Hypnobirthing is about healthy women giving birth in a
healthy manner, and the bond between the couple and the newborn. It’s about
mind over matter. It’s a way to give birth without medical intervention. It’s a
drug free pain reliever. There are things that go into birth. Women feel pain
in birth because of many things like fear, tension and over-stimulation.
There is a cycle
called the fear, tension, pain syndrome where fear causes tension which in turn
tension causes pain. We as a culture have been conditioned to fear birth like
Pavlov’s dogs have been conditioned to salivate to the ring of the bell. We see
it every day through television where the women on the shows are told
everything that can go wrong in birth like baby’s death, mother’s death,
Cesarean section, injury to baby/mom, etc. We are told it from other women how
painful it is. Doctors give just enough information to the mother/ birth
partner to get consent to do an intervention.
Doctors use scare tactics and do not give the mother information of what
could happen if they wait to do intervention.
The fear created by all this conditioning causes the woman
in labor to tense up. It activates the autonomic nervous system. This makes us
feel like we are in an emergency. We breathe faster, our blood pressure rises
(can cause preeclampsia,) Our heart quickens, blood is shunted away from the
uterus which causes the vertical muscles to constrict instead of dilate. Our
hormones get involved. Catecholamines and cortisol hormones are released which
makes our body tense up more. When we tense up our body it stops the progress
on opening up to give birth. After all this the pressure of the horizontal
muscles on the uterus pulling on the constricted vertical muscles causes us to
experience pain.
When I started attending the hypnobirth class I learned
about how we can use our mind to release our fears. I learned how the mind can
enable a peaceful birth. In Hypnobirthing we recondition ourselves to not fear
birth through hypnosis, meditation, and relaxation. We change the words
normally used in birth like labor, pain, dilating, to less threatening words
like birthing, waves, and opening. We get our parasympathetic system to work
with the meditations, conditioned cues, and an environment that makes us more
comfortable. We practice before birth so that when the big day comes we are
conditioned to the cues. We have colors in our mind that deepens us into
relaxation. We use meditations to make us feel more comfortable. We use our
mind to make it more peaceful to bring our baby into the world. We make our
environment quiet, dark and peaceful so the baby feels at peace. We use
affirmations to make us feel stronger. We eat healthy like preparing for a
marathon so that our body has the energy it needs. We make sure to eat and
drink during birth to also give the body what it needs to be comfortable at
birth because when it does not have the energy it needs or the water it needs we
could experience pain again.
This reconditioning we practice before birth creates a sense
of self hypnosis which is a deeper relaxation and focus. Our boy reacts to what
happens in our minds. This is a psychophysical correlation.
If you would like to learn more about hypnobirthing you can contact a local hypnobirth instructor. Local Salt Lake instructors are found on this website: http://www.hypnobirthingutah.com/
Our instructor was Rachel Dietrich and her website is http://cachevalleyhypnobirthing.homestead.com
Namaste my friends
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