, forceps and finally a caesarean. For 36 hours her head had been repeatedly forced against a closed cervix (it never dilated beyond 2cm because she wasn’t presenting properly) and she had taken enormous pressure in her head, neck and pelvis. She was perfectly healthy thank goodness, and remarkably unfractious - and we were discharged.

She was very windy though and sicked up. A lot. Reflux was diagnosed but I was unconvinced and didn’t want to ply her with medicine. I knew she needed a more holistic appraisal than the NHS, brilliant though it had been on the critical front, could offer. After her second session with an osteopath, she farted like a donkey and was very upset - but has been almost wind-free ever since. Her sicking up all but disappeared. Her problems were due to her pelvis having taken the majority of the pressure during her prolonged birth and her pelvis, ergo intestines, were slightly twisted. She was also concertinaed along the length of her body and needed to be “lifted out”.

Many adults today are expressing their unresolved birth patterns, says Heller, they may have headaches, lung conditions, back pain, constipation, irritable bowel syndrome, even anxiety or depression. The first year of life is the best time to have any birth issues resolved, but it’s never too late (although tell that to my dad) to find out about your own birth experience - something not many of us think about - and see if something in that may be contributing to the problem. This is doubly important if you are a mother as you will have been born and given birth so will have two dynamics to resolve. A woman’s work really is never done..