In this episode I’m joined by Alex Heath, owner of Traumatic Birth Recovery. Alex is a hypnotherapist, doula and Traumatic Birth Recovery specialist.
Birth trauma is a lot more common than people realise, in this episode we talk about what can made a birth traumatic, we look at challenges with induction, as well we what you can do if you need support following birth.
So get as comfy you can, grab your birth partner if possible and enjoy.
Resources:
- If you’ve had a traumatic birth, or are struggling to process birth, or you’re a partner who feels they need support following birth, please do get in touch, I’m always happy to have a chat through options.
- If you’d like to book hypnotherapy with Jade you can do that here: https://sonamum.com/hypnotherapy
- To read more about Alex’s work head over to https://traumaticbirthrecovery.com/
Transcript [Please note this is automatically created and may contain some errors]
In this episode, I’m joined by Alex Heath owner of traumatic birth recovery. Alex is a hypnotherapist doula and birth trauma recovery specialist, and has been a great inspiration to me over the last seven or eight years. Birth trauma is a lot more common than people realize it is a really important topic to discuss here. In this episode, we talk about what can make birth traumatic.
We look at challenges with induction and whether there’s anything we can do about them as well as what you can do, if you need support following birth. So get as comfy as you can grab your birth partner, if possible, and a cup of tea and enjoy listening. You’re listening to the positive induction podcast, a podcast for those who have chosen to have an induction or for those interested and how they can make induction a more positive experience.
I’m your host, Jade Gordon, clinical hypnotherapist, hypnobirthing teacher, and positive induction coach. As always, I want to remind you positive birth. It means different things to different people. And we will talk about that in this case about the difference between positive and traumatic births and everything in between for you positive breast may be about feeling in control or maybe being respected and formed supported.
We’ll look at the other side of this too. As a C in this episode, my aim here is to give you tips, inspiration and real life experience, as well as St. Paul’s in you two additional resources. So let’s get started. So thanks for joining me today, Alex, you are actually responsible for me being here, being talking about him to therapy.
You’re talking about induction so much because many years ago, I did your, one of your tuning course on trauma and inspire me so much that I am, you know, went even deeper with induction and hypnotherapy everything. So it’s really exciting to have you here today. Yeah. We’re going to be talking about what makes it induction traumatic, and obviously some people experienced birth trauma with any kind of birth and all those don’t have any time at all.
So we’re going to look at what can impact that kind of trauma induction on, I can’t think of anyone better to talk to you so welcome. Ah, thank you. J just love to have a conversation about such an important subject that it affects so many people. Yeah. And a little, it may sound like a negative subject, and we are just going to kind of look at it in more depth,
because I think the more you understand things the better, and it’s going to help people understand some things they can do to help themselves. Of course, we’re never seeing that you can prevent trauma. Sometimes trauma happens, doesn’t it. And there’s nothing it’s out of our control. The big question really is first of all, how would you describe first trauma,
Perinatal trauma? So any, any trauma, not just birth trauma is really any experience that person feels that there’s a real threat to their life or the life of someone close to them, or they felt a threat to their integrity either physically or emotionally. So very often people feel that the situation or the event was out of their control, that they were helpless and that they were unable to get out of that situation.
So they were kind of trapped by that situation. And perinatal trauma is very nuanced from other types of trauma, such as road traffic accidents, or, you know, physical assaults because of the vulnerabilities that are involved for people who are expectant with babies. It has several different nuances, I think, to other kinds of traumas, which well well worth considering I think for any parents who are traveling that kind of journey,
because that can happen at any time as I’m sure many parents are aware. So not necessarily even just at birth, but other things that are traumatic, such as miscarriages, baby loss, but even things like hyperemesis or difficult breastfeeding journeys can be traumatic when parents feel that threat to life or feel that the threats to their baby’s life. So, so often that is held that,
you know, there is that vulnerability that remains with parents, that anxiety, which leaves them vulnerable to trauma. So understanding that sometimes helps clarify things because I think sometimes people are inclined to think, oh, well, you know, I’m alive. My baby’s alive. Was it really that bad? And, and you look back and reflect and think, oh,
well, we’re both still here. It couldn’t have been that bad, but actually it’s more about how the person felt at the time, if the person felt unsafe, if they felt done too, if they felt out of control, then the chances are that they might’ve experienced that as traumatic. And there’s also a greater chance then that they will continue to be affected by what happened by experiencing trauma symptoms or anxiety or some other kinds of negative effects related to that frightening event.
