Blissful Birth
Childbirth, Naturally

Congratulations to Dr Denis Walsh, one of the UK’s most influential midwives, who spoke out saying that mother and child would benefit if the ‘epidural epidemic’ gave way to yoga, hypnosis and birthing pools.

The Guardian Observer reveals that Dr Denis Walsh, a senior midwife and associate professor in midwifery at Nottingham University, said that hospital maternity staff are too quick to offer an epidural injection or agree to a painkilling injection request from a mother in labour.

Dr Walsh insisted that labour pain is natural, healthy and temporary, but the current culture of celebrity has made pain relief seem normal.

Unsurprisingly, his comments prompted a furious reaction from many quarters, but in my view this backlash only served to obsure his core messages.

Giving Birth is not a medical condition – it is a natural process.

And yet the number of women having an epidural has nearly doubled, despite medical risks such as a prolonged first and second stage of labour, a heightened chance of the baby’s head being in the wrong place and lower rates of breastfeeding.

And crucially, Dr Walsh says – “in the west it has never been safer to have a baby, yet it appears that women have never been more frightened of the processes”.

In my experience, it is this fear which makes labour more painful than it needs to be – as fear causes tension which slows down the process of giving birth.

Why?

Because, in survival terms, your body (and ‘mother nature’) knows that giving birth in a ‘dangerous’ situation could be fatal to you and your baby. Fear is the alarm bell that warns the body of danger.

The thing is, your body doesn’t know you are frightened of experiencing labour pain – so a vicious circle of fear, pain and tension sets up. In other words, women experience more pain in labour than is necessary because we have been conditioned to expect it.

It doesn’t have to be like that – and whether you choose to learn birth relaxation and reduce labour pain with our Blissful Birth programme, or you choose an alternative approach like HypnoBirthing or Yoga, you owe it to yourself to break that conditioning and have as relaxed a birth experience as possible for you and your baby.

Bye for now,
Heidi

Ps – Please leave your feedback and comments below!

It has been a while since I posted a blog entry – life with two boys is busy as you might imagine, so it hasn’t left a lot of time to write.

Our eldest turned three years old last month, which made me think how quickly time goes with children around – in hypnosis we call it ‘Time Distortion’ (which, by the way, is also a very useful technique to help change your perception of contractions in labour too).

It also means that the Blissful Birth programme is three years old now – and still going strong. Thanks to everyone who has purchased the programme over the last few years, and for telling your friends too.

It’s not much in the way of a return favour, but those of you who have already been through the Blissful Birth programme and have children will probably already know about ‘Handy Manny’ – which airs on Playhouse Disney.

Our eldest loves the programme (he even had Handy Manny plates and cups at his party), as well as the songs they sing. So after some fruitless googling for the lyrics, I decided to do a public service and put them here.

Those of you who are still pregnant will thank me one day

“Work Together”
Let’s get going and fix it right,
Twist and turn, make it tight,
Trabajamos juntos (← ‘we work together’)
we work together now.

Cut it, measure em, tap it flat,
Bend and twist, just like that,
Each of us has a special job,
We work together – Todos juntos (← ‘everyone together’)
We can fix it right!

“Let’s get to work”
Uno, Dos, Tres, Cuatro, Cinco, Seis, Siete, Ocho, (Neuve)
Hop up jump in,
Come on let’s go
Hop up jump in
Si vamanos (← ‘yes, lets go!’)
Hop up jump in
Don’t move too slow – keep up!
Let’s get to work
Muy rapido! (← ‘quickly!’)

Bye for now,
Heidi

Ps – Glad to have these? Think I’ve finally gone mad? Did I miss something? Leave your feedback below!