Terrified of giving birth

[bells2810]

I’m 20 weeks pregnant and couldn’t be happier that I’m having a baby, I’m counting down the days until my due date and can’t wait to meet our baby girl. But every time I think about giving birth I’m getting horrendous anxiety and feelings of pure panic and fear, sometimes I go into a cold sweat and my heart races and I end up feeling really panicky. I’ve tried to research natural births vs caesarean, I was

(continued) I was looking into c sections and natural birth but both are making me equally nervous. I told my midwife at my last appointment that I’m really worried about birth and she said we could discuss it nearer the time.

Does anyone have any tips for overcoming a fear of giving birth/anxiety around it? I know baby will have to be delivered one way or the other and just wish it wasn’t filling me with so much anxiety and fear because I really can’t wait to meet her and want to enjoy my pregnancy as much as possible.

Your body and mind will automatically sort it out for you. When I got to 9 months plus two weeks I wouldn't have cared if they'd got it out with a tin opener I was so sick of being pregnant.
And I'd been terrified of the birth right up to that point.

What messages have you received about giving birth so far? In particular, does your mum have a scary birth story? I think it sounds like you’ve heard scary things and those have stuck with you. In a way, it’s about the story you tell yourself about childbirth that is leading to this fear.

You could consider counselling of the CBT variety to challenge some of your thinking about this. You could also do some reading eg The Positive Birth Book.

Good luck.

HYPNOBIRTHING! I recommend the positive birth company online course. Teaches you the logistics of labour and birth and what happens to your body, and ways to cope with the intensity. I was exactly the same as you, extremely fearful. But I had an amazing birth experience and now I'm doing it all over again 18 months after xx

Follow some good instagram pages around hypnobirthing, positive birthing.
Our bodies are built for this. It is scary, but try and change your outlook a little if you can. What part of it scares you?
Are you able to join a hypnobirthing class or read a book/audiobook about it? It helped ease my anxieties a little with my first.

It's all unknown so it is scary! Congrats on your pregnancy! Xx

Don't worry so much. I started screaming in my first labour because I was scared but your body knows what to do. Make sure you take deep breaths during your contractions and listen to your midwife. They'll tell you to push with your contractions at a point.

P.s I ate a lot of dates in my second pregnancy and they really help! My 2nd was breech but was born in 20 mins! I ate around 12 small mini dates from the 36th week. You don't have to eat so much but they do help.

Exactly as @Bestcatmum said - I was hugely anxious about giving birth, was under the perinatal mental health team as it was so bad. By the time I got to my due date I was begging to be induced, giving birth no longer seemed so bad once I could start worrying about the dangers of being overdue. I'm not trying to say no one should go overdue by the way, just an example of how my anxiety shifted and I was less freaked out about giving birth.

Honestly I had what would probably be called a not great birth (induction, heart rate dropped leading to forceps) but once I was there nothing phased me, I didn't even panic when they had to get the team in because your body just takes over and your brain doesn't devote any energy to anxiety.

The best advice I had (and I know how hard it is) is to not research/plan so much that you get fixated on an idea of what you want. I didn't even have a birth plan as the team advised it may make my anxiety worse if something happened outside of the plan. As it was the only thing I had written down was "no epidural" and that went out the window very quickly!

I stuck my head in the sand from 20 weeks onwards - every time I panicked about birth I thought about something nice to do after birth and just shut down thinking about it on the basis that "the baby has to come out somehow so worry about that later." I realise this makes it sound like I'm trivialising your anxiety by saying "oh stop worrying" but I'm honestly not, it's a horrible feeling and I know how draining it is, but head in the sand really helped me!

I opted for c-sections due to fear of birth and have no regrets, I still feel happy I did it when I hear about birth stories and ongoing trauma. Weigh up the pros and cons and do whats right for you.

I was, I thought I was in the minority since everybody always just seems excited only, but I think everybody gets a bit scared.
Somebody on here told me that it isn't great, but if it were that bad nobody would ever have done it twice or more. And it's true. That's what made me think OK fine, maybe I can get through it.
If it were that bad, siblings (that aren't multiple births) wouldn't be so common.