It’s less about what happened. A lot of people think, oh, well, you know, no one died or we’re both still here. We’re both healthy. So it couldn’t have been traumatic. It’s much more about how the person felt at the time when it happened and how they still feel about it. Now, if it still continues to cause anxiety upset,
anger, flashbacks, you know, rumination about what happened, then the chances are that it has left a mark and that it, you know, it, it probably was traumatic in some way. Even if that person doesn’t use that language to describe it, It’s so true. We still see his, a society like people who are trying to be helpful,
associates you’re bound babies. Well, and what have you got to complain about, which is just so dismissive and terrible because like you see, that’s not what happens to you, it’s your experience and how you’re, how you felt during it. And I always say like, if you have like two bits of paper and you compare like minute by minute, and two people had almost the identical birth experience,
one of them could feel amazing about it. Like it was really positive and the other can feel completely traumatized because there’s so much more to it than, you know, a timeline of what happened. So yeah, I think that’s so important. So in terms of total, not an induction, of course not all inductions are traumatic, but here today, we’re going to look at what,
what can meek or can contribute to an induction being worth traumatic with a hope to look at, you know, how we can take some action. So what are the main things? And people come to you with breath trauma, or like perinatal trauma following induction for the main themes are present around that. First thing is, is that the way that induction is presented induction is often presented as it’s less necessary because the health of the baby may be in danger.
If you go and post date. So often inductions are presented like, well, we won’t let you go over 40 weeks because your chances of still birth go up or double after this time, which obviously sounds very alarming. And bearing in mind, the parents are very vulnerable and very preowned and sensitive to, to the health and safety of their baby. You know,
this is often forgotten the parents spend nine months growing and protecting that life. So that’s threat immediately leave somebody vulnerable to experiencing induction as traumatic because it’s been presented as needed for the health and safety of the baby. So this is something that I often point out to healthcare professionals that often it’s about how we present interventions, because if we present them as in,
well, you know, there’s something wrong. Truth of the matter is, is that most inductions are recommended because it’s standard protocol and procedure. It won’t be necessary for every single pregnancy to have an induction, but it’s offered to every single pregnancy because that’s protocol. And obviously there’s lots of different research, a lot of which contradicts each other, which makes it even harder for parents to make a decision.
So the way it’s presented will have an impact upon the parents. The first thing is that leaves parents vulnerable. I think the other thing that leaves parents vulnerable is just the loss of control over something that is a, a physical, emotional, and spiritual transition for a person from non-parent parent. It’s a full on thing. It’s like a holistic transition one that needs to be handled with care,
support, love, and kindness. And so in induction sort of takes those elements away and makes it a very medical mechanical extraction process basically. And that feels very frightening to many, many people. You know, everybody has a different idea about how they’d like to give birth. And parents are bombarded with so much like posing and polarizing information, get the epidural and straight away go natural.
Do your hypnobirthing course, you know, and everything that’s anywhere in between do make a birth plan, be informed. Don’t bother making a birth plan. You don’t know what’s going to happen on the day. There’s everything, all of this going on and around fair for every kind of parent, you know, and everybody’s unique and individually and what they will want,
but most people don’t want to feel like their birth is so managed that they lose connection with what is happening to their body, because that does feel very frightening. And it can be also very re-triggering of past traumas where people have lost control in medical environments, or even in abusive environments where they’ve lost control over their bodies and they’ve felt done too. So we have to bear in mind,
somebody’s past experience of that kind of thing. You know, losing, losing control over one’s one’s physical body, you know, that’s, that’s how it feels. And so I think that that’s a key thing, loss of control over something that is such a, an important transitional time length of time. You know, often people say it just went on and on and on.
