Music is good for both you and your Baby

We now know that unborn babies hear, love and remember music, especially if the music you are listening to makes you feel relaxed. Your baby is able to relive those good feelings associated with the music each time they hear it and calms them as they recreates the reassuring feelings the music engendered in the womb.

There is also research to show that baby’s prefer not just music but voices as well, which goes to show how easy it can be to communicate with your unborn baby anytime you want.
You can put on music and sing to them at the same time, maybe your favourite nursery rhymes. After they are born put on this music and sing and help quieten them.

Gently dancing while you are pregnant will also be appreciated as they love the rhythmic sway of your body as well. The rush of endorphins they experience as you do something you love gives them a feeling of contentment and pleasure.

Inspiring Birth Stories

I am collecting women’s stories on pregnancy and birth to compliment my book Birth Beyond Fear. I would like to invite you to add your story to the collection. My aim is to inspire other pregnant women with your stories, to motivate them to know they can change their beliefs and thoughts around childbirth from fear or anxiety to trusting in the process of birth.
In particular I would like you to:
1. Describe how you prepared yourself emotionally and mentally for birth.
2. Tell me about your labour and birth and early parenting.
3. How did you support yourself if things didn’t go as you planned?
I want the book to focus on the solutions to challenges you were able to overcome, so other women can use these inspiring stories to overcome their own challenges.
They can be as short as one page or as long as five. Put in anything you think may help another woman during her pregnancy and birth.
If you have any questions or would like to send me your story email me on lorraine@birthbeyondfear.com.au

Becoming Aware of Your Fears

One of the most important things a woman can do is to become aware of her fears about childbirth, because once you have awareness of these fears you are halfway there to changing them. One way to become aware is to ask yourself the following questions. If they cause you begin to experience fear in any way it is because you have an underlying negative belief which once aware of, you can now easily change, if you choose.

Your Own Birth
What are the stories your mother has told you about your own birth or your sibling’s births, were they positive or negative? Remember it is not always what was said that matters, non-verbal communication is just as important.

Others Births
What types of births did others in your family have? What about your friends? How do you feel when you see births portrayed on television and in the media?

Your Own Previous Labour and Birth
You will take with you all the experiences of your last birth with into your next birth. Was your last birth was long and difficult? Were you able to resolve any issues you had about your previous labour and birth?

You Support Network
Are the people who support you during your pregnancy positive or negative. Do they believe in your ability to give birth?
Does your work place support your pregnancy and your planned leave following the birth?

Your Relationship With Your Baby’s Father
Is your baby’s father involved and supportive during the pregnancy? Are you able to communicate what your needs are to them during the pregnancy and birth?

Your Career
Will you need to put your career path on hold following the birth of your baby? Do you intend to return to work very soon after the birth?

Adjusting To Parenthood
Are you afraid that you won’t be able to cope as a mother? Were you given a good or bad role model in your own parents? What childcare arrangements do you have?

Your Living Arrangements
Will you need to move to a bigger home? Have you left these changes to your living arrangements to the last minute?

Caregivers
Do you feel comfortable with your present caregiver? Do you feel that they will be supportive of your plans for your birth?

Money
Do you have enough savings to allow you not to work after your baby is born? How soon will you need to go back to work? Will you be able to meet your monetary commitments?

Loss of Control
Do you feel you need to control everything about your pregnancy and birth? Do you have a long and detailed birth plan? Are you frightened of losing control in your labour?

In my next post I will give you a ideas to help you change these any negative beliefs you have discovered.

Childbirth Education Classes Increase Women's Fear About Childbirth?

Can this be true? Surely not! Don't we encourage women to go to childbirth education classes to reduce their fears? So I thought that is until I attended a conference last week and was stunned by the findings of recent research that showed that women's fear levels in childbirth were actually increased in those women who attended childbirth education classes! Where have we gone wrong? As the guardians of normal birth have we forgotten what are role is? That is promote, encourage and support women to achieve their birth with unnecessary and minimal intervention. Are we emphasizing obstetric care not midwifery care in our classes? Have we gone overboard in giving women to much information to cover ourselves? I think there needs to be a major review of the information women receive in these classes, we need to give a more balanced view. Let us not forget we are midwives and as a profession in our own right we should be creating programs that are midwifery lead and focus on midwifery and not obstetrics and let the obstetricians conduct their own classes if they choose to.

I would love to hear what others think.

A Simple Technique to Eliminate Fear in Childbirth

A simple technique you can use to help eliminate fear in childbirth is to question your reality in the present moment. Fear can only get it's grip on you when you are focus on the past or the future. Ask yourself the question "what is my reality right now?" and the answer  is usually all is well. When you are able to put aside your fears you are able to make choices that are based in reality, you are able to do what needs to be done. 

Stay in the moment and fear has no chance of getting you in it's grip. In future blogs I will give you tools to help you stay in the moment.