Tokophobia is a severe fear of giving birth, it’s more common than you might think. Maybe research it and see if it sounds like what you’re experiencing?
Might be worth looking into your local mental health services to see if you can get some help for it.

To add, I think the advice here is lovely. Maybe reaching out for some support from a doctor or therapy with your fears may be really helpful if you don't think courses and other things will help. Keep us updated with how you're getting on xx

So I’m a big worrier and I’m also someone who doesn’t like feeling out of control. Both things left me terrified of giving birth. I now have two DC’s!

First birth was natural with ventouse delivery and second was ELCS. First birth I was petrified the moment I got the two lines on the test about how I cod deal with the birth. So I started hypnobirthing, I got a doula and I decided early on that I would mentally take control even if things physically felt a bit out of my control. It was invaluable and more to the point, it was doable. Please consider hypnobirthing, either a course or even just a YouTube videos. The day my DD arrived it was fine, I kept it together, used the birth pool, doula helped advocate for me and when I needed a ventouse I didn’t panic.

Second time was more medicalised as DS kept measuring big. I eventually agreed to an ELCS. But again, this was my choice and I was in control.

I would say if you’re low risk at the moment I wouldn’t seek out an ELCS just because you are scared of birth. It’s taken me a lot longer to recover from my section than my natural birth. I promise you that you can do this. The mind is incredibly powerful and sometimes just making that conscious decision to proactively be positive can make the biggest difference in itself. But I do 100% recommend hypnobirthing.

Cbt therapist here op. If your that fearful of birth your midwife really should be referring you to your local perinatal mental health team, you are entitled to opt for a c section if that's the easier option for you. A fear of giving birth is actually quite common and the midwife should be sitting up and listening to this more, 20 weeks is the perfect time to be discussing it why wait until 2 weeks before your due date good luck xx

Is there something triggering your fear?

I think it’s important to identify just what your fearful of to try and help you work through it. So so many women have birth fears so please know your not alone.
We have been so accustomed to listening to horrific birth stories and honestly being traumatised by other peoples stories and very rarely we hear positive stories because it seems to be sneered at for some reason. I find sometimes it becomes a case of who had it the worst and it’s scary to listen too.

It’s important to remember everyone has different experiences. Birth isn’t a walk in the park but it doesn’t need to be scary, there are many options open to you depending on what’s driving your fear.

The positive birth company digital hypnobirthing course saved me. It’s about £39, best money I ever spent. It reduced my fear by helping me fully understand the birthing process, tools to stay calm, breathing technique, understanding the roles of hormones, positions to help birth progress, etc.

Hello, I think you hear a lot of negative stories about birth and that's important, it's important to be prepared to understand what's going on and to have thought about things that can go right and wrong. I was grateful people were brave enough to share their negative birth stories.

However, I loved my birth. Baby was back to back but I only needed gas and air, I felt strong and powerful. I had an awful pregnancy which puts me off too large a family but if it was just the birth bit Id have a Von trapp clan.

Read give birth like a feminist and the positive birthing book and do the daisy classes. They aren't a magic wand that will guarantee a perfect birth but they ensure I felt in control and like I had it. Mindset makes all the difference!

@bells2810 is this your first baby? I totally get how you are feeling because I was exactly the same. Like some of the others have said, I would 100% recommend doing the positive birth company’s digital hypnobirthing pack - it was a game changer for me. I was terrified of how I would cope in labour but using the techniques in the hypnobirthing pack I managed to get through the majority of a 56 hour labour at home with no pain relief to my absolute surprise! I ended up having an episiotomy and ventouse delivery but was so calm throughout. If you have Facebook you also get access to a page where people share their positive birth stories and I found it really helpful to read through these in the weeks leading up to labour to get myself into a positive mindset. Good luck, you will be absolutely fine ☺️

