Hypnobirthing - Terrified to Empowered and Confident
Let me give you a little background to my personality before I launch into why I did Hypnobirthing and why I'm so convinced that the techniques are hugely beneficial, that I've chosen to train as a practitioner plus utilise my nutrition studies together.
I once read in a book about being a fearful person. Being born fearful. I mean, you can ask any member of my family and they'll tell you that I was indeed an exceptionally freaked out child.
When I was born my father quickly picked up that I was finely tuned, overly sensitive and not just affected by my own emotions but by others too. Seeing someone else hurt, made me hurt.
It was true. Without going into my 'life' story too much I eventually realised I had to control this. Yet, it took me nearly 27 years to realise.
The 23rd of December 2016 my father passed away. Unknowingly, I was pregnant and just four days later on the 27th of December that was in fact my 27th Birthday, I found out.
Suddenly, life was no longer about just me. It was about someone else too. Someone I hadn't met. Yet felt an instant strong connection and bond too despite how terrified I was.
Terrified of what? Terrified of giving birth. Which sounds ridiculous considering I’m a woman that’s anatomy and physiology is built to birth!
So here I was, putting on a brave face after my Dad had died. Trying not to show too much emotion to anyone but more so trick my own brain because I didn't want any stress for my baby. Soon enough it catches up with you, right? At some stage you have to deal to your emotions.
Three months later, my father’s death hit me like a tonne of bricks so that I decided to see a counsellor. I thought talking to an outside person would help. It did. Reflecting on my childhood when I was little and following my dad around like a shadow, brought back a feeling of peace, happiness and joy.
However, I was still scared to give birth. I mean, all I heard were awful stories. A natural event in a woman’s life that’s been blown up into something that she should suddenly be fearful of. Severe tearing, emergency caesarean sections, 40 hour labours, inductions, drugs, epidurals... How can you not be fearful when no one wants to tell you a good story! On top of all this, having a naturally heightened personality that's sensitive and operates far too much from the sympathetic system didn’t help! What a concoction for absolute disaster... Or was it?
I began researching about natural births and positive birth stories. One afternoon a close friend of mine told me about a book called 'Hypnobirthing - The Mongan Method'
It sounded too good to be true. But, hell, I'll give anything a go! I rapidly read the book and I was convinced that I’d found a practitioner and coincidentally got the last spot on the course. It was meant to be.
What is Hypnobirthing?
First of all, some might say it’s a bit “woo woo” and there is no conclusive scientific evidence that it works but I can honestly say it significantly helped me relax throughout my labour and birth. I suppose you could say Hypnobirthing is just a fancy word for what woman have been doing for centuries. It is essentially just deep relaxation free from fear.
The aim is to give the mother and birthing companion tools and techniques to experience a calm, relaxed, beautiful, peaceful experience, nature intended, birthing to be. Doesn’t that sound wonderful!
When you go into labour stressed out, tense or fearful then your body does not function as it should.
Based on our current societal conditioning we are programmed to think that labour is painful and usually needs medical assistance. So, the science behind our brains is that when we hit the 'fear' response our body goes into fight or flight mode taking blood oxygen away from non-essential organs such as your uterus and diverting it to essential organs. This causes the muscles in the uterus to fatigue and not operate as they should. Our bodies begin pumping too much adrenaline and our cortisol levels go through the roof which blocks endorphins and tenses all of our muscles making it harder for the involuntary muscles responsible for labour to do their job. Labour is now operating from our 'sympathetic nervous system' which is referred to as the 'emergency room' by Marie Mongan, the founder of hypnobirthing, a place we should only stay in for less than 2% of our lives and is designed for when we are in danger. E.g. like a massive grizzly bear is about to eat us! Using this 'emergency room' blocks the oxytocin flow (the love hormone) which in turn makes labour slower. When we have the ability to activate our 'parasympathetic nervous system' also known as 'rest and digest' through utilising our breath, we draw from using the hormones we need for labour.
Your parasympathetic system and sympathetic system cannot work together. Our bodies will not allow it.
Hypnobirthing utilises a mixture of using breathing techniques, visualisation, deep relaxation and positive affirmations to birthing effectively through self-hypnosis that in turn reinforces to your subconscious mind which is what you readily access when birthing.
These techniques together provide practical ways for your birthing companion to assist you throughout labour. Now, I know you might be thinking that I’m slightly a bit mad. How could you possibly be under “self-hypnosis?” However, all self-hypnosis is simply a powerful way of speaking to your subconscious which is used by many successful people in society. Believe it or not, we actually engage in self-hypnosis on a daily basis. Have you ever got in your car, arrived and your destination and thought “How did I get here” – well you were in fact in self-hypnosis! We also engage in it with self-talk. Have you ever heard of using positive talk will get you positive results? Hypnobirthing is no different.
So, you are reading this and maybe still slightly sceptical… “Bec, what about people that need medical intervention…What about the ones that still have a difficult birth?” – Yes, I totally appreciate that. Sometimes, it’s unavoidable and I completely believe in keeping an open mind that if your birth takes a turn and it requires intervention for the safety of you and your baby then that’s okay too. I have had friends that would have loved to have had a natural birth and their mind set was completely in the right place but due to circumstance, medical intervention was necessary.
However, in my case, learning the hypnobirthing techniques and skills to deeply relax enough and my partner the skills to actively assist in a meaningful and practical way. The classes my teacher offered were very calming. We spent a lot of time focusing on deep relaxation, visualisation exercises as well as learning about the physiology of labour. It wasn’t just about going to a class once a week and then forgetting about it until your next class. I practised these techniques every day and throughout the day. I can honestly say that I put my heart and soul into doing everything I could, to have the most positive and empowering birth experience for both me and my daughter. I suppose you could look at it like running a marathon – you don’t just throw yourself in the deep end and show up on the day to run 40km, you mentally and physically prepare your body prior. To some peoples despair, I never took any standard antenatal classes and I chose not to because I was continuously told that they prepared you for the medical model whereas hypnobirthing explains how your body works in labour and how to optimise that. A relaxed body enables dilation to progress more smoothly and which exercises will allow this to happen.
The techniques that Hypnobirthing offers, isn’t just great for labour and birthing but it’s great for everyday life!
Besides hypnobirthing, I attended a holistic antenatal course - Optimum, which I highly recommend
as it reinforced similar skills you learn in Hypnobirthing yet it's very interactive with a bunch of like minded parents. It's about mindful childbirthing and they offer you learning tools to enable you to overcome fear, utilise your breath calmly and confidently and support you holistically as you approach the birth of your baby and transition into parenthood.
I loved, loved, loved it!
I also kept active throughout my pregnancy, attended yoga classes, practised regular meditation and I worked with a chiropractor weekly to establish the best pelvic balance prior to birthing along with maximising the right nutrition, taking any necessary supplementation to benefit myself and my baby along with a specific probiotic that is formulated for infant growth, infant development and wellbeing.
This all might sound like a lot but I wanted the absolute best start I could offer my beautiful bubby Bella! Birth shouldn’t be about feelings of fear or anxiety it should be about feeling excited and empowered for the big day of meeting your beautiful bubby! I honestly cannot recommend hypnobirthing highly enough. If you would like any further information on hypnobirthing or the holistic antenatal course, Optimum that I attended please feel free to ask me. I'm more than happy to share!
As always, yours in happiness and good health,
Bec xx
