To think that Hypnobirthing is a load of crap

[Poppy1774]

Just that really. I did all the affirmations, breathing exercises, meditation, etc. In the end needed lots of intervention for the safety of me and my baby (and we were both healthy afterwards, thank goodness).
However I felt disappointed with my 'birth experience'. I wish I had never heard of hypnobirthing. If I hadn't, I'd have accepted what happened much more quickly. I wasn't naive about childbirth - I knew that things could go wrong. Yet somehow hypnobirthing got into my head and made me feel that intervention = bad = failure. I wasn't positive enough/calm enough etc. Difficult to be positive and calm when in absolute agony and baby in distress.
Two of my friends have also had the same reaction after births that did not involve breathing a baby out in a birthing pool.
I feel hypnobirthing is not just nonsense, it is also actually damaging to women's self-esteem after birth.
And before you tell me it helped with your second birth after a difficult first birth...second labours are often easier!
Rant over. Thoughts?

I agree.

I’m sure if you have a reasonably straightforward birth anyway hypnobirthing can empower and help with feelings of control.

It won’t change anything though. It used to really piss me off after i had a section when people would put their textbook v births down to hypnobirthing. It made me feel like it was my fault, that i could have done something. When in reality there was nothing that would have changed the outcome..

Hypnobirthing gave me a few tips about how to cope with the pain but it didn't have any impact on how many/few interventions I needed during the birth.

Hi, sorry to hear about the experience you had.

My experience was that hypnobirthing really helped with my birth - which was as medical as it could be and ended in an emergency c section.

The hypnobirthing course I did wasn’t focussed on a perfect home natural birth. It was focussed on calmness and positivity for whatever birth you end up having.

Agree. It completely fucked my mental health and I should almost certainly have gone for an elective section. Instead I held out for a “natural” birth and wound up with a far more dangerous section, and DD and I escaped unscathed only due to the skill and expertise of the medical team. It’s very disingenuous- claims it doesn’t guarentee a pain free birth but actually, that’s entirely what they seem to be promising.

All the techniques were completely pointless in the face of relentless contractions. I’m fairly sure that most/many women are capable of intervention free births, and the fact that some ascribe them to hypnobirthing is entirely coincidently. I’m especially sceptical of those who had bad first births, did hypnobirthing and their second birth was much better. Second births generally are more straightforward and quicker, whether you hypnobirth or not. In both cases my births only became enjoyable once the epidural kicked in.

Not being invited to the post birth meet-up didn’t help either

I can not describe my anger when a ‘friend’ suggested my labour would have better had I done hypnobirthing.
Presumably my placenta would have moved magically, DD wouldn’t have been back to back and ended up in NICU....

I disagree.

It helped me greatly. I ended up in emergency care and DS eventually had to be delivered ASAP. But I felt so in-control and at peace.

I felt like I had the power, I felt strong and capable.

I listened to the cd religiously when preparing for the birth of my first. I think it helped in the very early stages of birth to keep calm but really when the tough got going, no amount of breathing or visualisation through ‘surges’ was going to cut it. I’m pregnant with my second and I’m not going to bother.

On the other hand my sister used it for both her births and swore by it.

I think I agree. I didn't do hypnobirthing and had a fairly difficult birth (induction, problems with epidural, EMCS) but felt happy -other than the pain- during and after.

Some of the other NCT mums did hypnobirthing and seemed more disappointed when they couldn't have the magical birth in the birthing pool they had imagined and had to have various interventions.

It might not be for everyone but I honestly feel like it was the best thing that I ever spent money on. I had a tricky first birth - all went easy peasy for stage 1, then stalled, I had to have an oxytocin drip and had a 5 hour pushing stage and a big tear (and some gas and air!). However, I never felt scared or overwhelmed and felt so positive about it all afterwards. Used it for my second birth too, which although faster was scary with concerns about DS’s heart rate and then shoulder dystocia- the hypnobirthing helped me keep it together.

I don’t think it’s crap. But I’m very sorry you were disappointed with your birth experience. I’ve been there and no amount of affirmations are going to help in those scenarios!

I see it as an extra tool to help a woman keep calm through the pain (of an uncomplicated labour), I never would have considered that hypnobirthing = guaranteed straight forward birth.

I suppose it depends on your expectations. I had a go at it on my last baby and found it helped keep me calm but that was literally all I expected or hoped for. It never occurred to me or was suggested that it would prevent any interventions. I saw it as something that would help me cope with whatever labour threw at me, not something that would completely alter the path of my labour.

