The key to remaining calm during labour & birth

Labour & Birth? Calm?

Do those words even belong in the same sentence??

Childbirth is supposed to be this sweaty, screaming, straining affair isn’t it? Red-faced, on your back, legs akimbo, with some stranger staring at/sticking their fingers inside your lady garden right?!

At least that’s what you see on the TV…

Let me tell you…this is absolutely NOT how birth should be, and yes it absolutely can be a calm event!!

Don’t worry, I’m not about to sell you some airy fairy “just breathe” approach. Whilst breathing techniques are massively important and helpful, there is also SO MUCH more that goes along with this.

No, the key to a calm labour & birth is this…

BIRTH EDUCATION

There, I said it. I’m sure that’s not the answer you were expecting. But the fact is that without birth education, you simply cannot understand the depth of what is happening within your body during labour and birth. Without this understanding, the mindset work has little effect. Without the mindset work, the breathing techniques have no focus. And without the breathing techniques, the ability to remain calm and in control is almost impossible!

Let’s reverse that…

When you take the time and spend the energy gaining a comprehensive and good quality birth education, you can gain a deep understanding of what your body is going through during labour & birth. The mindset work that you then do can have an astounding effect on the process, and the breathing techniques that you learn have a great deal of focus!

All of this together with learning about possible curveballs and how to effectively gain information and make informed decisions, will enable you to encompass a feeling of control, and therefore also be calm about the situation.

When we have knowledge and understanding, it eliminates that feeling of fear and panic because we KNOW what these sensations are, and we know what to expect, and we understand what different things might mean.

So there you go, the key to remaining calm during labour & birth is birth education!

However that education looks is up to you…

It could be a comprehensive birth education group course

It could be an online digital course

It could be 1:1 birth coaching

It could be through reputable books and your own research pieced together

However it looks for you is absolutely fine, because birth education is not necessarily “one size fits all”