Fundal Massage

They check the fundal height to make sure your uterus is going back to its normal size at the proper rate. They only do a massage if it is boggy, not in the correct position, or not involuting properly. It does suck, esp with a c section, but it's necessary to prevent hemorrhaging. It's not a long process.

I honestly don’t remember any super bad pain after birth. I had my son in February of 2023 and I remember them pushing on my stomach and everything after I had him, but I also remember thinking “I thought this was supposed to hurt more”. I was amazed that certain things I heard after labor was horrible only for it not to bother me all that much. So I just say it may depend on your pain tolerance, I’m not saying it won’t be painful for you. I’m just saying it definitely wasn’t as bad as I was expecting, but that’s not to say you’ll have the same experience

I’ll be honest it’s the worst lol I had to have it done a couple extra times because I was bleeding heavily. The nurses always did it for me and said this might be “a little tender” 🙄 it is more than a little tender. I think if you’re expecting it to be painful it won’t be as shocking but I didn’t know it was and it was a big surprise

Depends on if you’re bleeding too much, they’ll do it more to stop the bleeding. I had a normal bleeding amount and while I didn’t love the fundal massage, it wasn’t too bad!

I heard it was supposed to hurt really bad but every time it was done it was done gentle to me. I didn’t tense up or anything after

I didn't find it worse than birth but it was pretty sore the first couple times but the last time wasn't too bad my womb had started going down very fast 😅 it is often needed just as a quick check so it's very brief at least
Not many people tell this extra info so it's handy knowing beforehand
Like after birth when you breastfeed you get cramps too until the wombs back down to size

It wasn’t unbearable but it wasn’t fun either lol it def hurts a bit

Yeah... I was in the same boat as @Tessa
I hemorrhaged, and it was NOT pleasant... worse than labor/delivery in my opinion (I delivered with gas and oxygen)! I almost asked for the gas back when they were doing it!
I took a heating pad into the hospital with me, and that helped the pain ALOT. I also ended up bruised across my entire lower abdomen... and it was painful to the touch for over a week.

I had a long pushing phase in labor, and baby got stuck. I was honestly like in survival mode yet so exhausted and just drained. I remember very soon after I gave birth the nurses or doctors started pushing on my stomach. It definitely hurt and I was surprised because it is like a stomach cramp when they do that and the placenta comes out, but it wasn't bad, it was nothing compared to contractions and it lasted maybe a couple seconds. Aftward they just pressed on my stomach and checked it a few times within 24hrs pp, it wasn't bad at all when they were doing that, it didn't hurt.

My midwife told me that it used to be common protocol after all births, but with more research it’s not been shown to be necessary in all cases. She said she’d only do it if my uterus didn’t feel right after birth and not as a matter of course. Not all hospitals operate this way though, so if you want to avoid routine fundal massage, you can put it in your birth plan

I kept getting told that it was going to be horrible, but after an unexpected failed epidural, it was Nothing. Not comfy, but not worse than birth for me

I work in emergency medicine. They’re super questionable. There’s new literature suggesting that they may actually cause hemorrhage in some cases rather that slowing bleeding. We have changed most of our policies to only doing them if absolutely necessary and I fully support women who refuse them in non-traumatic births. However, hospitals are usually a few years behind us in changing their policies.
Oxytocin released from breastfeeding/skin to skin contact and a calm, quiet room is usually more than enough to stop bleeding. Some bleeding is normal.

I had a terrible one with my first and then it wasn’t bad with my second. What you can say is that you want to do it yourself, and the nurse can show you how to do it the first couple times and then hopefully you don’t have to do it too much but yeah with my first she was super rough on me and I wasn’t expecting it either.

It didn’t hurt me when they did it tbh.. 😬 I never understood why people said it hurt so bad.. but maybe the nurses weren’t doing it right or something idk?

I was looking online to find out the latest research on this because I'm not looking forward to it... my last birth in 2020 the nurse did it and I screamed out in pain... I had an epidural super early in my labor but pushed for 2.5 hours and didn't want much medicine so stopped dosing myself pretty early. Not sure if that's why I didn't feel it with my first birth.. but yeah I honestly feel like it's a different type of awful. 😬