And often the, the level of intervention, it starts with induction, but often there comes more intervention with that. All of those things, it kind of mounts and mounts mounts, and what is often presented as, oh, it’s a simple thing, but we recommend it for the safety of your baby. Actually, isn’t a simple thing. And of course some,
sometimes induction is quick, right? There’s always like the different spectrum. Yeah. Like it is born for being longer. And with that longer induction that you’re not sleeping either. Right. So you’re in a more vulnerable state as well. And yeah, there’s a lot, there’s a lot going on there as you see, like There’s a lot going on.
So there is no hard and fast rule. But for those who find induction traumatic is often because there is a loss of control, the intervention scales, upwards, it’s other, other things as well. And it’s the length of time, you know, a lot happens. There’s a lot of shift changes. So naturally if you’re in hospital over a long period of time,
you will have two or three or four shift changes of midwives. And they might all be different people. And we know that one of the things that causes people to feel like their experience was traumatic is feeling unsafe and feeling safe, usually is about who is in the room, supporting you. So if you, you know, I know people that have had really positive inductions experiences because they’ve had the support of either their partners or their dealers,
or a good midwife who were able to like support them as they went through that induction. And it wasn’t a traumatic experience. So support and feeling safe is such an important factor in protecting birth environment, from it being a traumatic experience. And so when, when parents feel unsupported and it’s a long period of time, they’ve had a change of midwives, perhaps their partners even had to leave.
And obviously during COVID partners, weren’t allowed to join until they’re until the birth in person was five centimeters or more, you know, you might be in there two days before that has happened in an induction process. So all of those things contribute to it being a traumatic experience for some people. And so, unfortunately, as we’ve been discussing before we came on together,
it’s recommended at 39 weeks from most pregnant people now isn’t it? Yeah. So yeah, locally, they get given a date, like at your first name week appointment, you’re usually given a date for induction. And then one of the things you were talking about control and well go. I was thinking about like that feeling of failure of like frustration. Like why,
why have you not started Libra body healing? God. Yeah. Like when you get an appointment for like 41 weeks, it’s our name weeks say, oh, you’re being told, oh, well, you’re not likely to do this yourself. Right. You’re not likely to want to leave her. So here’s the date, we’ll start it for you. Like it’s not great for your mindset at all,
is it? No, no. It’s not conducive for you feeling empowered and able to, to do it on your own terms. And, and as I said, just the presentation of induction as being needed for safety, I think is something else that puts people in a vulnerable risk for, for finding it traumatic. But I think it’s really the same as any other intervention that parents find themselves offered.
It can feel like you’re being pending to like a place where there, there is, you know, little option or very little maneuver. And that’s, that’s the start of feeling unsafe. Right. I have to do this thing and I don’t really want to do it, but I have to do it because there’s mountain pressure. And it’s really difficult for parents who perhaps,
you know, many of which would really, I don’t know that how I would have got to 41 weeks pregnant. I was so miserable being pregnant. I think that’s why mine came early because I just couldn’t get there. So quite understand that many parents would, you know, quite happily go into an induction and wanting their pregnancies to, you know, to produce the baby that they’d been growing for for however many weeks.
But with any intervention, it’s about really carving out choices really for oneself. And just because you’ve been offered in induction, whether you want it or whether you don’t want it, whether you feel pressure to have it or not feel pressured to have it just knowing that there are still choices that you can have within that, you know, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be a foregone conclusion.
So knowing about the type of induction that your hospital offers is a good starting point, you know, do they offer something like Cook’s balloon or an other induction method that allows you to go home until birth light until contraction starts? That’s really your best option? I think PO possibly some of the most longest inductions are the ones where you go in for the pessary.
