Anybody else done hypnobirthing/ gone drug-free for labour? How did that go for you?

[YourVagesty]

Hi all!

I'm reading a lot of Ina May (famous hippy midwife basically) material at the moment and I follow her logic that the female body is built for birth. It all makes sense to me that if a woman isn't stressed and understands what is happening, then the body should be able to birth a child without interventions. And her statistics speak for themselves too (she hardly ever has to use forceps or even stitch women up afterwards).

I like the idea of doing things naturally, with the help of hypnobirthing.

But obviously, part of me wonders if it's hippy nonsense and I'll be screaming for an epidural when it's too late to get any help? I realise this might sound hilariously naive to some!

So I'm looking for real-life stories of people who eschewed epidurals and went with hypnobirthing instead.

How did you get on? Any regrets? Would you do it again?

So as not to drip feed, this is my second baby but I had an emergency C-section with my first.

First birth was fantastic. I just used TENS and water - I didn't like gas and air. It hurt, but it was always manageable. I didn't tear, got up and walked away. It was an amazing experience and I felt beyond incredible when it was done. I just went into my head and I could do it.

Not planned, but I delivered my first with just gas and air that I didn’t get until I was 8cm. Too quick for any other forms of pain relief. I will admit my body panicked as everything happened so quickly but I can imagine if it was a slower build up I would have managed better

First time I didn't really understand, in hindsight, didn't practice enough, kept thinking about my progress, kept trying to chat to the midwife, kept being the sensible normal me, between contractions. I strongly suspect if I had been more focussed on my body and done more of the relaxation techniques, I wouldn't have felt I needed the epidural which was so (over) effective I felt no pressure at all, and meant I laid on my back for hours. Supposedly sleeping but actually panicking and thinking.
Second time around, DH and I read the scripts many more times, I practiced mindfulness, I practiced my counting methods. In labour, DH advocated for me not wanting constant midwife presence, and read the scripts. I stayed in my inward looking bubble throughout. Was at home initially then in birthing pool at birth centre.
At a certain point, I thought, this is too much, I've been doing well but I can't do it now. Two more contractions and baby was born.
It was honestly blissful. Painful, but I was so tuned into seeing the pain as productive. I felt very well supported, and very loved.

Would highly recommend Katherine Graves book and accompanying Spotify tracks. So helpful to have a plan to follow, and listen to. I found my DH reading aloud far better on the day, than prerecorded Spotify tracks. More personal, and he could pause instantly if I held a hand up or spoke.

I didn't do hypnobirthing but had 2 natural births without pain relief. I kept myself fit and active during pregnancy (which I 100% think makes a difference) I think I'm quite good at dealing with pain generally if I know what it is and that it's happening for a reason, pain is only scary when you don't know what's causing it. I kept telling myself this is literally what woman were designed to do, of course I can do this. Probably also helped i grew up on a farm and have watched 100's of animals give birth with no pain relief or complications.
The contractions are the sore bit if you can deal with them you can do it and they don't get any sorer as the labour progresses, you just tire of them so find a way to deal with them. For me it was to keep moving in earlier labour, when a contraction came on I would march around the room until it passed. As labour went on I counted, when a contraction came on I started counting and kept thinking by the time I count to 20 this will be passed and it always was. Both births I walked to the shower within 2 hours of having them, and that was only so long because I breast fed 1st. I had no intervention and needed 2 stitches 1st time for a slight graze and no stitches 2nd time. I felt absolutely amazing and empowered after, honestly was the best feeling in the world. I would love to do labour/birth again, just the 5 years after putting me off 😂

What a crock 🤣

I never set out to have a pain relief free birth but just used hypnobirthing as a tool to help me. First time around it really helped, got me to 8cm dilated no issues but then it all went out the window to be honest, still only had had and air but baby got stuck and had a long and painful pushing phase. Second time around I ended up in an EMCS after baby got stuck again (seems I have a quite tiled pelvis which seems to cause issues), but hypnobirthing techniques were absolutely INVALUABLE when it came to the spinal and the process itself. So worth doing either way just don’t pin your hopes on no pain relief, be open to all options.