I had all of this my whole life, literally as early as I can remember considering having a baby I remember knowing it wouldn’t be coming out of ‘there’ for no other reason than just the sheer pain. I remember my aunt had a c-section with my little cousin and I thought as I child that would be how I would need to do it to avoid this huge fear of birth. It took me so long to convince myself I could even manage that but eventually after years of research I got pregnant, told the midwife at the booking appointment (as she tried to tell me about the labour suite I’d be giving birth in) that I had this massive fear and needed a section. I would have done literally anything other than go through the alternative. I know people have epidurals etc but it just wasn’t for me in any way whatsoever. I was very firmly not for it 🙈 Its hard to put into words how much I just wouldn’t have even attempted it. I assumed I would die and the baby would die and that’s why my body was so against it (nonsense most likely, I know).

Eventually after harping on at the midwives for months, I got to speak to a consultant at 23 weeks and she obviously realised how petrified I was. The only thing I would warn you about here is they try to save themselves money by scaring you out of a csection by reading you the risks of all c-sections, not electives. What you’re looking for is an elective, you aren’t someone who’s been in labour for 2 days, already hemorrhaging and baby’s oxygen supply is being cut off. In that case a csection is done to save both mum and baby’s life but somehow those risks are listed against all csections as if the operation played any part in the state the woman was left in 🤔 I think something really needs to change with that. In my hospital you aren’t given any risks of a vaginal birth either when weighing up your options, it was just sold to me as if you’d just waltz in and the baby would fall out then you’d head home. I was so set in my mind as to what I wanted anyway so the risks didn’t affect my choice, I’d looked it all up myself and knew the real risks (most are very rare).

I had the c-section and it was the best day of my life by far! So easy, so chilled. The only ‘painful’ part was the little nip to get the cannula in my hand. That was it! I lay down, curtain went up and 90 seconds later the curtain was back down and my baby was there! The recovery really wasn’t that bad either. I would 100% recommend a section but do not go to a medical appointment not knowing which one you want as they will just sway you into a vaginal birth from my experience. You need to be set that it’s a section you want if you make up your mind on it. Research it all and look into your options with pain relief etc for a vaginal birth. Feel free to PM me if you decide to go for a section and have any questions. Just try to relax, it will all be okay x

I think people generally tend to share the scary birth stories more than the positive ones.
Its natural to be scared but honestly your body takes over and you just know what to do. It’s the most overwhelming feeling.
I had two natural births, one ended with a third degree tear and the other a second degree tear. However they were both totally manageable, I ended up not having any pain relief for either and recovery was quick and easy.
Good Luck ❤️

I was scared too, but I can honestly say, birth was much easier than I expected. My body took over, I didn’t have any pain relief, no gas & air. And it’s true, that once you are holding your baby it’s all forgotten. Good luck OP.

Yes, same.

OP, look up the Fear Free Childbirth Podcast with Alexia Leachman. She suffered from tokophobia but got through childbirth and set up a podcast to help women in the same position.

I just wanted to say a huge thank you for all your lovely messages!! For some reason I didn’t get any notifications to say that anyone had replied but I’m very grateful to all of you. I will definitely take on board the suggestions of hypnobirthing and reading some more positive birth books. I was born via C section and my older brother was born naturally and my mum always said how awful both experiences were so maybe that’s why it makes me so nervous!! I’m also going to mention it to my midwife again. Thanks once again lovely people x

Hi @bells2810 just wondering how your birth went in the end? I’m a first time mum due in august but already fearful at the thought of labour - I just fear I’m going to die or my baby will. Wah!

Definitely do the positive birth company hypnobirthing

I was as anxious as you sound (this time 2 years ago). I really wish I hadn't been. I had a wonderful birth. Best day of my life. Not just saying that! I did a hypnobirthing course. I'd suggest that - the breathing techniques were handy! I was lucky to have a short 4 hour labour. The pain never felt unbearable (I just needed gas and air during the final stages of pushing, and for stitching up afterwards!).