You hang around all day, hang around all night. And very often people are really uncomfortable with the pessary. It can really stimulate contractions that aren’t necessarily always picked up on by healthcare professionals. And that can be quite worrying for parents. You know, they’re, you’re not on a labor ward, you’re on an anti-natal ward very often. And so, you know,
negotiating with type of induction that you have if possible. And as we were saying before, you know, maybe, maybe you don’t want, if you really do not want an induction, ask your healthcare professional for an elective, C-section, you know, if you’ve got good reasons, why you think an induction would be traumatic for you, take me into consideration your past history.
So, you know, maybe you’ve got the calls in your past to find an induction, you know, that it will be very stressful and traumatic for you. And if that is the case thing, go and argue that with your consultant obstetrician and ask for an elective, C-section, you know, nice guidelines states that each healthcare provider have to consider parents’ wishes for an elective and I’ve supported many parents to,
to get elective C-section. So they do happen. So it may be that’s an avenue that you would rather go down than an induction. Yeah. Yeah. You can always decline induction. And if they’re really concerned about baby and you waiting, then if they are really concerned and they should always see the orphan us as area. And of course, so I,
yeah, I think you mentioned before, to me, I’m about like taking ownership of that decision as well. And if you, you know, we are talking here about Toma and we’re talking about putting, when you do want to have an induction, but of course, with control, some people choose an induction because they want to feel in control for whatever past reasons or previous pregnancies or things like that.
They may choose to do it. But in the case of feeling that I have control when you don’t really want an induction necessarily, but it seems like the best case for you. How can you take that one on a ship or have a more positive decision making, like starting early? Like what can we do to improve that? I think regardless of what the intervention suggested.
So whether it’s induction or something else, I think actually we should be encouraging parents to engage in conversation with their healthcare professionals, much more. You are able to enter into a conversation about what is best for your health and what is best for your baby. Communicating one’s fears to healthcare professionals is really important in order for us to get the best care. And in order to fast to get personalized care.
And a lot is talked about this with continuity of care for that allows relationship and trust and rapport to develop. So parents are able to have this communication now continuity of care is available in some places, but very often I think mostly just for the most fun, well, now that there’s shortages as such, I don’t think it’s happening in any meaningful way anywhere.
So you’re, you have to just communicate with who you’ve got on that day, you know, and know that your opinion and your wishes for your own health, it’s your health. You have to take ownership of it. So taking ownership of that by saying, this is what is best for me. And this is what I want you to support me in very often is how you get personalized care.
And it, it can feel difficult to ask for that because, you know, you might not have the support of your partner and that’s where working with a doula or working with an antenatal teacher who know what the research is around different interventions, who know what the stats and figures, and usually know what the offering is. Your local trust is really important because you,
you know, you kind of often do need support to navigate today’s maternity system, you know, and that’s what independent antenatal education gives you. And that’s what working with an independent dealer gives you, you know, is that support in navigating the system in order to get what is best for your health. And I think that that’s possibly the best way to avoid trauma is to,
to always be asking for what’s best for you. And that’s very unique and different for each individual. And of course, if people are listening to this and they feel that they’ve done all these steps, like of course we can never truly prevent trauma. It’s about finding the things we can do to make it less likely. So yeah, for people who have had a previous traumatic birth then,
or for anyone who has had a recent one, how do we process that trauma? Like why can we support ourselves one babies here? If we, if people are listening to this thinking, oh, I might have that sense of something I’m experienced, what can they, what can they do The best thing really after they’ve experienced anything that’s difficult. Life-threatening scary,
frightening event is for us to really reset our nervous system because our nervous system is completely shot and rinsed through coping with that kind of trauma because it goes on for a long time, very often. And it is a full physical, emotional, you know, assault on oneself very often. That is how it feels. And so being able to reset one’s nervous system is really important and that again,
will be different for everyone. Some people will want to be surrounded by people who make them feel safe. So surrounding yourself, by people who make you feel safe is really important. And that sounds really silly, like who choose to surround themselves by people to make them feel unsafe. Flashy just means like, if you go home and you’re not up to handling your wing or say,
I’m not up to handling my in-laws. And the other thing is, you know, some people feel that that nervous system is, is stood down and reset by physical touch hugs, massage, light, touch, massage, you know, stimulating the Vegas nerve will again, help people come back down to a sort of homeostasis where they can begin to process what’s going on.