Really…. Every birth is different. No one else’s birth story can prepare you for the birth you’ll have. You can give birth 2,3 or even 4 times and experience different births each time.
I agree Hypnobirthing and the breathing/mediation can be great for all types of birth and understanding the physiology of what your body is going through is never a bad thing. BUT… it’s a lottery. Everything on the day can come down to so many factors outside of your control. It’s easy to say that your head space, your fitness level etc. will determine your outcome but that’s disingenuous and part of the reason so many women experience birth trauma and a sense of disappointment or failure when it doesn’t go to plan. “But I’m fitter than so-and-so, why did they get such a straight forward birth and I didn’t? She takes a day off work when she stubs a toe, so why did I end up having an epidural?” Ultimately it’s a roll of the dice.
By all means try for an unmedicated birth, but also read up on all the pain relief available to you and decide what you are and aren’t comfortable with. Pain relief when you need it to birth your baby safely makes you sensible, not weak. A respite from pain can re-centre you to keep going. There are no medals for how you get there, you just need to get there.

Lots of hypnobirthing practice for DD1…. But she was firmly wedged transverse so wasn’t going to come out the traditional way.

At a meet up after the babies in my group were all born, the cow of a leader told me it was a shame I’d had a CS. Yeah… a shame me and DD hadn’t died…

My NCT leader was like that. Those types of people are part of the problem. It baffles me that they are put in charge of “mentoring” first time mums. Getting to new mums at their most vulnerable more like…

I didn’t do hynobirthing but didn’t have any pain relief. I had a few puffs of gas and air but it didn’t do much except make me queasy so I didn’t bother with more. I’d have asked for an epidural if I felt I needed it, I hadn’t gone in with any firm desires for a particular birth.

With DD2 I focused on breathing more, and staying relaxed during the contractions (with DD1 I sort of tended against them) and it helped massively. Didn’t have any pain relief for that birth either, but again, not through any strong feeling either way. I was induced with DD2, and my only firm opinion was that I was refusing consent for the drip unless I had an epidural actually in place and working. It didn’t come to that, as I didn’t need the drip.

My view of hypobirthing

it works if there are no problems, but there are often problems

It’s bullshit that our bodies were designed to do this perfectly - the maternal and neonatal death rate was huge before we had medical interventions, and still is in places where these interventions aren’t available. That’s the evolutionary trade off for having large skulls and brains.

I used hypnobirthing and it very much did help with the pain. To the extent that with DC2 they didn’t believe I was in labour and I nearly gave birth in the triage room. DC1 I had gas & air and that’s it.
However - my babies were small, correctly positioned, I went into labour naturally not induced and my labour progressed fast. Any sniff of induction or back to back labour or a 30+ hour marathon and I’d have wanted some drugs please.

Basically it can help you deal with the pain but it can only do so much.

First labour was a horrible, slow drawn out back labour ending in an assisted delivery and epidural.

Second time around I went to a pregnancy yoga class read Ina May, spent hours looking at a website called spinning babies and spent a lot of time on all 4's in late pregnancy. Had a very rapid labour were I didn't even need to push, my body just took over. I did have some gas and air but the midwife kept telling me off for making oohhh noises through the contractions rather than breathing in the gas so I don't know how effective it was (more useful for the stitches afterwards). I really felt the yoga helped me be more confident with positions and I insisted on being upright on my knees rather than laid down to give birth which helped too.

Hypnobirthing techniques were really helpful with the god awful after pains that hit me with my second every time I breastfed for the first few days. I was not prepared for those after pains, they don't tell you about that shit.

Will it help with labour? It might do. It might not. But the breathing turns out to be useful for other things so why not add it to your arsenal?

Wow this seems to have grown arms and legs! I’m slightly different in that I did hypnobirthing classes for my first child and ended up with an induction and delivery with keilands forceps. However, he was small for dates and then struggled at the end of labour but I did have nothing other than tens machine til fully dilated. My second child I didn’t do the classes but just needed gas and air. I think the techniques are useful for helping you feel some control and that in itself helps you deal with pain.
There are some dreadful comments on this thread dismissing women’s experiences-I was euphoric after my second birth and whilst I’m sorry not everyone feels that way, you can go and fuck yourself before telling me that wasn’t my own experience.
long story short, if you can afford it then I think the self impowerment is useful but if it’s a struggle then maybe the book would do. Ultimately, there are factors which can’t be controlled but if all is well, hypnobirthing is useful and in any case it does no harm.

You didn't have back-to-back labors then, how nice for you!

This is very similar to my experience 30 years ago. With my first I got to hospital and the midwife said it’ll be ages yet, but I couldn’t go home because there was a city wide snarl up, so she booked me in and went off for her coffee break. The baby was born before she got back. 😆

I listened to some hypobirthing meditations but didn't "properly" do it - I enjoyed them, usually went to sleep. Not sure if they helped I definitely wasn"t in some hypnotic state and it bloody hurt, but I only had tens/gas and air with first and just tens with second (had a waterbirth). Would have gladly had some gas and air with second but was more progressed than I thought so didn't get any until I had transitioned and just didn't like it after one puff.

