Posterior.

I made the mistake yesterday of googling "posterior labor" and scared myself.  So.  As long as I'm still waiting to go into labor, I figured I might use the time trying to spin the baby around from posterior to anterior.  

Let me digress with a quick review of fetal positioning for anyone who isn't familiar with the terminology, since not a few of the folks I've mentioned this to have thought I meant the baby was breech when I described him as posterior.  Skip this if you know all that.

• "Breech" would mean the baby was head-up, feet- or butt-down, and that is potentially a more serious malpositioning which frequently requires cesarean section and almost always is delivered by c-section these days whether necessary or not.
• "Vertex" is the opposite of breech:  head down, ready to be born headfirst.  You can see why we don't refer to babies as right-side-up and upside-down.  Too ambiguous.   Even when the baby's definitely not breech, he can assume a variety of positions; here is a good diagram showing the possibilities and the abbreviations.  
• "Posterior"  means that the baby is facing the mother's front, not her back.  Yes, posterior means "back."  It's short for "occiput posterior" (sometimes "occipital posterior") which translates roughly to "the back of the baby's head is towards the mother's back.")  Sometimes this is called "sunny-side-up" which, I assume, refers to the way the posterior baby would face at birth if the mother were in the obstetrical semi-sit or on-her-back delivery position, either of which would be a pretty crappy way to deliver a posterior baby.  
• "Anterior," really occiput anterior, is the opposite of posterior:   baby faces the mother's spine, back of the baby's head to the mother's front.

The usual manner of birth is vertex and anterior.  My baby is vertex but posterior.  Most of the time posterior babies turn during labor at some point, though often not until after many hours.  If they don't turn, they do come out that way, but it's more difficult -- labor tends to start later and take longer and be more uncomfortable, or at least that's what they say.  

I'm a little anxious about it.  

So I spent some time yesterday crawling around on hands and knees, feeling like I ought to say "Moo" every now and again.  Originally I thought I might use the time constructively by scrubbing the floor or something (it needs it; Mary Jane dumped a box of baking soda on the floor last week and tried to clean it up herself, with a wet mop, before she was discovered), but the hard floor hurt my knees, so I settled for circling the armchair on the area rug.

It's hard not to blame myself for the malpositioning.  I have spent too much time in front of the computer and leaning back in rocking chairs.  I am now sitting in front of the computer perched on the front of a rocking chair to tilt it as far forward as I can without sliding off.  Last night I arranged all the pillows I could find (Mark had to wad a blanket under his head) so I could sleep all night on my left side with my belly button pointed down, or at least as down as I could point it without cutting off anybody's oxygen.  Before that, while Mark was reading stories to MJ and Milo, I spent some more time doing pelvic rocks on hands and knees. 

Oscar, who's nine, peeked around the door with an alarmed look on his face.  "Is the baby coming out?"  I suppose I looked a lot like some of the pictures in the birth books.  I said no and he said "Are you sure?" 

I assured him that, if the baby were in fact coming out, I would know before he would.  After he went back to his bedroom, Mark laughed at me, or maybe at him, and told me I needed to get in the habit of closing the door all the way.   Which is true.

I woke up very achy from sleeping on the same side all night.  

 I guess I can turn my impatience to have the baby into thankfulness that, since he's not quite engaged yet, there's still room for him to turn around.  Think rotational thoughts.  

Comments

[BettyDuffy]

I had a posterior one. I'll spare you the description of how that felt, but the good news is they all come out. Mine had a pretty nasty bruise on his head from where he kept hitting some bone of mine in there. Had a nurse from Eritria who delivered her babies in refugee camps, sans medication. My doc was losing interest in vaginal delivery, since baby appeared to be stuck, and my brilliant nurse got out a bottle of some sort of lube, vaseline or some such. Doc was like, "What do I do with this?" Nurse pretty much emptied the bottle on the doc's glove and had her reach up and lube the babys' head. Worked like a charm.

[Cathie B]

Hands and Knees...I have spent much of my last weeks there because my first was posterior. Just do it as much as you can. I'll be saying some prayers for rotation.

[Jamie]

Please don't blame yourself for the malpositioning! And please don't let worry mar the last few days of your pregnancy. It doesn't have to mean miserable back labor if baby hangs out OP for a while. All 5 of mine started out like that and turned during labor. The first time was awful, but not the subsequent births. (I mean, it was still childbirth and everything, but I never once had that stereotypical back labor thing going.) You have an experienced body -- if you do labor with a posterior baby, it will be different for you than for a primapara.

I will offer the third joyful mystery for you today, and ask for the intercession of Our Lady of the Nativity. Hang in there!

[Jamie]

Primipara. I hate typos.

[Bethany]

Did I miss the post on how you know for sure that the baby is posterior?

[bearing]

Legs and arms poking out front all the time. It's really obvious. I didn't need the midwives to tell me, although I trust their judgment anyway. If the baby's head were anterior, he'd be able to star in the next remake of _The Exorcist._

[Bethany]

Funny. Okay, thanks for clarifying. Turn, baby, turn!

[Kelly]

I was born posterior. I'll spare you the birth story, though. But I did come out in the end. And hey, you won't be denied everything but ice chips, and all that other lovely 70's stuff my mom went through.

[Christy P.]

Like the other commenters I will not share my story of posterior labor except to say that I made a lot of loud noise. She did turn eventually. But I will chime in with the reassurance (platitude) that they all come out. And yes, you have an experienced body and you will have full control of you muscles and wits, at least as much as you can in labor, rather than being confined on your back in an unfamiliar bed with a tube stuck into your spine and needles in your arms. Unless you want to. ;-)

[Mike (the lantern crossword dude in that cartoon physics class)]

Look at it this way: He's not even born yet, and he's already keenly aware of spatial relations. As an engineer, you should be most proud.

[Alicia]

I only have one little one so far, but she was posterior, and we had a natural birth with a midwife. I won't lie about the back labor--but after a 15-minute knees-up/chest-down inversion during contractions, followed by a few hands-and-knees contractions, she turned like a charm and it was much, much better from there. I'm sure you know the technique, but be encouraged that it can work!

[bearing]

Thanks, everyone, for tips, prayers, and good wishes. I'm aware that this is the sort of thing lots of people have to go through, so I shouldn't whine too much.

The perfectionist in me is agitated by any less-than-ideal condition.

[Christy P.]

As long as it is theoretical -- assume a different boundary condition.