This is a photo of me after our 2nd baby, following all the 2nd baby advise, like giving the first child a present from the new baby!

My recovery from my first birth didn’t look like this. I was on my own, in the recovery ward with a baby up in intensive care, taking in the shock of an emergency c-section, while I listened to new mothers with their babies around me.

There is so much that was traumatic about that time, it has taken years to admit that it was difficult and that I struggled. I could tell you a long and emotional story about that birth and having a child who isn’t well. Talking about that and sharing our stories has it’s place, but today I want to tell you about how I learned to cope with it.

1. I had to work through my anxiety about my child being unwell – trauma often creates triggers and I certainly had some triggers from having our daughter. Doctors visits and vaccinations took me straight back to having a baby covered in wires and needles. I started a consistent yoga practice after having my daughter. Although I didn’t know it at the time, I was creating within myself and established practice of bringing myself from “fight and flight” to “rest and digest” through yoga and breath work.
2. I believed my body had let me down – Before my c-section, I remember asking my husband “is my Dad ok with this?” . My Dad’s a doctor and we are one of those families that don’t make a fuss, paracetamol fixes everything and I just expected to be “good” at birth. I was really shocked that I hadn’t been able to birth my baby vaginally. It was really important for me to process that feeling when going onto having another baby. I was very lucky to be fully supported by St Thomas’ hospital, I went along to their VBAC class and gave myself the best chance at a vaginal birth – I also had a midwife who knew my wishes and was determined to get me there!
3. I started to love thinking or talking about my birth experience – For some people their response to trauma might be that they can’t hear birth stories or want to avoid thinking or discussing birth. It can also go the other way and I certainly immersed myself in the birth world. I wanted to hear every situation and medical event that could possibly impact my next birth. Hearing other peoples stories helped me feel I wasn’t alone, it helped me know how to advocate for myself and hugely impacted my birth preparations for baby number 2.

Healing the Body to Heal the Mind

When we experience a traumatic event, the body remembers the event often better than the mind can. When I trained as a yoga teacher, I also trained in trauma sensitive yoga. When yoga is adapted to take trauma into consideration, it helps the person practicing increase their body awareness in a safe space. It also helps them move from “fight and flight” to “rest and digest” – people who have experienced trauma often end up stuck in fight and flight, especially when faced with a situation that reminds them of their trauma.

My 3rd child was born 3 days into the first lockdown – 25th March 2020. Unfortunately we ended up back in special care (just for a few days) but this time I was on my own. No family could visit. I remember sitting and watching my baby boy, with a cannula in his perfect little hand, wondering how on earth I was back in special care. 

My breath work and my amazing husband helped me, I shed a few tears, that was to be expected. but I had built up a strength within me to cope, I could better control my anxiety and knew how to bring myself back to the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest). 

It’s now my passion to work with parents to be, who might have experienced a trauma of their own. This could be the trauma of loss, IVF or the trauma of a previous birth. I teach these birthers, to ask empowering questions, to feel in control and part of the decisions that might be made about their birth and their body and to learn the techniques of breath work and yoga to “heal the body to heal the mind”.

One lady after a yoga session said “I always feel like I carry a weight around with me, after these classes the weight is gone”.

 

 

Do you struggle to slow down? Is your work fast paced? Is your exercise fast paced and adrenalin filled? Maybe you have a yoga practice but its all about breaking a sweat, achieving those arm balances and maybe the idea of a slow and deep stretching pose sounds awful.. it could be time for some Yin!

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Working in partnership with CoCreate Consultancy, Active Stillness will be delivering a virtual and in-person programme to leaders in one of the largest organisations in the UK. This organisation have recognised their leaders are struggling with burn out, stress and anxiety due to the pandemic.

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Do you want to find out if hypnobirthing is for you? Is your partner unsure about what hypnobirthing is? A FREE taster session is a great way to find out about he basic principles of hypnobirthing, what you would be learning over a full course and also experience a hypnobirthing visualisation.

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