The Ordinary Doula Podcast
Welcome to The Ordinary Doula Podcast with Angie Rosier, hosted by Birth Learning. We help folks prepare for labor and birth with expertise coming from 20 years of experience in a busy doula practice, helping thousands of people prepare for labor, providing essential knowledge and tools for positive and empowering birth experiences.
The Ordinary Doula Podcast
E60: Balls, Balls, Balls During and After Labor
In this episode, we discuss the role of birth balls and peanut balls as valuable tools during labor and the postpartum period. Learn how these simple, yet effective tools can help with:
- Promoting optimal fetal positioning during labor
- Reducing labor pain and improving comfort
- Enhancing mobility, balance, and relaxation postpartum
We share tips on incorporating them into your birth plan. Whether you’re preparing for labor or looking for postpartum comfort, this episode provides practical advice to empower your journey.
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Show Credits
Host: Angie Rosier
Music: Michael Hicks
Photographer: Toni Walker
Episode Artwork: Nick Greenwood
Producer: Gillian Rosier Frampton
Voiceover: Ryan Parker
Welcome to the Ordinary Doula Podcast with Angie Rozier, hosted by Birth Learning, where we help prepare folks for labor and birth with expertise coming from 20 years of experience in a busy doula practice, helping thousands of people prepare for labor, providing essential knowledge and tools for positive and empowering birth experiences.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to the Ordinary Doula podcast. My name is Angie Rozier, I'm your host and I am so happy to be with you today. Not sure where you are, what you're doing when you're listening to this, but welcome, and I hope you can find some information that is helpful or useful to you here. Whether you are having a first baby, a third baby, a tenth baby or helping people have babies or thinking of having a baby. Hopefully you can find some information that will be beneficial for you. So today we are going to talk about all things balls, birth balls, peanut balls and all the different ways that we can use those before labor, during labor and even after labor. So I'm going to kind of start with a birth ball.
Speaker 2:Now, in our world of birthing, we call it a birth ball. This is also referred to as an exercise ball or a yoga ball and it's just one of those great big. They come in different sizes. Usually it it's 55 centimeters, 65 centimeter or 75 centimeter sizes, different colors. Maybe you've seen these around, but let's talk about the sizes right away. I want you to kind of consider the sizes and, depending on your height, there's some easy guidelines you can look at online to see, depending on your height, which size you could get. If you are a shorter variety of person, you probably want to get a 55 centimeter ball. If you're kind of an average height you know, five, two to five, six or something then a 65 centimeter ball is probably going to be a good fit for you. If you are a taller person, if you're 5'7", 5'8" or more, then you may want to get a 75 centimeter ball. So these what we call birth balls can be helpful before labor.
Speaker 2:You can spend time sitting on them if you have to do work at home or work in an office, if you spend any part of your day where you have to work at a desk or computer, then this could be a good space to spend your time sitting on a birth ball. I'm actually sitting on one right now. That's usually my chair at my desk is a birth ball, and it's been for years. So the benefits about sitting on a birth ball during pregnancy is fluidity. So when you're sitting on a birth ball it can be fluid and you can inflate it for a firmer fit or deflate it a little bit for a little bit more of a squishy feel, depending on what works for you. But it does give quite a bit so much more than rigid chairs, right. So as you're sitting on that, your spine is going to kind of fill. The benefits of that give Core as well.
Speaker 2:Even just sitting on it, as your body spends time on a birth ball, it will kind of work on core strength and the mobility of it. You can move on it and depending on where you kind of, when you just sit on a ball, you kind of want to think of another way to know a good size for you is that when you're sitting on it that your knees are able to make a 90 degree, like your lower leg and your upper leg right at your knee can make a 90 degree angle, and then you can also make a 90 degree angle from your hip to your torso. So that's kind of a good sit test that you could think about. So sitting on that adds fluidity to your spine and also the pelvis and you're not on a rigid anything On those sits bones, those can mold to your body very easily. So you're not sitting on anything rigid, your spine is not stiff or straight and you can also move on it with the pelvis. So you can work back and forth a little bit and do some gentle swaying. So if you're just spending time sitting, you're going to be moving a little bit and you can kind of do some gentle swaying Now. Spending some intentional time on the birth ball maybe you want to get that pelvis moving around. You can do some pretty good figure eights.
Speaker 2:It takes a tiny bit of practice not a lot, but a little bit of practice to get adequate at sitting on a birth ball. Not a lot, but a little bit of practice to get adequate at sitting on a birth ball. Hopefully you don't roll off of it, so make sure you're in a steady and safe position to sit on. It Takes a little bit of getting used to and if you want to get used to it prenatally, before you may need it during labor, that's a great time to do it. That can be a good place. We're going to move into the labor stages now.