Yes, watched the vids etc. first one got stuck and the baby was distressed to I was given an epidural and foreceps. Second one, no drugs, no interventions. Honestly, if I had to do it again, give me the epidural 😂

'i'm reading a lot of Ina May (famous hippy midwife basically) material at the moment and I follow her logic that the female body is built for birth. It all makes sense to me that if a woman isn't stressed and understands what is happening, then the body should be able to birth a child without interventions'......

This just is not true anymore.
Historically only the healthiest women with the bodies best designed for giving birth, managed to survive giving birth and their daughters inherited these characteristics. If your Mum or grandma needed intervention, historically you wouldn't have existed. Giving birth is harder in each generation, because we are helping women who would have died in child birth have children.
Womens pelvises are getting smaller and babies heads are getting bigger. More and more women are requiring intervention.

This whole thread I think definitely shows the huge variety of experiences and the fact that we can’t really control everything about our birth! I think hypnobirthing techniques can definitely be super helpful, I would second a PP’s recommendation for Juju Sundin’s birth skills book which covers some of these techniques but not in a hippy/woo way :)

I work in Labour ward and see lots and lots of different approaches and experiences. For me I am absolutely in favour of “natural” birth approach but with acceptance that things change and modern medicine is not the big baddie it’s made out to be by some, and that pain relief is amazing for those who want it!

I do think that it’s not that helpful to try to develop any feeling that you are in full control of your body, it’s more just kind of surrendering to what is happening to it rather than fighting things. So techniques like breathing, distraction, music to let yourself ride out the contractions, and definitely learning about stages of Labour and what your body is doing so you don’t feel scared/panicked. And things like dim lights, minimum interruptions so you can just be in the zone. Trust in your support person and you midwife is also really important.

Sometimes things will just go out the window though, and it makes me sad when women feel guilt/blame for complications that they can’t control.
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My own experience - my first baby first stage of Labour (contractions) really easily manageable with breathing, about 2-3 hrs long, got to hospital at 9cm so didn’t have time really for an epidural, and never turned on my playlist that I had planned! I only felt it was difficult to cope with contractions during transition. Unfortunately pushing stage was nearly 2 hrs and I found it very painful, regretted my lack of epidural! But once baby arrived kind of forgot all about it.

second baby I thought pushing would go quicker and easier so hadn’t planned an epidural, used breathing and music (just played my favorite album on repeat and ignored everyone for a couple of hours, kept on my feet). Pushing still hurt SO much, took 40 mins, and again regretted my decision not to have an epidural - lots and lots of swearing with each push.

This time round I’m undecided - I’ll probably decide against epidural again and scream/swear through pushing 🤣🤣

Birth plan goes out the window as soon as the contractions set in. I was screaming for an epidural. In the end I gave birth without one as baby came too quickly and on the whole I’m glad it happened that way (at least I can say that now). I wouldn’t say hypnobirthing is useless but wouldn’t invest too much in it.

This. Having smaller hips for walking upright, larger brains for thinking, means human female bodies aren’t ’made for having babies’. It’s an evolutionary trade-off. The benefits just outweigh the risks. Only just, because that’s how evolution works.

Those of us that tried to have a lovely, calm water birth at home with breathing and ended up with a c-section on all the drugs… would die in the majority world and would have died even a few years ago. If you breathe a baby out and dance out of the hospital, you're lucky.

I read a book on hypnobirthing and felt really prepared and on it. Ended up with a c section 😆 I siuppose we can’t control every outcome.

There was a bit in the book though about hypnobirthing and c sections so I tried to utilise those skills.

I had 59h birth without drugs, was forced to have oxitocin and guess what... baby was within 15min so bad we did almost raw csection.
And I walked happily out of the hospital the next day, fried few steaks and had a beer to celebrate.
So yeah, guess a woman who was not cut in half can walk 4h later.

Don't tell people with birth trauma to go and fuck themselves.

Nobody is denying that people have good labours and feel euphoric. They're pointing out that hypnobirthing does not affect the myriad physiological factors that lead to intervention and that plenty of women who did everything "right" have difficult labours and deliveries and it's important to empower women to feel informed and supported. Hypnobirthing can be a tool in that arsenal but it's not a magic bullet.