Can HypnoBirthing® really help you have a great birth? by Cliodhna Griffin

Imagine being pregnant and being terrified to give birth, or so afraid of your birth day that you can’t bring yourself to even think about it. What if you’ve had a previous traumatic birth and you’re terrified of history repeating itself? You may be a first time mom and just honestly not know what to expect on your birth day besides the gory stories you’ve heard from your friends or family members and you’re nervous to give birth.

These are such common fears and realities for so many expectant moms and such valid fears and concerns too. We, as a society, have been conditioned for generations to believe birth is an agonizing and torturous event that happens to a woman and a cross we must bear. But is it? Why does it have to be this way? Why would women continue to birth again and again if it really was as bad as we hear? What can our pregnant moms do to make their births easier, better and dare I say, actually enjoyable?

Enter HypnoBirthing®.

The HypnoBirthing® Institute, founded by Marie F. Mongan, has been helping women have comfortable, calm and easier births for over 25 years. Based on the workings of Dr. Grantly Dick-Read, a British Physician who simply asked, why is birth supposed to hurt? After observing many laboring women, he came to the realization that if a woman removed fear from her birth, she was more likely to not tense up and when a laboring woman didn’t tense up and remained relaxed, she was far, far less likely to feel that excruciating pain we so often see in the media.

Marie F. Mongan knew that by educating our moms and teaching valuable tools and techniques that they could go on to have great birthing experiences. Marie F. Mongan set forth tools such as Deepening and Relaxation techniques, Breathing exercises and talks about the importance of Visualizations and Affirmations to condition the mind and prepare the body for the work it will do on the birthing day. When a mother practices and fine tunes these tools and techniques she may very well go on to have a faster, easier and better birth for her and her baby.

As a certified HypnoBirthing® Practitioner and the founder of Born Free Birthing, I find the biggest hurdle our parents have is the Hypno/Hypnosis aspect. Many of the parents that attend my class expect I will preform a Vegas/Entertainment type of Hypnosis, but once educated and having experienced what Hypnosis for childbirth really is like, they are often blown away at how effective and relaxing it actually is.

A HypnoBirthing® class won’t teach a mother how to give birth; her body and baby already know how to do this, but over the span of five weeks, with each class lasting roughly 2.5 hours, we, as HypnoBirthing® Practitioners teach our moms about their body, and why it is working the way it is in order to birth their babies easily and comfortably. We teach our moms about the powerful muscle that is the uterus and how through breathing and relaxation techniques, to assist in helping it preform to the best of its ability and to not resist and impede what it is trying to do. We teach our moms to trust their bodies, for the birthing body is not a lemon, it is beautifully designed and they must trust the process to just release, relax and let go. We remind our moms they are capable and strong beings.

We prepare our couples for every turn their birth may take, because we know, birth very rarely goes exactly to plan and it is vital to be prepared and educated as much as possible. We pay great attention to the dad or birthing companion and educating them on how best to assist the laboring mom. We teach wonderful massage and deepening techniques that will help mom stay in her calm zone. We prepare our dads or birthing companions for the birth from the very start to the very end, what to expect through the stages of labor,  how to communicate with the caregiver on duty, bonding with mom and baby before, during and after the birth, hospital protocols, comfort measures for mom on the birth day and so on. When our dads or birthing companions are fully prepared and confident on the birth day, then mom can relax and birth free of worry or concern. When both mom and dad are educated and prepared for the birth of their baby, the birth day can be one of the most empowering days filled with immense joy, bonding and discovery, for it’s not just a baby that was born, but parents too.

Written by: Cliodhna Griffin, HBCE, APPAC

Cliodhna is the founder of Born Free Birthing and is a certified HypnoBirthing® Practitioner in Houston, TX, who has been trained in HypnoBirthing® by the founder Marie F Mongan and is proudly Houston’s first APPA triple certified Placenta Encapsulation Specialist.

Cliodhna is a dedicated practitioner and loves to help moms have happy births and strong postpartum recoveries. For more information, go to www.bornfreebirthing.com. You can follow Born Free Birthing on Facebook at www.facebook.com/bornfreebirthing and on Instagram at www.instagram.com/bornfreebirthing.

To find a certified Mongan Method HypnoBirthing® Practitioner near you, go to www.HypnoBirthing.com

Location

Find us on the map

Office Hours

Our Regular Schedule

Monday:

8:00 am-5:00 pm

Tuesday:

8:00 am-5:00 pm

Wednesday:

8:00 am-5:00 pm

Thursday:

8:00 am-5:00 pm

Friday:

8:00 am-3:00 pm

Saturday:

By Appt.

Sunday:

Closed

  • "Patient Testimonials: Coming Soon."