Myth: One of the most common prenatal massage myths out there - still taught occasionally, and repeated by many therapists and facilities. Many people including massage therapists, midwives, spas, and more preach that no massage or any physical services should be done to a pregnant woman in the first trimester because it could cause a miscarriage.
Where it comes from: This is because a miscarriage, which could happen for any reason, is more likely to happen during the first trimester. Additionally, with today's more modern testing abilities - pregnancies are detected much earlier than they ever have been, so many miscarriages which in the past would not even have been noticed or recognized as miscarriages, seem to be more prevalent. This has reinvigorated the fear that anything out of the ordinary can trigger or cause a miscarriage. This has lead to physical or bodywork therapists to completely put a ban on working on women in their first trimester just "to be save" and "just in case" anything were to happen, they could not be held liable or to blame.
Fact: A miscarriage is a horrible, traumatic, and disappointing event. However in the world of massage therapy, as long as there are no high-risk conditions, there is no medical evidence that a massage, especially when done by a therapist who specializes or is specifically trained in prenatal massage, can cause a miscarriage. It is tempting to "wrap a pregnant woman in bubble wrap" to keep them protected throughout their pregnancies, but women are a lot tougher than people believe. Many doctors today will advise women to keep doing what they and their bodies are accustomed to doing throughout a pregnancy - even if it goes against what "most women" should do or stop doing. If someone regularly recieves a massage, there is no reason they should stop just because they discover they are pregnant - UNLESS there is a risk of. miscarriage or high risk condition that a doctor is watching.
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