Hypnosis is used during labor and delivery to eliminate pain and fear associated with having a baby. Through hypnosis, the mind can be trained to recognize pain sensations as pressure. The mind can be trained to reduce pain and create your own anesthesia. In classes with a trained hypnotist or with home study materials, you can learn to put yourself into a hypnotic state.
The more relaxed a laboring woman feels, the more comfortable she will be during labor. The prevalent attitude in our culture tells women that delivering a baby is the most painful thing she will ever experience. Girls grow up believing labor is something to be feared. Crazy friends, family members and strangers seem to delight in sharing every horror story they have ever heard with expectant mothers. As a result, many go through pregnancy afraid of the birth experience.
Other cultures don’t do this. In many cultures throughout the world, birth is considered a normal part of life and nothing to be feared. Girls grow up unafraid of the role they will one day assume as laboring women. Kids are routinely present at the birth of siblings and see positive attitudes surrounding these births. This helps girls to grow up with the expectation of a positive birth experience.
Hypnosis teaches women to enter a state of self hypnosis at will and to create a natural anesthesia that is so effective there is no need for drugs in the majority of women using this technique. In the hypnotic state, the laboring woman relaxes deeply and goes deeper into herself. She learns to trust in her ability to birth her baby naturally, without fear or pain medication. Women using this method report feeling calmer and relaxed without fear and with far less pain.
There are several benefits associated with using hypnosis in child birth. Labor tends to be shorter because the mother is relaxed and doesn’t tense her muscles. Tensing makes labor last longer because your body is actually working against itself. Women using hypnosis ask for drugs less often and there is less chance of the risks associated with drugs in childbirth. The overall environment created by the mother results in a calmer birth experience.
You can take classes with a teacher or use home study courses to learn hypnosis. When you look for a teacher, remember that it’s best to have one that is trained in both hypnosis and as a child birth educator. The number of sessions, length of the sessions and skill of the teacher make all the difference in how prepared you will be for labor.
There are several home study courses available in hypnosis for child birth. These contain a variety of books, CDs, scripts and DVDs to help you learn to enter a hypnotic state. Some courses come with CDs for each of the three trimesters and one for creating anesthesia in delivery. Once the technique is learned, daily practice is done with guided visualization and positive hypnotic suggestions.
Your level of dedication will have a lot to do the success of hypnosis in labor. The more you practice, the better your results. Another factor is when you start. The earlier in pregnancy you begin studying hypnosis, the better you will become at the technique. You can still do it later in pregnancy, but the sooner you start the better.