You Can Say No

May 14, 2014 0 By admin

You Can Say No

You can say NoWe are all unique and every woman has a different belief regarding birth. You may deeply want a natural birth or perhaps you are thinking about having the medically managed birth. Whatever you want is perfect and right for you and where you are at right now in your life. The majority of women fall somewhere in the middle, wanting a natural birth yet not feeling confident enough in their ability to do so.

The implications from the majority of OBGYN’s, hospital midwives and even family and friends, of ‘we will take care of you’ and ‘do it our way and you will be safe, in fact often interferes with your birthing instinct and confidence levels.When you are vulnerable and unsure this is when the fear sticks. As those emotions fly, so does all the power and strength within to say ‘No’. Saying ‘Ok’, when it doesn’t feel right just to please your partner or the support is not ok. It is a far cry from your gut telling you to get down on your hands and knees and rock your pelvis.

Still, even today, although much lip service is given to ‘follow your body’, the quieter, gentle birth is much preferred to that where you pad around the birth space like a lioness, growling or roaring at that which threatens the life of your baby, or doesn’t feel right which creates trauma.We are told that birth is not meant to ‘feel good’. There is still shame surrounding what will make a woman feel good in natural labour. The subtle insinuation being a ‘good girl’ is powerfully played upon in the medical management of labour.

Too much of our personal power is given to those that deem that giving birth naturally is unsafe and that a woman is crazy or indulgent in her preference for wanting to experience the incredible power and wisdom of her own body. Once that birthing instinct has kicked in giving birth does indeed feel amazing, natural and powerful.

Giving birth naturally can also be incredibly blissful and gentle as your body ripens and opens with each contraction. I certainly felt the fear of the ‘support’ and chose to stay in my trust when I went into labour five weeks early with my second baby. I scared the doctors and midwives who had to attend to me whether they wanted to or not because I wouldn’t let them take over and ‘manage’ the situation. It certainly was not my intent to scare anyone.

All I wanted to do was to remain in my ‘birth zone’ and continue to labour and birth in the way that I was. I had already reached the point of no return and as they changed over midwives, again I refused to get up on to the bed so that they could hook me up to continuous fetal monitoring. I asked them to use the portable one. I could certainly feel my baby moving around and I was nine centimeters and in transition. I didn’t want any negative energy around my baby or me.

As the medical staff hovered anxiously around, taking my husband at the time away from being supportive and into his own doubt, I dived deeper inside. I made a nest with the gym mat and beanbag in the corner of the room, as far away from the bed as I could go and underneath the glorious sunlight that was shining in from a dirty window. A less resentful midwife who had also worked downstairs in the birth center was brought into support me, yet she couldn’t let go of wanting to break my waters.

I literally blanked them all out of my view and with closed eyes and a rising contraction I began to chant. The primordial sound rising above and clearing away all the doubt, judgement and negativity in that room. If I had gotten up on the bed or engaged with any of the other six people in the room I wouldn’t have been able to deliver Harry myself. They would of quite happily stepped in and saved us both and I wouldn’t have been able to experience guiding my baby out of my own body, gathering him into my arms and warming his blue little body with my heart and my skin.

The unnecessary push to have a baby out as quickly as possible and the false notion that the drugs will miraculously make your birth easier and monitoring so you know what is happening, doesn’t create a feeling of safety, it just creates more anxiety and disconnection from a very natural process.

To enjoy the natural process you need to prepare yourself through positive support, acupuncture, balanced and informative birth classes that give you real tools, hire a doula, hypnosis for addressing birth fears and to deepen the birthing trance, pre natal yoga and do whatever it takes to stay true to yourself and your own birthing instinct. Our gut instinct is never wrong!

Happy Birthing!
Copyright Rebekah Fisher