Controversial Subject!

Nef I am in no way saying HB doesnt work!!! But for me personally I cant think it would have worked as my way to cope with the pain was to scream. As I said, I didnt feel the need for pain relief. But my coping mechanism was to release the energy through screaming which isnt "wrong".
I was not scared at all of going into labour and in my opinion, I never believed that labour was "painful" so there was no fear for me. I was not afraid or fearful but excited to finally give birth and experience the miracle of life. I was very honestly shocked just how painful it can be as I always thought the moms I delivered were over reacting

Hi Claudia,
HypnoBirthing should work for everyone, purely because everyone is able to go int and out of a hypnotic state, whether they are aware of it or not. When you drive and arrive at your destination, but don't remember the route, watching TV, daydreaming in a boring meeting - all states of hypnosis.
BUT being able to take youself in and out of a deeply relaxed state at will takes practice.
So for me being a research scientist by trade starting HB as a pregnant mom was a bit out of character, but I persevered out of desperation to avoid my 1st birth experience.
The weird thing is because it is a conscious choice to go into that relaxed state and you are still conscious but focussed you are actually more alert and more in control- especially during birth, you experience it so much more.
Does that make sense?

@Claudia, hypnobirthing can totally work for you! I have never known that i can be completly relaxed and completly in control at the same time. But its exactly how i felt when i birthed my baby! The reason i did hypnobirthing was because i wanted to be in control of my body and my babies birth and it worked out great.
In the end i had a little interference with my gyni putting pressure on me to push, which i did and because of this it hurt for the last few minutes and i had a little tear but other than that i had a great experience.
Next one will be a home birth!

@ Nefertiti, I've never really looked into the hypnobirthing thing because I'm an A type personality that overthinks things and have always figured that this would affect my ability to "let go". I never really switch off - I sleep very little and will often get up in the middle of the night to do things if I think of them, because I cant just put things on the back burner.
My choice to home birth was not because I'm a hippy type, rather that I did not trust a South African Doctor to not practice defensive medicine as opposed to evidence based medicine which seems to be so endemic in our private obstetric services. I dealt with the pain because I told myself that an epidural or pain relief were not an option unless a c section was on the cards - that for millenia women have tolerated the pain (and gone on to have further children) so why should I need any different. Do you think that hypnobirthing would work for me or am I just one of those "types" of personality that isnt ever really able to let go.
(Incidently the reason I hate drinking alcohol is that I hate that out of control feeling, so aside from the occasional glass of wine with a nice dinner I border on teetotaler)

Meags, yes you attended the course, but unless you had listened to the rainbow relaxation daily for the last 3 months of pregnancy (which I know you didn't get on with) practised the breathing daily, and had a specific fear release during your pregnancy about your upcoming birth, then you couldn't expect to see the benefits of the techniques.

Because of your background and your exposure to birth before your own, any imprint of pain would have been a significant one. As you would know from the book and course, any negative images of anxiety of any kind can affect the birth process.

You had the birth that was right for you and Matt, I'm not saying its wrong that you didn't practice the techniques - it's not for everyone, and besides when you attended the course it was in your capacity as a midwife and not a mom-to-be.

BUT it is really important that women that are interested in HB understand that achieving a pain-free hypnobirth comes not by just reading the book, or attending a course - there is a lot more to it. Remember my analogy of weight watchers? I just give the moms the recipes, it is up to them to use them or they won't get any results. ONLY the mom is able to take herself into a relaxed state on the day and that comes from weeks of practice.

I hope that makes sense and you don't think I am dismissing your comment or experience - just trying to explain why it would not have worked for you

xx

Tanz Im going to be totally honest about my experience.
I had been on the hypnobirthing course and read the book too. During labour I so wanted to try the breathing and relaxing but honestly - the pain was SO intense for me that no matter what I tried, the only thing I could do was scream in order to cope.
Not once did I feel like I wanted something for the pain though which is strange. I never sat there wishing for an epidural or something. I just screamed (HYSTERICALLY) through each contraction (from 7-10cm which was luckily only 90 minutes).

From 0-7cm I coped. Up to 5cm I wasnt even sure I was in labour. 5-7cm I paced really fast up and down the room. From 7cm I sat on the bed sobbing and screaming and couldnt move or concentrate or anything. I felt like I was dying.

At 8-9cm they broke my waters (I asked them to, to speed things up) and they noticed meconium in the waters (indicating fetal distress) and baby's heartrate dropped instantly.

Midwife told me to let her know when I wanted to push. 30 minutes later I still felt nothing but I was fully dilated and head very very low. So I started pushing. I had to push exceptionally hard as baby needed to get out quickly as he was not coping at all. I asked the midwife to cut an episiotomy to help make space for the baby and she said no, just to push hard. So I did. I tore on both labia, the one side worse than the other and I felt it tear - it was flipping sore but when I knew that the head was now out, I was so happy!! I pushed so hard all the blood vessels in my eyes had burst! I was physically dead exhausted from the labour and birth that I didnt even want to hold the baby. I was exceptionally swollen down there and struggled to walk for 5 days. I believe if I didnt have to push so hard and if I could have had a slower delivery, perhaps I wouldnt have been so sore down there.

I think I could deal with the pain again but honestly I am considering epidural for the next one only because I missed out on bonding with Matt due to being so drained and exhausted and I didnt even have the energy to feed him.

Thanks everyone for all your inputs! I really appreciate having a place I can ask for some advice!