I disagree... to a point, I think if you don’t buy into the whole concept and just see it as learning some techniques to use in labour however it goes it is helpful. I used some visualisations during my very tricky 1st labour and it really helped.

I do think the courses are ridiculous though - I just learned my techniques from a £7 CD - maybe that’s why I found them more ‘tool’ like rather than a whole scale lifestyle approach.

I found it really good I was sent home and listened to the tape and by the time I got myself together I was through the transition phase and nearly had the baby at home.

I'm not very woo but the tape I was given used to knock me right out.

I think it really helped.

My labour went from bad to worse and being able to zone out and cope with the pain made it much, much better than it would have been otherwise.

I had an emergency c-section in the end but feel that expecting not to have complications if you do hypnobirthing is a bit deluded.

I have to say that 90% of the hypnobirthing testimonials I’ve read are about second births OP. It does seem to help a lot of people but when I did my course some of the stuff they said just sounded ridiculous. I just couldn’t really get on board with it which would obviously be a big reason why it didn’t really work!

I do think it sets people up with unreasonable expectations but I can also see how it would make a straightforward birth feel even better, or make someone feel like they somehow influenced that outcome. And perhaps if it helped them stay relaxed and calm, it did affect their birth for the better.

Worked for me

I don't know anyone who did hypnobirthing who didnt have interventions. At best its ineffective, at worst: cultish. I've heard stories of women convinced childbirth wouldn't hurt and refusing medical intervention because it means they would be failing. It's dangerous and needs to be regulated better.

Agree it's totally not going to stop interventions etc but it's a prop to get you through the first bit.

It makes me LIVID when people say if only you did x/y/z you wouldn't have needed intervention.

The course I did placed the emphasis on feeling as calm and in control as possible whatever happens during the birth, even if you end up needing forceps or a c section. The instructor spoke pretty openly about the fact that interventions are sometimes needed. So I don't think I went into birth with false expectations and I do think some of the techniques helped.

Obviously though it's wrong to tell women that hypnobirthing guarantees them an intervention free, pain free birth as long as they do it "right" and any instructors giving that message are ridiculous.

Hmm.

I think it’s success depends a lot on your mindset. I’ve heard others rave about how well it worked for them, but I tried it with dc2 and didn’t think much of it. I’m a massive sceptic and found it hard to let go and really throw myself into the excersises without feeling a bit ridiculous.

I’d also had the ‘benefit’ of having been through labour before, so I knew that all the positive thinking and breathing excersises in the world weren’t go to magically stop the pain.

I did similar to hypnobirthing and the problem with the one I did was that it basically encouraged you to only rely on hypnobirthing. And after 24 hours, that had long gone out the window, I totally exhausted and needed intervention.

With 2nd birth I had come across a similar one, Gentlebirth I think it was, but it recommended loads of different tools to use, as many as possible. So for example I used birth ball, acupressure points, TENS, hypnobirthing, gas and air, and stayed upright (no epi). Also had a good dinner before going into hospital as knew I'd need my strength! Had a great 2nd birth.

I was also a lot more assertive 2nd time round, requested private room for early labour etc

I can imagine that bobble. I never expected that. It's fine to be sold as a calming relaxation aid but if certainly didn't stop it hurting

I couldn’t get into the affirmations but the breathing and mindset and visualisations did help me stay calm throughout a very long back to back labour. I was lucky in the end after 24hrs of being 1-2cm ds finally moved into position and I managed a four hour water birth without complications.
Tens and breathing got me through that first 24hrs.

Worked for me and also a lot of the relaxation techniques helped after when I was struggling with feeding and sleeping. Helped me to drop off really quickly.

Yeah I think if you have a normal straightforward labour some of the stuff is helpful. But mine didn't follow what the books/course said, really. My contractions came every 2-3 mins from the start, and then quickly became back to back. I had no chance to reset my 'traffic light' back to green as I didn't get any break. I didn't get a gradual onset where I could bounce on my ball. And then in eight hours I hadn't dilated past 3cm.

I got an epidural which was amazing and then while they were monitoring baby after administering it, they realised she was in distress and may have been for a little while so I had an emergency section.

Didn't even get my fucking tea lights out of my bag. And if DP had attempted light touch massage I would have lamped him. As it was I just told him to fuck off three times (he informs me).