The problem is for a lot of parents who come out of difficult or traumatic first, they th they, they don’t have that, that moment of reset where they can begin to feel safe again. And then at the time that’s right for them, they can start processing. What’s happened, obviously after you’ve gone through that trauma, you’ve then got the, the challenging situation of looking after a newborn sleep and everything.
Yeah. And I said, really, for that to happen, you really need to, to be in a place where again, your autonomic nervous system is, is, is able to produce, you know, facilitate that relaxation mode and the oxytocin that’s needed for feeding, bonding and rest, you know, and if we’re in the fight or flight mode,
then all of those, those we’re in the opposite of that mode that’s needed for the nurture and recovery, basically. So doing things that facilitate feeling safe and grounded. So being with people that make you feel safe, lots of hugs and massage, if you are a huggy, a massage person, if you’re not a huggy and massage the person, it won’t work,
but that’s kind of, you know, all of the ways that we know we can stand down the autonomic nervous system, but generally, you know, being able to feel safe and, and not, I think that the biggest issue for parents is feeling like they can ask for help. You know, it is a difficult and challenging time for so many of us.
Gosh, you know, I remember how much I struggled with my first. It was absolutely hell long legs. And I just wished that, you know, there, there would have been more common knowledge about postnatal Dina’s because that’s what I needed. Looking back. I needed something to look after me and to support me as I learned how to be, to encourage me to show me what to do.
And I was really lucky that I had my own mother who helped me a lot, but still it was still a struggle. So I think asking for help and knowing that you need it is the biggest strength is the hardest thing to do, but it’s the beast. That is the biggest thing that you can do for yourself is to say, look, I,
I, you know, I didn’t have a good time. And now I’m really still feeling the effects of that and to, to seek support. And again, it will be different for everyone. Some people might want the support of a dealer. Other people might want to talk to somebody who’s trying to listen to difficult or traumatic stories. And to begin that process of,
you know, understanding and processing what happens different for everyone really. But ultimately we want to stand down the nervous system that’s left in that state. And I love that so much of that is what we’re trying to encourage them to do in birth as well, the light touch massage, or that heaving or anything like that, that we’re doing all the things that are helping our oxytocin floor,
our natural it’s, the dual center, you know, like that kind of nice, cozy, oxytocin environment, really helpful afterwards as well. I think often BB arise and we forget all that stuff and actually heal loads of that stuff is still really important. And that’s why hypnobirthing teachers like UJA say valuable and like are able to communicate that like hypnobirthing techniques,
aren’t just for the birth thing. They’re there for pregnancy they’re for birth and they’re for beyond. So I think the tendency is, is when we, when we go into it, when parents go into an induction, they think, oh, it’s to hell in a handcart. Now we might as well just let go of everything that we’ve been planning for,
because it’s all gonna be taken away from us. But actually there are a lot of things that you can do with your Hypnoparenting techniques to support yourself through an induction, which I know is all of the stuff that you do, but, you know, and even if at times things feel like they’ve gone off course, you can still always, you know,
come back to using the techniques that you’ve learned to help reset, you know, things kind of go get derailed at a certain point, you know, try and get yourself back on track by bringing yourself back into a calm centered and grounded place. Even like your breathing techniques and everything like that, that you learned. Yeah, Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Yeah. I think, I think the thing is, and I know this is something that obviously you teach in your Hypnoparenting class and something that we were talking about with the recent social media posting over the weekends, there needs to be like more discussion of all of the shades of birth. Yes. It can be glorious. Yes. It can be powerful.
Yes. It can be majestic and all of those things, all of those beautiful, beautiful things, but realistically, it’s going to be some other things as well. It is going to be a bit frightening. It is going to be a bit out of control. It is going to be a bit hammy at sometimes it’s, it’s going to be all of those things and Hypnoparenting can help you navigate with those things.
