My midwife loaned me two titles this visit to peruse on natural childbirth. She has a great library and I'm all about free books on topics I love. Plus, its been 2.5 years, I figured I need a refresher.
Both are about managing pain and techniques for doing so during labor (excuse me, birthing). One, which I don't recall the title of because I put it down around page 6, was a little, to, umm..... weird.
When it comes to natural childbirthing circles, there is a lot of crunch out there. And by crunch, I mean a LOT - its hippy central to the max. I say that in the most loving, affectionate way possible, because, honestly, I do agree with a lot of what they have to say, even if I don't always execute it in the same way (fully nude birth, complete with pictures and eastern chants are not really my style).
However, when this book started explaining that childbirth can be a painless experience once you understand the six chakras and how to channel your inner spiritual energies to find the divine goddess within, the teacher from Charlie Brown took over (waaahh waahh waaahh waaahh) and I was about done.
First of all, painless? Have they given birth? Apparently, I'm just "doing it wrong"? Not to mention the theological differences someone such as myself would have with this theory.
The second book, of the popular hypnobirthing phenomenon, is less weirdy but still out of my purvue, I think. Its not focused on pagan spiritualities, but it is still rooted in the premise that childbirth is not a painful phenomenon and if you can relax enough (using relaxation techniques that you practice and condition yourself into during pregnancy), you will experience "birthing" as "uterine surges" and delivery as "breathing the baby out."
Here's why I think its not for me - I think too much.
Relaxation and self-hypnosis (which does skeeze me out, just a smidge, even though it is apparently a legitimate therapy technique) is all about visualization and well, relaxing.
I stink at visualization. Imagine your happy place? Fail.
Shoot, I have trouble praying the rosary because whenever I try to imagine the different mysteries, my mind goes off on terrible tangents. I am a very visual person, but I need the external stimuli - my cervix is an opening flower and my uterine muscles as soft, blue satin ribbons tightening is too abstract and distracting to focus on.
Thus, I ask the birthing world - where is my book? Where is a book, course, lecture, etc. that fits me?
I've had a baby - I know it hurts (shoot, I've had menstrual cramps - I already knew it hurts!). That isn't the problem. I don't have an issue with childbirth being, lets use a pretty euphemism here, "uncomfortable." Its like running a marathon (so I assume, since running is for prisoners) - no pain, no gain. Its not all foot massages and ice cream cones, but the end result is definitely worth it and the process can be enjoyable too, if you can be in the right frame of mind and soul.
So where's the book that helps Christian women birth? How do I use that pain for my own spiritual improvement? How do I unite those sufferings with Christ? How do I make my birth part of Christ's Redemptive Suffering? How do I focus enough on Him to pray through the pain?
If anyone has any thoughts or reading suggestions to share, please do so!
St.s Gerard Majella and Margaret of Antioch, patrons of childbirth, pray for all laboring women!
ETA:
My husband says - you should write one.
To which I respond - if I already knew how to do these things, I wouldn't be asking for a book about them!
Well, I'm going to be one of those commenters that doesn't help all that much...but I too have to visualize. I don't have a happy place. Honestly, the only way I did J all natural is because I had already had E 19 months before and new I could do it again. J's labor was much more intense (I was at a 9 with E when I got to the hospital, and a 5 with J but his felt like a 9) and longer but I knew the pain would plateau and at some point it wouldn't get any worse. And if I thought of E, I could refocus. So basically I just breathed through it until he crowned (which I didn't even feel that time around) and since I knew how to push, busted a lot of blood vessels getting him out. No meds, all natural for both.
ReplyDeletei'm hoping that helps this time too - i did it before so i can do it again?
ReplyDeleteI know I CAN do it, its just starting to pysch me out a little bit :-p
plus the whole - "It shouldn't actually hurt, you just need to relax more" makes me self-doubt and feel a little stabby :-p
You might be on to something- writing your own book. The problem I've always found with these birth books is they feel very all-or-nothing. Either you agree with their POV or you don't. I feel like there should be a book written by multiple women about their different stragegies and birth experiences. Then we don't have to feel guilty or inadequate for not following them to the letter. KWIM?
ReplyDeleteEmily - welcome! no, i totally know what you mean.
ReplyDeletei posted my skepticism on FB and a friend asked if by "catholic birth" i meant "no meds." And, while I did, for me personally, i think more importantly, even if you have an epi (or a c for that matter), there is a deep spirituality to birth - it is the most like Christ a woman becomes, in a physical sense (giving your body for the life of another.
How to use labor to make that efficacious in your own soul is something that all catholic mamas would benefit from, no matter the type of labor they have!
