Preparing for birth

Birth is one of the most natural processes and its amazing how every woman can birth a child without knowledge and preparation. We simply have the ability, it's written in our DNA. Nonetheless a little preparation, mentally and physically, doesn't hurt. Birth is a myth these days. It's something that happens behind closed doors in hospitals, with numerous doctors in white gowns and their medical instruments. By the time we hit 30 and are pregnant with our first child the closest we have come to witnessing birth are TV shows and maybe the stories of our own mothers. We know birth hurts, hurts a lot but that's often pretty much about it. We don't really know what happens during birth. For our ancestors it was normal to witness real births before they gave birth themselves. Well, for us that isn't really the case. So we need a different method of preparation. Of course we can go in cold handed but as we don't know much about birth, the idea to do something you have never done before and know little about is so scary that our worries could interfere with our ability to give birth naturally. Even though I am generally a person who likes to gather knowledge and look up everything on the internet, I didn't want to research too much about birth. Main reason was I didn't want to get too scared. For instance I don't like TV shows about birth, as I believe they often just give you the picture of a painful process. So what did I do?

I prepared my body.
Here in Amsterdam it's very common to do pregnancy yoga. And that's what I did. I did a pregnancy yoga class with Pascale Bonnet. I have to say I loved loved my pregnancy yoga course. It was a peaceful moment every week that let me connect with my body and my baby. Also I met other expecting mothers with whom I could share my experience and above all my teacher Pascale was fabulous. She even became my doula during the birth. Pascale taught us very useful yoga poses and breathing techniques that also helped me during the birth to deal with the pain. She also explained all the stages of birth. That was done during two partner classes, which was very good as our partners also learned about the process of birth and how to assist us best during birth. But above all she gave us confidence, confidence in ourselves to birth, confidence to try for a natural birth and confidence in mother earth that everything will go well. This was a class that ran for a couple of weeks. After it finished I continued with kundalini pregnancy yoga with Siri. Siri also became a good friend and I did two other courses with her. Dancing for birth and Mama and Baby yoga. I loved Dancing for birth. We danced with our pregnant bellies to music from around a world. It was so much fun. It also prepared my legs for the 30 hour birth marathon that I did primarily standing doing dance moves as this was the best way to encounter the pain.

I also prepared my mind.
I believe its very important to prepare mentally for birth. Especially to face your expectations and fears about birth. I started to meditate before I was pregnant and I continued doing so during my pregnancy. Daily yoga and mediation, especially towards the end of my pregnancy, became a ritual. I love to read books, but I didn't read too many on pregnancy and birth. Which was good. But I read one that I can recommend to any expecting mother. It's "Birthing form Within" The book covers some general information about birth but its focus is really on preparing the expecting mother mentally. It uses art as a form to prepare for birth. I am a creative person and I liked that approach a lot. Using the book I worked with two of my biggest fears concerning child birth: having a c-section and giving birth in a hospital with a lot of medical interference. I dreamed of a water birth at home. Eventually I had to face one of my biggest fears - giving birth in a hospital with medical interventions. But I prevented a c-section and I managed to give birth to a breech baby vaginally, I believe mainly because I was mentally prepared. As part of the book exercises I made two clay figures. A dolphin representing my baby (his name is Yunus which means Dolphin) and a small statue of mother earth. During every birth there's a moment when you think you will die and you can't go further. I remember asking for my mother earth figure during that moment. I hold on to it tightly, praying to mother earth to give me strength and let me go on. And I went further. I passed a moment that felt like death and found some energy and strength in me that I never imagined excited. Passing that moment gave me so much self confidence. Whenever I see the mother earth figure laying around at home now, I remember how strong I am and that I can overcome any difficulties. I also asked my mother, my grandmother and my sister-in-law about their birth and they gave me some good tips and their stories showed me again that every woman is capable of giving birth.

Lastly I got some additional support
Just a couple of days before giving birth I hired my yoga teacher Pascale as my doula. This was the best decision around birth that I took. Because I had a breech baby and I was now facing a very medical birth in hospital I felt I needed some support from someone who was not family or in any other way related. I needed someone who had experience with pregnancy and childbirth, who could support me mentally, who could also be there for my husband, who would be another supporter of natural birth in the hospital and who I trusted. Pascale helped me in so many ways, it was great to have her at my birth. I also thought about my ideal birth beforehand and made a birth plan. We couldn't really stick to it but it helped me to think beforehand what was important for me and to give me strength to fight for some of of the points I wanted.

Mental an physical preparation helped to have the birth I wanted.