Hypnobirthing - will I want to punch the teacher?

[BabCNesbitt]

After doing a wee bit of research and on friends' recommendations, DH and I signed up for a hypnobirthing class in July (due end October). In advance of the class, the teacher's sent us a copy of the hypnobirthing book and the Rainbow CD, and dear god, it's driving me chuffing insane! The CD especially makes me want to claw my ears off - her accent reminds me of my American MIL, the affirmations seem completely useless to me (I don't want to "remain still and limp" during labour, FFS!), and the imagery in the CD, inviting me to imagine breathing in different coloured mists, made me think of nothing so much as mustard gas in the trenches.

If this is my initial reaction, would we be wasting our time going to the classes, or are they usually less violence-inspiring than the CD and book?

(NB I'm not saying that hypnobirthing is therefore absurd and useless for everyone - just that this was how I reacted to the recordings.)

call your teacher and talk to him/her about this. It's obviously triggering something in you to feel such a violent reaction.

BabC this sounds like me and why, whilst I can understand the benefits of positive affirmations etc to get through labour (NLP, innit), I have not signed up for hypnobirthing. However ohmeohmy's suggestion of talking this through with the teacher is a good one: you can find out if you can take or leave elements, if other people start out this sceptical etc etc (and if they do, if you can talk to them about how helpful they found it in reality). If it's all or nothing and requires total commitment, it might be challenging, but if it's "like, or nothing" you can put aside what doesn't work for you. Have you spoken to the friends who recommended it, and found out if they had a similar response at first?

Afraid this is totally what put me off the idea.

Several of my friends enjoyed it all though.

I did my own positive affirmations (yelled / grunted 'I CAN DO IT!!!!') at moments of stress during labour and that was quite helpful when it came to drowning out that unhelpful inner voice whispering snidely 'you can't do it, you should have gone to hospital, ner ner ne ner ner') so I can see how that sort of thing could be helpful.

Ditto - spk to the teacher beforehand, see if he/she can give you some examples of what they do. I am a hypnotherapist (not hypnobirther) and it isnt for everyone...though I've never been punched!

I haven't spoken to them since I got the stuff through, no, though I'll definitely be double-checking what they thought of the classes. I might email the teacher, too. I do suspect, however, that the main thing it's triggering is my deep-seated antipathy to the apparent expectation that women should just lie down, shut up and do nowt but breathe during childbirth. Am I misunderstanding the texts, or is the suggestion really that if women make too much noise or pace around during labour, they're just not sufficiently relaxed?

Which text are you reading?

Marie Mongan's Hypnobirthing book.

There's a thread in the childbirth topic atm.

Have a look at it... here...

Nowt wrong with hypnobirthing, I quite like it. But Marie Mongan has some funny ideas. Like the thing with breech babies. This only happens if you're unhappy or unable to let go. And if you need medical help you're 'surrendering'. I don't think it's empowering at all, quite the opposite. Not sure about other methods though, just this one irks somewhat.

I did the same course, with the same CD, it was a little bit annoying at first - it's a shame they don't have an English accent version. I definitely got over it and used the CD during the birth. It really was fab, i must say I didn't get the same messages as SOH but that may have been because I chose not to hear rubbish like that and focused on the good stuff.

I did hypnobirthing for DS2's birth - hated the CD but actually found the teacher great and the course and exercises we did in class v helpful. Teacher told us if we didnt like the CD, there are other versions you can download online with less irritating voices saying the affirmations. And basically the bottom line is just do what you need to do to feel completely relaxed with the giving birth experience - if that's sit still and breathe, that's fine. If its move around and moan, that's fine too.

See, I'd like to try that, Ealingkate, but the whole CD annoyed me - not just the accent thing, but the suggestion that all that was needed was to relax and give myself up to 'nature', and everything would be sunshine and roses. I don't think I could sit in a class and be told to visualise rainbows without feeling deeply . Have emailed the teacher, though, so I'll see what she says.

