Just Relax...

What's the first thing that comes to mind when you hear "we're taking a Hypnobirthing class"? Probably picturing people sitting in a circle with incense floating in the air and someone chanting meditations at you. That's pretty much what I thought when I first heard about Hypnobirthing through bebo mia when I first started working with them. Still relatively new to this whole world, I was on a bit of overload. Doulas and homebirths were one thing. Hypnobirthing and placenta encapsulation were a whole different story.

Until I sat in on a class.

As part of my intro to bebo mia over a year ago, I was invited to sit in on the first class of a Hypnobirthing series so I could have an idea of what went on and would be able to explain it from experience. That one class completely changed my mind about what Hypnobirthing really was, and how helpful it could be to achieving a calm birth experience. The class description does a really good job of introducing what Hypnobirthing is, but it's also so much more. I just love the very first sentence of the description:

"HypnoBirthing® is a birth education program that teaches you to replace fear and tension with   confidence and relaxation."

Sounds good, right? Who wouldn't want that! How could it be that easy without everyone doing it? I think it's simply that people either don't have the resources to hear about it, or the name totally turns them off (guilty!). I really wish they would have picked a different name.

So, I'm not a big textbook reader in general, but I really got a lot out of reading the Hypnobirthing book that came with the course. Combined with discussions in class, there were a few things in particular that really stood out. Things like:
 
When you are presented with a stressful situation, your body is programmed to go into Fight or Flight mode. In the case of labour, Fight isn't really an option, unless you punch your husband, which might make you feel better for about 3 seconds. Flight also isn't really an option since you can't escape your own body. But when your body goes into a sort of "flight'' mode, all of your energy (including blood and oxygen) spreads to your extremities (arms, legs), in order to help your body get away. We heard a story about about a woman who had such a traumatic labour and was so completely terrified that when she ended up in a C-section, her uterus had turned completely white since all her blood had gone to other areas of her body. YIKES. So what happens when you can't fight or flight in labour? You freeze. When you freeze, your body essentially shuts down, you tense and tighten...meaning that every muscle that should be relaxed to allow for a natural birth has closed up and baby can't get anywhere. All of a sudden, your labour slows or stalls, baby is distressed, and boom: surgery. No fun.

Somewhere along the way in our history and culture, birth became something negative or something to be feared. This explains why there used to be (and still are) women who stop their walk through a field, lean against a tree, birth their baby, and go on their way. There's a fantastic story in the book about Dr. Dick-Read (a central influence in Hypnobirthing) and how a birth in 1913 changed his entire mindset about childbirth. He had gone to assist a poor woman living in the slums of London with her birth. This was when they would use chloroform to knock you out and deliver the baby while you slept. When he tried giving her the chloroform, she refused and kept breathing deeply. She birthed her baby with a few deep breaths, calmly and silently. The doctor asked why she had refused pain relief and she shocked him by saying "It didn't hurt. It wasn't supposed to, was it Doctor?". Whaaaaat?! This prompted his assumption that the absence of fear during birth also meant the absence of fear, and after years of research, he called his theory the "Fear-Tension-Pain Syndrome". Meaning that it's as simple as that. If there's fear, there will be bodily tension which physiologically causes pain. Without fear, there may be discomfort, pressure, etc. but no pain.

Why can we trust our bodies to know how to conceive a baby, how to grow a baby during pregnancy, but quickly doubt our bodies ability to birth the baby? (We talked about this a lot in my prenatal yoga class). 

Anyways, this is getting long winded and I've probably somewhat made my point. I'm sure Hypnobirthing in it's entirety isn't going to be for everyone. But at it's essence, learning how to tune out fear and draw on relaxation techniques during birthing is something anyone could benefit from. I'm off to listen to the relaxation CD and very very likely fall asleep...