Speaker 2:If you're adequate at sitting on a birth ball, it could be a great place to spend some early labor. Again, it's a restful spot. Walking is good, upright motions are good, upright postures are great, but our legs might get tired. So this could be a great place to sit and the birth ball you can do a really wide stance with nothing inhibiting you from that. In early labor, as we've talked about before on this podcast, you want to have your knees and toes, femurs, basically pointed out and make that wide stance. That is very easy to do on a birth ball. You could do a nice wide stance on a birth ball. You could do nice big figure eights on a birth ball, a little bit of bouncing, don't go crazy or anything, but all of these motions are going to be helpful and comfortable during labor.
Speaker 2:What I see a lot of times is early labor, and this is totally anecdotal, I have not done any research on this, but what I see a lot of times is that people enjoy the birth ball earlier in labor, but as that baby descends and that cute little head is kind of nestling itself lower and lower in the pelvis, the pressure of the birth ball is kind of interesting, an interesting sensation, and a lot of people don't prefer the birth ball later in labor for sitting on. However, there's other ways we can use it. So sitting is one and other people can sit on this birth ball. A lot of times in hospitals there's a birth ball in the room and if the mom gets an epidural or something. The hospital staff's quick to take it away and I'm always like, can you just leave it? Because if we have, like myself or a partner, the birth ball can be a great thing to help you sit very close to the bed. If you're sitting next to the mom on the bed and if you're doing back massage or counter pressure or pelvic rock or anything doing some hands-on comfort, you can sit on the birth ball and be close to the bed. So it's just another sit tool as well, but it is. They do roll around and get in the if we do need to get rid of it. Okay, so that's labor for sitting.
Speaker 2:Another thing you can do during labor is use it to kneel against. So whether you have a yoga mat on the ground, you're just kneeling on a soft-ish surface, carpet, whatever. If you're on the birthbed or your bed at home, you can kneel on the bed, have the ball in front of you to kneel against. So it's kind of like extended prayer position, if you will, where your arms or your shoulders are broad, open and you're kind of draped over that birth ball and that can kind of give a nice long sway to your back where it elongates the spine and let your belly just kind of hang there while you're supporting your knees, leaning onto the birth ball. So that's a good forward posture in a restful spot, so restful to your legs, restful to your arms, as you're leaning forward. Knees might get tired after a while so we can kind of work with that.
Speaker 2:Another space for the birth ball is in the tub. A lot of people or in the shower excuse me, a lot of people have I've seen and worked with at home in hospitals. We'll take that birth ball right into the shower, sit on it, do the swaying, do the moving. Those can get wet, they're waterproof. So great place to sit on and get some good hydrotherapy too in a shower. All right, I want to move now. Okay, wait, let me go to after, before I move to peanut balls, postpartum, Postpartum the ball can be great for kind of rocking a baby on.
Speaker 2:Babies love rhythm, they love motion, they love movement, they love warm bodies and breathing and heartbeats. They love everything about the rhythm of life and movement. So sometimes that's a nice space for mom or dad or partner or any kind of caregiver to kind of rock that baby. Just do a little gentle bouncing as we're getting that baby to sleep and, especially if you're adequate, just do a little gentle bouncing as we're getting that baby to sleep. And especially if you're adequate, sitting on a birth ball can be comfortable. A little easier, I think, to move on a birth ball than it is like in a rocker or something, depending on your rocker or rocking chair.
Speaker 2:I have another note on a birth ball. I was at a birth a couple weeks ago and this mom was having a breech baby. It was amazing, she was unmedicated. Go, and this mom was having a breech baby. It was amazing, she was unmedicated. She did fabulous and so did her birth team. But she loved the birth ball almost all the way through labor and I thought about that because she had a different presenting part, not a head but the cute little bum of a baby coming down. She and I talked to her at our postpartum visit too. She said that birth ball was the best tool for her throughout the process. So that's another case where it worked beautifully. I also have seen people like maybe the mom is sitting on the birth ball and a partner's in a chair or something well supported behind her and she might be on the birth ball and just kind of roll her hips forward, like so it's kind of on her sacrum and so she's leaning back and just being supported in her partner's lap, so like maybe a thigh of the partner under each arm, so it kind of creates this awesome armchair where she can kind of lay back. That's another position.
Speaker 2:People have used a birth ball in during labor. All right, let's switch to peanut balls. So peanut balls have been around for a while. A lot of people say what's a peanut ball? I'm like it's a ball that's shaped like a peanut, but a big peanut, right, not a tiny peanut. And there are different sizes of peanut balls. Some of them are way too big, some are way too small. Again, depending on the size of the person, their height, the length of their legs Shorter people get smaller peanut balls. Taller people get smaller peanut balls. Taller people get larger peanut balls.
