Chiropractic & Pregnancy : Posterior Pelvic Pain | PPP

This is why you need to always give up your seat for a pregnant woman.   Not only are they creating a little wee person, but some of mechanical stressors and stuff they have to deal with.  Oy vay.


So if you are pregnant, and experiencing low back pain or something that you think may be Sciatica...read on.

Here is the 411 on PPP:

• PPP is one of the most common issues I see related to pregnancy.  
• It can mimic Sciatic-like symptoms and location (back of the hip, bum, thigh)
  
• It occurs 4 x more frequently than just low back pain, and is usually a source of frustration because it happens all the time with the most everyday things:
• walking and running
• getting up from sitting
• rolling over in bed
• going up and down stairs

Please just take a minute to re-read that.  That is like, what, 80% of your day?! 

Ugh.  I really do have a lot of empathy and love for my PPP patients.

PPP usually starts becoming an issue towards the end of the second trimester (so, in tandem with your new curves we talked about yesterday) and often feels like it is in the base of the spine, or spreading across the hips in the back. It can also feel like it goes into the bum and hamstrings, too.


Looks something like this:







Usually the culprit of PPP is a combination of a few things working at once: 

1. New Stresses to Spine

The low back is literally changing it shape.  (Read more about that here.) And even though you might not be tipping over, your center of gravity does shift forward with increased anterior weight, which stresses out your joints (in particular the SI joints), holding ligaments of the pelvis and spine, and muscles around the spine. 

Blurg.

2. Hormones Galore

The second thing, which may seem pretty obvi, is the abundant hormones in your body!  

Relaxin Hormone being the main one, which basically...well, relaxes everything.   

In the pelvis, we normally have some migh-ty strong ligaments - which are basically turned to silly putty by the end of the pregnancy via Relaxin.  The amount of relaxin increases as you progress through your term for a good reason (to help prepare for labour) and not some random cruel joke from Mother Nature.


But it can leave things feeling wibbly, wobbly, and generally unstable.  This can and does annoy the muscles and nerves in the area, and can exacerbate the problem.

3. The Preggo Walk

When the baby's head drops further down in later stages of pregnancy, this is when the classic waddle tends to appear.  

It is generally characterized by a shorter stride, and less range of motion.  Preggies tend to have a "wide shuffle" walk, in which shorter, smaller steps taken at a wider distance apart.  This too, will irritate everything in the pelvic area - most importantly the joints, ligaments and muscles.



Coupled with the hormones relaxing the ligaments, the weight gain, and everything feeling loosey goosey - your back muscles are more tired, and you are more weary in general.  This preggo walk is a way to deal with the physical and mechanical demand on the body, but also, unfortunately can further aggravate the issue.

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All of the techniques I talked about yesterday (Chiropractic, muscle work, and Acupunture techniques, etc) can be used to help the mum with pain relief and have also been shown to help prepare her for a speedy labour as well. 

The point here is - yes - if you are unfortunate to have to experience PPP - it can totally suck.  But there are some solutions that are available to you that you may not have considered before that can really help with pain management which are organic and good for baby and body.  :)


It is often the case that during treatment, the baby will start to kick and wiggle around like crazy, almost like it is getting more room to play in...


Dr. S