I did hypnobirthing and pretty much ignored everything I thought of as bollocks, which was quite a bit, and took away the useful stuff, which was very good. My husband was very sceptical beforehand and ended up really enjoying the classes and is looking forward to wielding his feather touch massage. The entire class was united in finding Ms Mongan's voice irritating but I no longer notice that after listening to it for so long. I tend to read my book during the affirmations and then listen to the relaxation exercises, although I think my other half is now convinced he has a nice pink cervix.

The teacher was absolutely great and keeps in touch. She was a very calming, positive person. There was no suggestion that labour be about sitting around. Some of the videos we saw showed people who kept very still and quiet, and others didn't. My midwives are active birth midwives and are very pro-hypnobirthing. I see it mainly as a relaxation method to use more than anything else, and I know friends who have ended up with C sections who still felt it was helpful in labour and delivery. I hope your teacher is reassuring.

I did hypnobirthing for my first birth, the course was pretty terrible and my husband cringed through most of it. I felt like it was a waste of £300 and a weekend. The leader did give us a good handout on how to be assertive to medical staff/ words to use to stop being bullied, which could have come in handy; she also showed some lovely peaceful birth DVDs (which my independant MW had already lent me - but I was lucky). I did read the book though and listen to the CD regularly and had 24 hours of labour with absolutely no pain relief, my husband coached me through and was a rock - the breathing exercises and deep relaxation really helped. This time I am listening to the prenatal hypnotherapy CD's - they're pretty good at getting me into that same trance/relaxed state and the narrator is English...

The teacher's just replied and reassured me that she's very pro-active birth, and suggested that I set aside the CD until after the class has started, which seems like a sound idea!

StiffyByng: at your OH's nice pink cervix.

I did hypnobirthing for DD and yes some of the stuff is very 'American' but I found it easy enough to take what I wanted and leave the rest. i never listened to the affirmations but found the Rainbow Relaxation great. If you try not to focuson the words and just focus on the relaxation bit of it it does get easier. There is one CD on 'pre-birth parenting' that was just a step too far for me though - I just couldn't get past more than about 30 seconds of it. The info on standing up for yourself in the face of HP wanting to do stuff to you so that they can meet their target of babies being born in x hours was very helpful for me cause I usually just meekly accept but I didn't in this case and it made me feel in control of what was happening. (Ok it was only refusing to have a venflon put in 'just in case' but it made the difference to me.)

He he this mde me giggle as I would feel the same. I try to do my own visualisation, picture the perfect place to sit and chill, cliff top, medow, rainforest etc and concentrate on all the smells and sounds. You can get quite relaxed and fade out of the room if you find the right image without an annoying voice over and sometimes work better without music plus you are in control of the image at your own pace. Give it a whirl and hope it works plus my DH pissed himself laughing when he heard the cd and could not take it seriously which would be no help as he kept making me laugh - although laughing is supposed to stop the pain (wonder if i can giggle my way through contractions?) Good luck x

God I know what you mean about the American accent, a friend of mine had those and my hubby and I had a listen and thought there was no way we could do that, we would have been in fits of giggles the whole time. Did a bit of research and we found and English version done by Katharine Graves. Nothing Amercian about this and the course was awesome and we are now practicing lots in anticipation!

Her website is here - www.thehypnobirthingcentre.co.uk

I did the course and also absolutely hate the CD, makes me cringe and stops me relaxing. Everytime she says 'go to that wonderful place' I want to kick her! There were a few other things about the course I also didn't like and I did think it was very American and could do with being adapted for a British audience. However the scripts which dh reads to me are really helpful and I think paying for it has motivated us both to practice - with ds1 I just read the book and listened to the CDs but didn't find it helpful at all.
The other thing which I really object to about hypnobirthing is the emphasis on how babies delivered this way will be calm and relaxed and given the best possible start. My ds was delivered by emcs after every intervention going, and the stuff about how good it would have been for him to be delivered naturally made me first cry and then get angry. As far as I know there is no evidence at all for this so I think they shouldn't say it, it is only going to make women feel worse if it doesn't go to plan.