“I really want a calm birth experience, but I feel stressed/anxious”: Understanding your phobias (fears), stress and anxiety and how I can help.
As with any conditions we may experience or develop, there are different categories and levels. Not everyone will have a phobia (fear), but we all experience stress and anxiety at some point, at some level.
Stress originates from a disturbance of a person’s mental and physical well-being, which passes as the situation/threat is resolved, but left untreated, it can lead to anxiety. Contrary to popular belief, anxiety does not arise directly out of dangerous or painful situations but out of thoughts.
In a given situation, it is the thought of potential danger, not the actual danger, that produces the symptoms of anxiety. [Hypnosis for Change, 3rd edition, 1996, Hadley, Straudacher, pg 211]. It is perfectly normal to feel anxious from time to time, and similarly to stress, it is essential as these feelings help to focus the mind, problem-solve and protect us and those around us. Whilst anxiety can also pass, avoiding it will not make it go away as it will grow, returning in waves, resulting in a feeling of apprehension and further developing into phobias/fears.
Phobias/fears are much more extreme than anxiety as they most commonly may have been something that has been witnessed as a child or in young adulthood and built up over time. It is key to note that many phobias/fears are acute, stemming from the subconscious, which can be treated.
“There is nothing to fear but fear itself” [First inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt]. We are born with only two fears – the fear of falling and the fear of loud sounds. Thus, phobias are either learnt behaviours or can stem from an individual’s initial sensitising event (ISE) and, in some instances, can be hereditary. In the early 1900s, an American Psychologist, John B. Watson and his graduate student, Rosalie Rayner, carried out an experiment to explore if humans can be conditioned by learned behaviours.
Watson believed that the fear of loud sounds is an innate, unconditioned response and wanted to test these principles, now known as “classical conditioning”, with the aim of conditioning a phobia in an emotionally stable child. The result of the experiment found that the association between the loud noise and a furry animal (in this case, a rat) caused the child distress, thus conditioning that child to a phobia of the association of the fear of loud noise with a furry animal.
As with stress and anxiety, there are also a number of different types/levels of phobias, from simple to complex. Talking openly about anxiety, stress, and phobias has become increasingly acceptable in the current day, with many businesses and scientists looking to offer alternative treatments, thus avoiding medication, including the University of Oxford developing a virtual reality therapy, which first looked to address the phobia of heights. Richard Bandler, co-creator of Neuro-linguistic Programming, used a tennis ball with his clients, passing back and forth to both hands, thus passing the hemispheres, and whilst it reduced anxiety, it didn’t remove it permanently. Indeed, scientists and researchers have been studying the effects of mental health conditions such as anxiety and stress for a number of years and, through research, have found that hypnotherapy can help relieve stress, fear and anxiety.
Additionally, many will see fear/anxiety as a trauma. You may hear yourself or others explaining an experience as “that was traumatic”. However, trauma is not what happened to an individual – not the difficult moments experienced or the pain that was felt, but trauma (originated from the Greek trauma meaning ‘wound’) is the wound sustained as a result.
This is true when negative birth stories are shared as it can be heard by people saying, “My birth was traumatic’ – much the same when someone describes their birth as resulting in an emergency caesarean.
There is a very small percentage where the caesarean results in an emergency; thus, it is better described as an unplanned caesarean (however, an emergency sounds much more of a gripping tale to tell). So, how can we improve the birth experience and move to a calm, efficient birth that does not result in trauma for the mum and baby?
A proven method of achieving this is with hypnobirthing. As hypnobirthing gets ever popular, there continues to be an ‘unknown’ to what it is – commonly confusing it with being hypnotised, which can lead to the fear of being ‘out of control’. The truth is, you will be ‘IN’ control more than you ever imagined!
If hypnoBIRTHING isn’t hypnoTHERAPY, how can I help?
It is true that hypnosis has been shrouded in the murkiness of exaggerated claims of a collection of beliefs or practices mistakenly regarded as being based on a scientific method for decades – if not centuries and is often the reason why most couples are confused about whether to explore hypnobirthing with the beginning of the word starting with ‘Hypno’ – not to mention the many staged acts! A simple way of understanding the difference is that hypnotherapy works on un-doing a behaviour/fear. In contrast, hypnobirthing uses hypnosis techniques such as meditation, guided imagery, deep breathing and relaxation as a means to enable a mum-to-be to increase her oxytocin, reduce or, even better, remove adrenaline, thus moving to a calm and efficient birth. As a result, the remarkable work of Marie Mongan, Founder of Hypnobirthing, used her hypnotherapy skills alongside the concept founded by Dr Grantly Dick Read of the fear-tension-pain cycle, putting the two together and enabling hypnobirthing to be born (pardon the pun).
Additionally, hypnobirthing is vital for the birth partner—understanding his/her role—and for both the mum-to-be and birth partner to understand and navigate the maternity services that enable the untangling of some very complex information so that decisions that are right for mum and baby can be made. Coupling this with logic, methods, and the key—the practice—can result in an empowering birth.
Find Out More
You can read more about my work on my website, www.ellivasehypnobirthing.co.uk, and tune into the MyBump2Baby podcast during the Easter celebrations. We will discuss all things hypnobirthing as we celebrate new life and new beginnings.