Is the 'hypno' part of Hypnobirthing scary?

 

I was already a midwife for 10yrs when I fell pregnant with my child. And although I knew the mechanics of birth, and felt confident in my body’s innate ability to give birth. I still felt fear creeping into my thoughts. When I was snuggled in bed, waiting to dream, I would remember the little person squirming in my belly needed to enter this world. When I was driving along in my car and my mind wandered to the day of my birth, I imagined pain. Little did I know that in these states of daydreaming I was actually already entering a self hypnosis.

So I enrolled myself and my partners into a course very similar to Hypnobirthing Australia’s. I initially thought it was just for my partner- who is not a midwife- to become educated and aware of the passage of birth. But what I found in that weekend, was the physiology I knew, the experience I had and the knowledge I had accumulated could only take me so far.

Many wise women have said in the past- your head has no place in birth. Never did I learn this as much as during this course.

I learnt that our minds are our biggest obstacle to a positive birth. All those times I had heard women asking for help, it was always ‘I cant do this for anouther 10hrs’ or ‘if it gets worse than this I wont cope’. But these are all fears for the future, women are coping in the now.

Learning self meditation or self hypnosis techniques allowed me to let go of the fear, it allowed me to stay present and accept what was happening in the now. The hypnosis wasn’t like on TV, no one clucked like a chicken. It was a deep meditation- where I was aware of the room, where I could react to danger (real or perceived) and where I felt safe.

I admit I had to work to accept hypnosis. All hypnosis is self hypnosis, so if you don’t believe it will work, it won’t work. I felt like accepting hypnosis was like being tricked, that if I could resist the deepening state then I was strong. But the opposite is true, accepting the gift of allowing yourself to sink deeply into a state of relaxation is amazing.

My birth was long, it was calm, it was beautiful. Was it easy? No, labour is hard work, labour takes you to a place of such intensity you struggle to put it into words. But labour doesn’t need to be painful and it doesn’t need to be scary.

Contact us for more information on Hypnobirthing Australia Workshops.

amy@eastsidemidwives.com.au or Helen on 0425 770 316

Posted on Apr 27, 2017