It’s not going to mean that the bad things don’t happen. It’s going to mean that you’ve got some tools to navigate the bad things, but in birth is just like anything else in life or your working day, you have some highs and you have some lows, you have some stinky things, you have some beautiful things. And it’s about using those things to navigate those.
So we’re less polarized, nothing king and talking about the like, it’s, it was this kind of, you know, glorious, like angels came out and said, There’s a rainbow outside the window and locks were in the trees because they might be some of that. But there’s also going to be bits where you felt embarrassed because I don’t know you farted in your partner or blew out or something.
That’s life. It’s all that thing. It’s all. Yes. How, how you feel when those things happen as well, like how you’re respected and Hey, see if you feel that you see safe as the important word, what we’re we think we want is control batch. What we want is to feel, see, and every birth control here and there,
but yeah, safety is really important. It’s tricky, isn’t it? Because ultimately there’s a degree of loss of control. So it’s not going to be hard for those person. I’ll put my hand up to being one of those people you like to have control, you know? So that’s part of it. Yeah. And just wanted to say as well,
we were talking about trauma related to birth. There’s not always, of course, just the person given birth, the partner. I think quite often when partners with me, they will say, oh, they’re almost embarrassed. They’re almost like excusing the fact that they’re here for this, when it wasn’t them and Libra and like all traumas, valid trauma, like if you’re present and you,
you are having those trauma symptoms, like that’s valid as well. Yeah, absolutely. It’s all valid. It’s all valid. And you know, there, there can be no judgment on how you’re feeling because they are just your feelings, you know, you can’t say well that you’re right to feel that, or you’re wrong to feel that they are feelings.
You know, you feel that way for a reason. So, you know, very often I think there’s power in validating our feelings or having our feelings validated and at least acknowledged if not by ourselves, by someone else. Yeah. So for anyone who’s had previous birth trauma, who’s paying for another birth. I mean, maybe an induction. If they listening to this,
what, what would be helpful to them to do in preparation for their next birth experience? I think it depends how you feel like I often work with people who have had previous birth trauma and a subsequently pregnant and they are, they actually coped really well after their initial birth trauma, but it’s when they were pregnant again, they started to experience birth trauma symptoms and a lot of anxiety because obviously it all comes flooding back when you’re pregnant again.
And so, yeah, working with a trained professional, somebody who has got the skills and training to be able to work with that person, to process that trauma, to lift those symptoms and to, you know, support them towards their own goals for what their next birth looks like. And again, that will be different for everyone. Yeah. You know,
it’s all of the, all of the things are valid. You know, you hit, you will hear a lot of things in the birth world about this is the best way, or that is the best way, but it really is about the individual being able to, to, to, to connect with what is best for them really. And I think as well as working with somebody who has that skill and training in lifting trauma symptoms,
start talking to your healthcare professionals as soon as possible about your fear. And I think this, this, this also goes for what I was saying earlier about talking to healthcare professionals. Don’t as much as possible, don’t leave it until you’re in the birthing room to bring up a fear that you have talk about it early on. And if people seem like they’re not listening,
then schedule some time with a head of midwifery or somebody who a consultant midwife would be the person, a consultant midwife, or a consultant obstetrician who has the time to listen to your fears. Your fears are important. Even if your mother-in-law has said they’re not important, or your best friend has told you not to worry about it. If you have fears in pregnancy about your birth,
whether they’re relating to a previous birth, or you’ve never given birth before tall Carly on to your health care professionals about that. And if they don’t take you seriously escalate it to the consultant, because it is important. If you go in feeling unsafe, if you go in feeling fearful, then those are the things that tend to play out for you. If we’re able to say early on,
I’m really scared of this. What can you do to support me? Can I have X, Y, or Z and go to them with your own desires for what you want. Then that’s very often when you start to get a personalized birth plan written down, whatever your thing is in your head, go to your care provider and ask for a personalized birth plan to be written.