Speaker 2:If we're going to be using them for traditional purposes and sometimes the nurses don't take that into account when they'll bring a peanut ball into the room, so I'll ask around in a hospital setting for a different peanut ball. So kind of traditionally what peanut balls are used for. They're a fabulous tool after people get an epidural in in traditional sense. So it's something that can allow for a lot of great hip movement and opening of the pelvis while the mom is not in an upright position. So peanut balls in a traditional sense we lie the patient on their side, put the peanut ball between their legs and the divot in the middle of the peanut ball. That's kind of where a knee, the top knee, kind of drapes over and the legs just kind of hold it there in place. So if your nurse is using a peanut ball that may be how she's using it She'll pop it between the legs, leave the room.
Speaker 2:I love to use peanut balls much more dynamically than that and not keep them static but keep that moving. So we can do the peanut ball, put it in that same position, but we'll do I call it rocket and roll the peanut ball. When we move the peanut ball forward we're and then backwards. So we're doing some really great thigh and hip rotation and we're almost creating a really exaggerated big hip walking for the patient while they are laying down. So we do lose some mobility when folks get epidurals and we're stuck to the bed. But really for the support team, for the partner, for the doula, that's when your job goes up, because we need to keep that mobility going. The peanut ball is a fabulous way to do that, so kind of rocking and rolling it um, it can get exhausting for the person who's doing it. It's quite comfortable for the patient who's having it done, but for the person person who's doing it, I will do it for several minutes, sometimes half an hour, and then leave it be, do some stillness and we balance between rest and mobility. We can turn the patient over to the other side, do the same thing, so she's offering a ton of different options and opening spaces for the baby inside and during labor. So that's a use for a peanut ball during labor.
Speaker 2:Another use for a peanut ball we can use it kind of crosswise and people will and I always cover, by the way, any ball that I use during labor. I cover it with something, whether that's a full on sheet, a hospital gown, a chucks pad, whatever a towel. I like to cover that the feel of the plastic's kind of weird, I think, on the skin and then just a nice barrier for cleanliness, you know, extra barrier of cleanliness and just soft touch to the skin. I like to cover birth balls up or peanut balls. So another use you kind of make a T, like make it how do I explain this without pictures? So like make a T with the birth ball to the mom's torso so she can again lean forward. So she might be kneeling on the bed or on the floor and she can kneel forward. This is kind of a forward posture, almost an a knee, open knee chest position, but the birth ball is supporting her so you're not as low to the ground like if you're kneeling and your chest is on the ground. Um, that is not a very comfortable position for a long time can be very helpful in moving babies who are a little bit in a interesting position, but the birth ball adds a little bit of support there. You could also line the birth ball straight up with the torso or with the body, kind of push it down the body so it's between the legs, a little bit kind of like straddling the birth ball. This could be for people with epidurals or without and get on hands and knees and kind of do a deep knee chest in a bed or on a supported space on the floor or something that's soft for your knees to be on Also a great place to kind of straddle the birth, I mean the peanut ball that way An interesting use of a peanut ball.
Speaker 2:One time as well I had a client who she was kneeling on the bed wanted to kind of be more supported, so we just put the birth ball right behind her knees. She was kind of draped up over the top of the bed, which was up high in a seated position kind of, and then we pulled out the stirrups from the bed which come out from underneath on either side. Hopefully you never see those in labor. I don't love it when those come out at the end of labor, but they do sometimes and lots in some areas of the country. Sometimes they never come out, but we did pull these stirrups out during labor and we kind of braced the birth or the peanut ball between the stirrups and the back of the mom so she could kind of lean back and had really good support resting her legs and sinking into that position as she wanted to. So both balls are very good tools during labor, especially after an epidural.
Speaker 2:That peanut ball is going to help with mobility and the birth ball has some good prenatal uses, some good labor uses and some really great postpartum uses as well. I suggest people get one and have it at home as your kid becomes a toddler. It's a great toy for them to play with. But it's a good thing to sit on for all people really. But during labor the fluidity of that with for the pelvis and the spine can be a really nice and a comfortable space to sit, helps open pelvises. It gives another option as a tool for people to use during labor, and that's what we want is to have lots of options available, lots of tools and there's lots of ways to use them. So hopefully you can take all that information about balls, balls, balls and use those as you see fit for your situation. It can be a great thing to use. I've seen it used in many ways and it's something I always look for in a birth room or a home birth when I arrive as a doula.
Speaker 2:Thanks so much for being with us today. I hope you are having a great day. Not every day is good, I'm aware of that, but hopefully you can find some little bright lining of today. A lot of times that comes from other people. So reach out, make a human connection, whether that's eye contact. Reach out, touch someone, give a hug, make a human connection with somebody you know or somebody you don't Hope. You have a good one, and we will see you here next time.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Ordinary Doula podcast with Angie Rozier, hosted by Birth Learning. Episode credits will be in the show notes Tune in next time as we continue to explore the many aspects of giving birth.