Does anyone else find the Mongan hypnobirthing book....

[MissTwister]

A little bit odd/ racially inappropriate in its sweeping generalisations of how people in 'Africa' (whole continent presumably!) give/ approach birth? Then there's the weird 'African' accent approximations she then kept writing in. It was all a bit odd and has really put me off. Really made me think of something from the 1950s.

The accent sounds French to me. I don't really like how 'American' the book is, but I just focus on the useful parts and ignore the annoying bits.

Yes. Conveniently ignores maternal and fetal death rates in Africa.

Yeah, I really hated the accent bits - as an academic in linguistics perhaps particularly! Not a fan of the sweeping generalisations either, but I also tried to see past those bits and get to the useful bits for me.

I absolutely hate HATE hate all this 'noble savage' crap, and the 'women have been managing without x for millenia' rubbish.

Yes, women gave birth without medical assistance, drugs, aseptic conditions etc for millenia. And a lot of them died horrible, agonising deaths.

The Africa thing peeved me immensely. 99% of maternal related deaths are in the developing world, half of those are in sub Saharan Africa. Of course it varies massively by country, but some countries have 1-2000 deaths per 100000 births, compared to 4 per 100000 in sweden.

For a similar reason, you don't tend to find many anti vaccination idiots in the third world - people see first hand the devastation childhood diseases cause and quite rightly queue for vaccines.

I found the book had a few good suggestions in it (breathing control and mindfulness is a good thing) but a lot of it was patronising.

Eh? I must have a different book?! I got mine 12 years ago, but maybe I missed the bits you are talking about.....most of it wasn't useful, apart from the breathing and viualising balloons bit, which bloody worked.

Thank fuck someone else said it!

I wanted to start a thread like this weeks ago but chickened out.
I got a hypnobirthing book, not the one you have, and I wanted to send it straight back.

Apparently positive thought can make you successful in establishing breastfeeding! I'm sure being positive is a good thing, but if it's not happening it's not happening. I can imagine it causing some upset for women.

Mine also suggested that midwives induce you so they can go to parties and that homoeopathy is effective.

I've seen enough hypnobirthing videos to know the technique can help, but I reckon the technique itself could fill a pamphlet and the rest is woo crap.

I loved the reassurance of how many babies turn before birth. Followed by the suggestion the hypnobirth practitioner had personally been responsible for babies turning due to her hypno methods. Ignored the previous stats she'd just given about babies turning themselves and took the credit.

Lots of 'we're designed for it and we've been doing it for years' with fuck all note of maternal and child mortality rates.

Woo that was long. Sorry.

I've had two c-sections and did actually learn some 'hypnobirthing' techniques and found them useful for my second section - kept me really calm. I used a CD (think it was called natal hypnotherapy?).

I can't get on with whole books that waffle on about how women have been giving birth in the bush for centuries (yep...and dying!) and that all intervention is bad. Whatevs.

Haven't read the book you mentioned though, so no idea what all the 'Africa' generalisations are about...but sounds dodgy.

Totally agree. There's another hypno book by Maggie Howell which excludes a lot of that crap. And her voice is more bearable too on the DVD. I can't bear Morgan. Not to mention all the 'god wouldn't wAnt us to suffer"nonsense

Apparently in 'Africa' women labour as they go about their day to day then they lean against a wall, say 'baby come' and deliver their baby themselves.

Then there's an even more horrific bit where she tells the tale of a man in a childbirthing class who looks agitated then explodes with 'what ees all dees stuff? In Africa we doan have all dees stuff!! We have de babee!!!'

I'm throwing it away

Oh yes, I forgot all the 'we are made in God's image' therefore we're not designed to feel pain bit. I think I blocked that out

I found Natal hypnotherapy excellent less woo all practical. My only problem was it was helping me get over my previous section as I aimed for VBAC, thing was I was never 'under' my section I was perfectly satisfied with the whole section experience except the woeful post natal support otherwise it was brilliant and I just skipped the getting over section section.

Haha this thread has made me laugh.

I'm having every bloody drug under the sun and an ELCS. Fuck that.

I've got the natal Maggie Howell book so will give that a go!

I can imagine it does sting a little Gemerama!

I tried to block out the waffle. I found a lot of the technical stuff about labour and birth helpful as it gave me faith in my body and that I could manage labour pain through trying not to panic. That came in really handy in both births for me, although my first was slightly more 'managed'.
The relaxation techniques and breathing really help me relax in lots of scenarios, like the dentist last week lol so I think they would have helped me whatever kind of delivery I had as they stopped me panicking.

The part about breathing the baby down was fucking useless for me though. The second birth my body just started manically pushing for me and it was less 'breathing the baby down' and more 'make cow mooing noises uncontrollably while my body made downward wrenching movements and threw my baby out'.