And for that to go into your notes, and this might mean that you are able to go against guidelines, you that you’re able to go against policy and protocol, and it’s the consultant midwife or obstetrician that writes that off, that signs that off. And it’s not a birth plan that you would write home. This is a D it’s like a new of how in your new,
You know, go and get that agreed by your consultant, midwife or obstetrician. So they’re able to write that in the notes and because it’s important when we have fears that we are able to feel in control, and the only way we can gain that control as much of it as we can is through having these conversations with our healthcare professionals early. And I know it can be difficult.
I know earlier on, I said, look, half like, make sure you have the conversation. The thing is, if you leave it to the birth birthing room, very often, it’s a bit too late, then things will start happening. And it’s very hard for us to vocalize when we’re in the dissociate, we kind of go into a birth.
And, but it’s really hard to find those words and anyone who’s listening to this and thinks I try to speak up, but I couldn’t speak up. Honestly, that’s so natural to experience that many, many parents regret not being able to speak up. And you know, when we’re in, when we’re in a traumatic situation, we lose our words. We go into,
we come into a freeze response where we literally can’t speak. We kind of go somewhere else in order to protect ourselves. And so when you’re actually in labor, that’s not the time to have the conversation. The time to have the conversation is before. And that might mean a bit of knocking on doors and, and making sure the right person listens, but it will mean that you get your healthcare professionals on your side.
We had this recently in the positive induction Facebook group for two people, actually, who wanted to have an induction, there was an implant induction for so many weeks or seven weeks for 1 38 weeks for the other. They were trying to get there, like, how can I make sure that I have this induction for mental health reasons or for past pregnancy reasons yet with the seam,
it was always like trying to find the right person. And if you don’t get a positive response, so you don’t feel like you’ve been listened to that. You see asking again and again, because yeah, like till you get to the person escalated to get to a person who actually listened to You just need to consult with midwife, but it might be a good consultant obstetrician,
but the words are previous experience. If you feel happy using those words, or if you feel even more comfortable being tides, be open the same previous trauma means that I fear that this will happen and it’s affecting my mental health now. And so to not be shy about talking about the effects, your mental health, to not be shy about talking about previous traumas,
because usually when being completely blunt about that, how it affects you as a person, how it affects your mental health, which is your health. You want, you know, we talk about mental health, it’s all health, all health. And we forget that sometimes, but our mental health is as important as our physical health. It’s all our health.
And so to be very clear about how it’s affecting your health, how this stress or fee or anxiety is impacting your health now and how it’s necessary for you to get some assurances from your care providers. Brilliant. That’s great. Thanks. One final question then for anyone listening, who’s confronted duction later today or tomorrow, do you have any final, you’ve covered a lot of tips,
any final words of wisdom? I would say as much as possible. Try and see if you can go home. So finding out what, what induction is offered and then try and go home until labor has started. But if that’s not possible and you find yourself kind of on an antenatal ward with a pessary for a long amount of time, just taking lots of things to entertain yourself,
taking AirPods, taking relaxation, recordings, like get some good apps on your phone, like calm or insight. Timer is free. Get all of your hypnobirthing tracks, ready, get some good books, get some good gossip, mats, whatever you like to read, you know, download your films on your iPad, make sure your charges and try and make yourself at home in that room for however long and try and steer away from thinking about God it’s been,
it’s been 12 hours and no one’s calm. It’s been this long, take all of your snacks. You’ve really got to go into hospital as if you are making that place your home, because you’re going to be there for a while, taking everything that’s going to help you to make it feel like home and just set up camp there without expectation and support yourself as best as you can get the people who are going to support you in there.
So if you’ve got a dealer, get your, get your dealers to come and visit the massage, you know, use the reflexology points on your feet. Use acupressure, all of the things that you can to get labor going naturally, but just, you’ve got to bide your time. And here’s what happens for most people is they’re like, oh my God,
I can’t believe it’s been, I’ve been here 24 hours. It’s like, yeah, sadly, you can sometimes be stuck on antenatal, waiting for labor to start and then to have your water spoken. So if you do find yourself in that kind of situation, where it’s, you’re in hospital for awhile, make the room your own, get supported by your family and yeah.