Helping Woman Make Choices

What motivates women to make the choices they make about the the place they give birth? Would they make different choices if they know that where they give birth will have impact on their birth outcome? I have often wondered this and after speaking with many women on the Birth Beyond Fear program realize that as midwives we have a huge potential to influence women to in this choice. But do we? Women know very little about the differences in outcomes of their births in relation to caregiver or place of birth and as midwives we definitely know. Who hasn't had a friend ask "who is the best doctor to go to?" "Which is the best hospital?" We as midwives are there with women and we see what happens to them. How can we use this knowledge in a professional way to benefit women? By of course asking them them what they want, overcoming their fears regarding childbirth, as often their choices are based in fear and giving them  information to make an informed choice. Sound easy? It is! We must as caregivers eliminate our own and women's fear surrounding childbirth or we have very little chance of stemming the tide of unnecessary intervention. In my privileged position as both a midwife and Birth Beyond Fear practitioner I have assisted many woman make these choices that have been best for both themselves and their baby.

Testimonials

Thank you for your guidance, you give women the ability to have the birth of their dreams

Cindy (midwife)

The Birth Beyond Fear "angel" Your experience is amazing, the program allowed me to look forward to having a wonderful birth experience enabling me to believe that I could do anything. Continue to keep the "normal" births numbers coming!!

Kylie (midwife)

Thank you so much for the Birth Beyond Fear program, I truly believe it was benefical in preparing me mentally and emotionally for labour and birth. I whole experience was so incredible and I feel blessed it went so smoothly. Our session definitely allowed me to go with whatever my labour involved. I also found I was able to focus and turn inwards throughout it all. It was amazing!

Belinda (midwife)

Thank you so much for all your kind help you gave us throughout out pregnancy in  preparation for the birth of our gorgeous son. Everything went really really well which we feel is in a great part due to the support and preparation that you were able to help us with. I know for sure that the Birth Beyond Fear CD I listened to throughout the pregnancy really empowered me to trust myself and my body to birth our son naturally, as we both wanted.

Leesa

I believe the session I had with you and the CD's had a very positive effect on me and our baby. He is very a beautiful and calm baby, we constantly receive comments on how contented he is. I  believe your program helped both he and I through our long labour.

Fleur

Thank you so much for your CD. I listened to it every day and found it much better then my previous hypnosis CD. I had our beautiful girl after a 2 hour labour.

Francis

Thank you so much for the Birth Beyond Fear program . I really felt it helped me cope for so long at home during the first stage of my labour and enabled me to stay calm and accept by birth journey as it unfolded.

Monica (midwife)

Well our little bundle arrived on the 4 May and was born at home in the birth pool, I can only describe it as perfect. I don't remember using any keywords or mantras from the CD but feel sure that it played a huge part and a positive part to my labour. I felt natural, unafraid and confident in my ability to birth our baby without any pharmacological pain relief. I am sure that my birth experience will enrich my midwifery practice hugely. Thank you for offering the Birth Beyond Fear program, for putting your time and love into making my experience so rich and rewarding. I feel ten feet tall, bulletproof and amazing. Childbirth for me was a life changing positive event. 

Melissa (midwife)

Why I like to work with women's fear in childbirth

I have been fascinated from the very first woman I saw who had the ability to go to a place within herself, to allow her body to do what it is designed to do, that is give birth safely and easily. I wanted to know why some women had this ability and others fought the birth process and had difficult painful births. Over the years I have come to understand why and now know with no doubt that it is the woman's attitude, beliefs and fears that have an enormous impact on how she births her baby. I also know from my work with so many women who are willing to look at these attitudes, beliefs and fears, that you can change them and thus change your birth experience from one of fear and anxiety to one of trust. So I get enormous satisfaction as I see women become empowered by their births as they use the tools from the Birth Beyond Fear program and find a power within themselves they never knew they had,  no matter what their birth journey is.

Welcome to Birth Beyond Fear!

I saw my first birth as a student nurse at the age of 17 and I knew from that moment that I wanted to become a midwife. I remember just holding this woman's hand as she gave birth, fascinated by the whole process, as well as being enthralled by the ability of the midwife to support and guide her. The following day the woman thanked me and said that she couldn't have done it without me. I remember thinking that all I had done was hold her hand and give her encouragement, telling her that her baby was going to arrive soon. I didn't feel I deserved such gratitude for such a simple bit of kindness, but then I realised that one of the most important things for a woman in childbirth was simply to have someone there who has faith in her ability to give birth. 

My plans to become a midwife however were put aside to have 2 children of my own, but all the while that fascination I had in the beauty of childbirth and the immense power of women to give birth easily, stayed with me in the background of my mind. When my daughter turned 5, I decided that it was now time for me to follow my dreams of becoming a midwife. 

As a midwifery student, every day I got to immerse my self in learning about the miracle of childbirth and every day I thought how lucky I was to be getting paid to do something I adored. I thought that everyone, like me, would love to spend their lives helping women in one of the most exciting and joyful times of their lives, but was to soon discover that I had something special inside me that would make me a wonderful midwife, a strong desire to help women and share this joy with them. 

So here I am now, 20 years later and I still find that with each birth I witness and support, I am filled with awe of the beauty of the whole experience and the power of women. I now hope to dedicate my life and my experience to helping women to overcome any fears they have surrounding pregnancy and childbirth and to encourage them and give them the tools with which they can have the birth of their dreams.