Navigating Pregnancy With Scoliosis and a Spinal Fusion

When my husband and I found out we were expecting a baby girl earlier this year, a lot of questions began popping into my head, as I’m sure they do for many first-time parents. Mostly the questions centered around how my back—scoliosis, spinal fusion, and all—would handle the changes my body was about to experience.

I wasn’t concerned at all. Why spend time and energy worrying about things that may or may not happen—and that you have no control over.

I was curious though; curious how my back would handle the extra weight of a baby bump, curious how my breathing (which is already mildly affected by scoliosis) would be impacted by the baby’s position, curious if my unfused lower back would flare in pain the further along I got. During labor, would I be able to get an epidural given the location of my rods? I was curious. 

I did my best not to dwell on any of these thoughts and tried to take each day as it came, each pregnancy discovery as it presented itself. I embraced the ways my body was changing and enjoyed how things were literally taking shape. And you know what? My back did just fine! I ran weekly up until 29 weeks when breathing started becoming uncomfortable and my stride started to naturally shorten causing wicked cramps in my calves. Then I quickly transitioned to walking nearly every day. The miles sure weren’t fast, but the movement was critical to my physical and mental wellbeing.

Aside from muscle tightness in my upper back (which I experience regularly as it is), my back didn’t seem to have any issues caused by the pregnancy itself—not even my low back! 

One lingering question rolled around in my head for a while as our due date got closer: would an epidural be possible?  

I worked with an excellent anesthesia team at our hospital and gave them the most complete picture of my back history as possible. During this process, I made a jaw-breaking (or should I say back-breaking?) discovery: I’m actually fused in slightly different vertebrae than I’d thought all these years. 

In order to give my OBGYN team as much information as I could, I requested my medical records from the children’s hospital in Wisconsin where I had surgery. Wow, was it a fascinating read! Through this, I learned that my fusion isn’t limited just to my thoracic vertebrae like I thought. My rods actually start at T4 and extend down to L3 in my lumbar spine. This presented a potential challenge with getting an epidural given where it needs to be placed, if that was a route I wanted to go. My mindset going into labor was to see how my body responded to everything and not be a hero; if the pain was too intense, I had no shame requesting an epidural.

From what I was told by the anesthesia team, due to where my rods are and scar tissue that’s built up over time, an epidural wasn’t impossible but the placement would likely need to be in L4 / L5 (I believe it’s usually placed in L2 or L3) and there was always the slight possibility that it just couldn’t be done for me. I knew all of this as our due date got closer, so I was able to wrap my brain around it all. Overall though, I really tried to keep an open mind in regard to the labor experience. Just as I didn’t know how my back would respond to pregnancy, I had no idea how it would respond to labor either.  

My water broke three and a half weeks before my due date (quite the surprise!) and when I started feeling contractions, they vacillated from front to back pretty consistently, staying in neither place too long but long enough to be quite painful the closer we got to baby’s arrival. 

The biggest surprise to me through it all: I fully labored and delivered on my back.

I anticipated that I’d want to walk around and use a birthing ball to help during contractions, but I actually wanted neither of those things; all I wanted to do was lay down. Aside from the growing intensity of the contractions and deep pressure when I started to push, my back handled it all without any issues. It probably helped that I only had an hour or so of active labor because everything moved so fast! Multiple doctors and nurses attributed this to staying so active during pregnancy along with being a distance runner all these years. 

And I was successfully able to get an epidural! Though things progressed so quickly that it barely had any time to do its thing: the epidural went in at 2:05pm and baby girl was born at 2:53pm. One of the most excruciating parts was the position I had to be in (sitting bent over hugging a pillow, shoulders rolled forward as contractions kept coming full-force) when the epidural was being inserted.  

I’m now nearly 11 weeks postpartum and my back is holding up decently well! Breastfeeding and holding baby girl have made my upper back more sore as of late. In the early days, our 5-7 pound bundle of joy was fine to hold for a while. My back muscles are rebelling a bit now that she’s gotten up to 11 pounds. I’ve been slowly incorporating some Peloton strength classes into my days, which have been helping a little, along with laying on my trusty heating pad at night to relax the muscles. 

Even 25+ years after being diagnosed with scoliosis, and nearly 23 years post-spinal fusion, my body continues to amaze me with its continued resiliency, strength, and ability to adapt to unknowns. Though it hasn’t always easy, especially with an infant, consistent movement, strength, and stretching are key for me to keep my back healthy and strong and I’m looking forward to building more of all of it in the new year!

Special shout out to Ally Kimpton Photography for the amazing bump and back photo!