Prepping for Labor: Weeks 37 – 39.5

What I Actually Did, Starting at Week 37

ACUPUNCTURE WITH DR. NEFERTITI ABDOU

I’ve worked with Dr. Nefertiti since my early IVF days in 2021, so going back to her in the final weeks felt like coming home. For me, the biggest benefit was honestly the calmness. I left every session looser, less in my head, and sleeping better that night.

PRENATAL CHIROPRACTIC WITH DR. BERLIN AT BERLIN WELLNESS

I started weekly adjustments at 37 weeks. I had experienced a lot of pelvic pressure starting at week 34 during this pregnancy. Practically speaking, the adjustments took a lot of pressure off my hips and low back, which at +58 lbs in July was not nothing.

PELVIC FLOOR WORK WITH DR. ANTHEA PITYSINGH, DPT

I skipped this with my first pregnancy, both for labor prep and postpartum care. Dr. Anthea (also at Berlin Wellness) had me practice labor positions, breath work, and strength for pushing, which meant learning how to actually push instead of just clenching and hoping. She knew that my goal this time was to deliver without an epidural so I could move around the delivery room more freely than during my first pregnancy, when I caved and got an epidural at 8–9 cm dilated. I was disappointed with my first labor, which required an IV and Pitocin and ended up including an epidural, despite my original birth plan at the time.

ONE AYURVEDIC MASSAGE

This one was purely for my nervous system. Slow, warm, unhurried the opposite of everything else happening in those weeks. I went in wound tight and left feeling like I had reset myself mentally and physically.

THE CLASSIC AT-HOME LIST

🌿Red raspberry leaf tea — every evening before bed with my magnesium glycinate, which I was already taking to help with charley horses and leg cramping.
🤎Dates — I did 3-4 a day rather than six. Six felt like too much for me. 3-4 was my sweet spot.
👟Movement — over 10,000 steps a day, strength training, medicine ball work, and reformer Pilates right up until the end. Some days I was fighting through it. I kept going anyway.

Week 38.5: Still Nothing

WITH ALL OF THAT IN THE MIX, I THOUGHT SOMETHING MIGHT BE HAPPENING BY NOW.

No contractions. No signs. Nothing.

So I did something I didn’t do the first time and got a membrane sweep with a midwife. She thought it would take me to about 5 cm.

It did not.

Week 39.5: The Castor Oil Smoothie

THE DAY MY WATER BROKE, AND THE QUESTION OF WHAT ACTUALLY STARTED LABOR.

By 39.5, I was still walking my 10,000 steps a day, still training, still pregnant. So I caved on the one thing I said I wouldn’t do.

My doula had mentioned castor oil, and a friend of mine swore it worked for all three of her natural births, so I figured it was worth a try. I did half the dose my doula suggested in a special smoothie to make it more palatable, to test the waters, at 5 pm.

Then Roman ordered Mr Chow a few hours later, and I went hard on the spicy stuff because, at that point, why not, last-ditch effort.

At 10 pm that same day, my water broke. And I mean it broke like Niagara Falls. We were off to Cedars-Sinai, where I ended up laboring for 25 hours but that’s the next post.

Did the castor oil do it? Honestly, I don’t know. I’d just done weeks of acupuncture, chiro, pelvic floor work, walking, tea, dates, a membrane sweep, and a plate of spicy noodles. It could have been any of it. It could have been none of it.

(Sharing my experience, not medical advice or a recommendation to use castor oil. Talk with your maternity care team before trying anything on this list, especially anything intended to bring on labor.)

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What I’d Tell You

MY BIGGEST TAKEAWAY FROM PREPARING FOR BIRTH THE SECOND TIME AROUND.

Here’s the funny part: my water broke at the same point in pregnancy as it did with Lily and, once again, just before bedtime. I went 2 for 2 on that, so we headed to the hospital even though my goal was always to labor at home as long as possible. Everyone told me second-time moms go faster, and my girl held out until 39.5 weeks and then made her mama work for 25 hours after I arrived at Cedars-Sinai.

All of this preparation helped me feel ready. It kept me strong and kept my head in the right place. But I also think labor starts when the baby is ready and when God says it’s time, and not one minute before. You can do everything right and still be waiting. That’s not a failure that’s just how it works.

My biggest takeaway from Prepping for Labor: Weeks 37 – 39.5? Focus on what helps you feel prepared, with guidance from your care team. And then let the rest go.

She’s here, she’s healthy, and she stayed in exactly as long as she needed to before joining us earthside. Looking back, I’m glad we made it to 39.5 weeks, because she came on her own time and she was born a healthy 8 lbs 12 ounces, and my delivery, as long as it was (without an epidural!), went smoothly with no complications.