Hypnobirthing has become a much more accepted approach for Mums to take these days and I am currently practicing what I preach by working hard in preparation for my first baby!
Reframing the mind is a wonderful tool to help lower anxieties before childbirth. Before any big event in our lives we need to go in feeling relaxed, or as relaxed as we can manage as this enables us to deal with situations in a positive way.
Childbirth is an event where we have to really allow ourselves to be driven by our primitive mind (quite different to what I am normally teaching people to do!) but this is where we see the wonder that is us! The instinctual behaviour of us as mammals, this knowledge is running through our DNA!
We are amazing creatures and we only need to look at how our bodies develop through pregnancy; growing a baby, changing and accommodating this new soul, not to mention what happens through the birthing process to really see how amazing we are.
I mentioned earlier ‘Reframing’; this is quite an important part to the hypnobirthing process. We’ve been conditioned and programmed over centuries in the Western world to expect serious pain and things to go wrong during childbirth, and that it’s not a pleasant experience. That’s not to say that these things don’t happen to some, but I hear so many other positive childbirth stories by women that I deal with through both my hypnotherapy and reflexology practice, saying how they enjoyed the birth and some saying they loved it.
The point that strikes me the most is that if you go in to the birth with lowered anxiety, i.e. you feel relaxed, intrigued or excited even, women seem to express a very different experience to those that have gone in with very high levels of anxiety. Now we know that if we feel threatened during childbirth, we can actually stop labour. This is a throw back form times gone by where if you saw a tiger pacing outside your cave, you would realise that this is not a good time to birth, and by allowing our Amygdala (the fight, flight part of our brain) to do its job, you would contract and stop the labour process.
So if we have that amazing ability, it really makes you think how important it is for a woman to feel safe and comforted during a time that she is at her most vulnerable. This can be where a birthing partner can really come into their own, making sure that before the birth they discuss what would be the most helpful and useful considerations for the birthing Mum. Think of environment, lights down low, music, breathing, massage, being able to see when the woman needs space – and also how when intervention is needed how to deal with this.
Allowing the anxiety to be lowered before birth really helps the woman to allow her primitive mind to take over during the birthing process. This is a doing activity – not a conscious thinking one, which is why the birthing partner is so important (whether that be Dad, a relative, friend, etc.). They need to allow the woman to get in the zone, so to speak, and if you talk to many midwives they say that is what women do during labour they go off somewhere else!
Getting yourself in the best possible mindset before birth is a wonderful thing to do, allowing you to enjoy pregnancy, and more importantly feel relaxed about your birth preparation. If you feel relaxed and go in with an open mind you can realise that location and plans can change but a settled, calm, strong mind cannot…