I don't know. I do love my hippy birthing books - I'm a total Ina May fan, just because the birth stories in her books make me happy and hopeful. I like the idea that there are women out there who don't find labor painful, regardless of whether or not I do.
ReplyDeleteBut it's true that different techniques are better suited to different people. When I was in labor with my first, I couldn't remember ANY of the techniques I read or tried before. I discovered that I don't WANT to be distracted or 'out of myself' during birth. Like you, I felt like it was a marathon and I just needed to get through it. Every contraction was necessary to get to the goal. I think that helped it to be less painful and frustrating because I could honestly welcome every contraction, but it wasn't anything like any book I'd read. I just kept thinking, "there's no way out but through, no way out but through". I couldn't even manage a hail mary. LOL.
My second birth was all kinds of fast and unexpected (7 weeks premature) so I didn't use any coping techniques at all except for screaming at the idiot nurse who tried to ask if I wanted an epidural when I was telling him that the BABY IS GOING TO COME OUT ANY MINUTE.
But still...I have all *kinds* of plans for how I want my next birth to be. :-D
oh i love those books too - i like reading birth stories were it "worked" for people - but i just feel like their way isn't my way (i couldn't manage any hail mary's either - gosh was i kicking myself afterwards! :-p all those souls in purgatory! lol)
ReplyDeletei was trying (badly) to focus on each contraction as it came (just have to get through this one, "put it in a box" as the birth instructor said), and i think that made it bearable. but a lot of whimpering ensued :-p
Caveat - It's been about four years since I've read the book I'll recommend, but I'm going to throw it out there anyway.
ReplyDeleteChildbirth Without Fear, by Grantly Dick-Read. He's from across the pond, and it was originally written in 1944.
I'm pretty sure this isn't *quite* the book you're looking for, but you might be able to get some bits and pieces out of it? Maybe after six or so more babies, you will be better equiped to write. :>)
I read "hypnobirthing" too, but never did the visualizations. During labor it did help me to do the relaxation breathing she describes between contractions, and then the "inhale as long as you can and exhale as long as you can" during the contractions. Until I got into transition, then I had to fall back to the "hee-hee-hooooooo" breathing I had learned in the hospital classes.
ReplyDeleteKnowing that I had done it once before (and maybe only that) helped me to make it through an awful transition phase during my second delivery that was induced by pitocin.
About making it a spiritual experience: I have a friend who went to confession and told the priest how sorry she was that she wasn't able to pray during the delivery. He just laughed at her... Maybe it's a little too ambitious to think that this is a good time to pray. Somewhere (and I forgot where) I read once that we pray now, so that during a time of suffering we don't have to.
I've wondered about any Catholic approaches to childbirth, too (specifically offering up the pain). Perhaps one of the devotionals below would help? I haven't read them myself yet, so if you looked at them I'd love to hear your impressions!
ReplyDeletePrayerfully Expecting by Cooper-O'Boyle
Your Labor of Love by Penny
Have not found a book I like from a specific Catholic perspective, but this second time around I really enjoyed reading "Birthin from Within" by Pam England as it is less about a specific technique as it is about helping you to identify your strengths and weaknesses and how to use (or minimize) in order to give yourself the best chance at having the birth you want.
ReplyDeletemy 2 cents
I think 2 things helped me during Lucia's birth. From a Catholic perspective, I did pray - even just saying "Hail Mary" or "Jesus, i trust in You" is just as focusing as saying the whole thing, but more importantly, I was praying for someone specific. I dedicated the whole ball of wax beforehand to this person and when feeling overwhelmed I recalled that I was doing this for him. It wasn't prayer per se but it made everything feel useful (because I am so bad at visualizing that I couldn't even focus on how these contractions were working towards getting the baby at the end) and connected to the prayer beforehand. The other thing was that I skimmed over my Dr. Sears' Birth Book and a diagram of the pain cycle really stuck in my head. That when you have fearful anticipation, you tighten your muscles which then have fatigue and are more suseptible to pain and then you have more fear, and then you tighten more, etc. etc. I don't recall if that's exactly it, but it's something like that. So I took my tendency to overthink and put it towards remembering that - as a contraction would come and I would start to tighten up in anticipation of pain I would command myself to relax, let go (and okay, being a california girl, I did try to think about the surge of a wave in the ocean) - not because I was a lotus flower but because I didn't want to get trapped by the pain. If I let go the pain would just pass me by, it would come and go and i would be fine. Worked more or less all the way to transition when everything was just piling all over, but then I could tell myself it was almost done.
ReplyDeleteHope those things help you as much as they helped me.
thanks vieve, that WAS Helpful! i need to come re-read all this when i'm close to my time... and figure out a good prayer intention :)
ReplyDelete