Saturday, June 13, 2009

Preparing For Birth

Many of you know that I opted for a Natural none medicated birth. It's funny how many looks of, "are you crazy woman!", I've gotten in the past 9 months. To me, giving birth is a sacred right of womanhood and I wanted to experience everything about it without the hinderance of drugs. It's not what everyone would choose... and I had quite a few people tell me that I would want drugs. (Even Steve did not think I would be able to handle giving birth without drugs).

To help me with the pain, I chose to use a method called Hypnobirthing. Hypnobirthing helps you to learn to focus yourself so that you can relax easily. It also places a huge emphasis on understanding how your body works and prepares for the birthing process. In order for it to be effective, it must be practiced. There are relaxation and breathing exercises that you are encouraged to practice every day. There are 3 certified Hypnobirthing Practitioners here in Reno, and we met with one once a week over a 4 week period.

I also hired a Doula, and chose to use a Midwife instead of a doctor. (If you search around on the the OB/GYN website, you will find a photo of me taken with my midwife at the photo shoot from a few weeks ago). Though, due to some strange circumstances, my midwife was not able to attend Abby's birth.

3 comments:

Pittman Four said...

Congratulations!!! That is awesome. My mom is a huge advocate for natural childbirth, she did all 5 of us natural... I made it 13 hours and then I floundered and got an epidural, my mom was not pleased!!! Oh well. She'd be proud of you!!! Go CHRISTY!!! By the way She's Beautiful

Keri said...

Hey girl, glad to see youve got a blog too.

Danila said...

That's so awesome! John and I did hypnobirthing as well, I still use some of the cd's just to relax at night! I'm so glad things went well for you and you were able to have her naturally, what a wonderful experience.