Negotiate along the way with what you can, you know, give them what their policy and protocol is. So it might be that when your waters are broken, that you, that your monitored or whatever, can you negotiate that? So you can move around. So once your waters are broken, your best being mobile. So can you negotiate to say,
okay, you can break my waters, but I want to stay mobile. Some ability will help you and will help bring surges on to, to a level that’s, you know, might mean that you can avoid the rest of induction. And then if they do want to put the drip in negotiating on that, just starting off really slow or really low point,
if you intend to use pain relief, like an epidural, then asking some hospitals, if they’ll put the epidural in with the, with the induction, with the so-called syndrome here, is it? Yes. And Tulsa Pitocin, synthetic oxytocin, wherever. So ask if they can put the, you know, if, if the two things can happen together,
one that they’re like, okay, I’ll be in juice, but I want the epidural from the get-go and that’s fine as well. All of these things are fine, you know, and get the two things in together. So always, always be asking each step, cause it’s step by step by step by step. First of all, they want to re ripen the cervix.
And whether that’s done by a Cook’s balloon or a pessary, you know, then they’ll probably want to break your water just to go skating each day and having a bit of a game plan about how you feel and how you want to, how you want this birth to go. So it can still go that way. Do you want to be mobile? Do you want the epidural or well,
in that case, go for the breaking of the waters and ask them to sign it as soon as possible. All of the same things apply during an induction as applied during a non-indigenous birth. So you want darkness, you want massage, you want soothing music. You want your favorite oils. You want to be a mortar. If it’s available in your labor ward,
some labor wards, do you have birth in pools? Do they have one there? Do they have a shower you can get into? You know, so just because it’s an induction, you can still work your labor exactly. As if you would, if it was, if it had, you know, spontaneously occurred. So just bearing in mind, all those things.
So trying to avoid the extra hell in a handcart way of thinking, which obviously, you know, is tempting because you think, well, this isn’t what I wanted or this isn’t why I would have chosen. But just because you have those don’t feel like you can’t still say what you want and don’t feel like you can’t still use all of that. The hypnobirthing,
all of the lovely things that you have listened to your body, think what’s it need, you know, you need to go into that really mum mammalian sort of state of kind of comfy cozy darkness to allow birth happen anyway. So, you know, and as Jay said, there’s so many there, there’s plenty of good induction stories, plenty of good induction stories out there.
So go find one. Brilliant. Thanks so much. It was great to talk with you today, Alex, and thanks for sharing all of that with us. Oh, you’re welcome. Thank you so much again, to Alex, here are a couple of points that stood out for me. I wanted to highlight before we finish. Firstly, you can’t always prevent breast trauma is so important to recognize this.
It doesn’t matter what course you do, how informed you are, the duly you have, et cetera, et cetera. Sometimes things happen that result in trauma that are completely out of our personal control. That’s not to see us, right. And no one’s to blame or anything like that. They don’t want you to blame yourself or to listen to this and feel like,
oh, if I’d only done that this would have helped. That’s not really how this works. Please became to yourself. Secondly, you have the right to feel the way you feel do to allay people’s dismissive comments to make you doubt it. It’s not so much about what happened, but how you felt at the time and how you feel now. Even if you and BB are well at the end,
that doesn’t mean that your trauma is not valid. It doesn’t mean that your feelings are not valid. Finally, if you have experienced birth trauma or perinatal trauma, do reach out and get support. Even if you don’t feel it’s breath trauma, right? Even if you just feel like you’re struggling to process birth, or you need support in some way, there are some wonderful support groups available and that are many things you can do to help you process everything.
This applies to partners. As thanks for listening to which I hope is a really informative podcast. So opened up your mind to what trauma is and what we can do to help ourselves process afterwards, head over to the show notes for this episode@positiveinduction.com forward slash episode 11, where you’ll find additional resources, including support available for birth trauma, recovery, and other resources.
You may find helpful. Thanks again for being here with us today and do get in touch. If you have any questions, you can email me cheat@positiveinduction.com. I hope you have a lovely week.