Trust Is Invaluable When It Comes To Birth
There are several different types of trust. The trust that you need to have in your birthing care team, the trust that you need to have in the process of birth and your body’s abilities (and I’m not just talking about “natural” birth here), the trust of yourself, your instincts and your intuition because when you have that you can surrender to what is and let go of fear and expectations.
Living in a patriarchal society, the dominant paradigm that governs the medical industry is no exception to the historical lack of research, care, time and energy given to matters of women’s health. Things have changed some but not nearly enough, especially in the area of maternity care.
Of course, there are vast differences among individual practitioners in women’s healthcare. There are many lovely, women centered, progressive minded providers out there for sure!
However, as a whole we have a long way to go when women of color in the United States are 2 to 6 more times likely to die from complications due to pregnancy than white women. That is a grotesque disparity in a country as wealthy as the U.S. You can find out more about this topic at Black Mamas Matter Alliance.
Trust is an essential component in the relationship between you and your provider. You want to find a healthcare provider who supports and cares about your choices. Surprisingly, you may come to find out that this person is not your OB/GYN who you’ve already been seeing from before you were pregnant.
Don’t hesitate to search around and visit other providers. You want someone who will take the time to hear your concerns, answer your questions and really respect what you tell them about your body.
Although you are consulting with experts to guide you through this process they are not the expert on you and what you want and need to feel comfortable, safe and capable of birthing. Therefore you need to:
TRUST YOUR INSTINCTS!!
No, you’ve never done this before, that’s true, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t know your own body and mind!
Birth is a natural process that women have been doing for a very long time. Trust that your body will be able to get your baby out safely. I know, it’s difficult to fully take this one in when we hear stories of our peers whose births did not go as they wanted. This is the difficult task of pregnancy.
We honor and trust our bodies that they know exactly what to do and will be able to carry out this incredible and amazing process of birth. We also trust….and learn to advocate within….the medical system to take care of us and our babies when something within the mother baby dyad isn’t lining up right and medical assistance is needed to get your baby out safely.
We must enter into the process fully expecting our body to do exactly what it’s supposed to. Because it can. First we must trust that our body and our baby will work together to birth with ease.
Women so often feel as though their bodies have failed them when something doesn’t go as they expected during birth and require medical intervention. Rather than thinking your body is failing you realize that your body is doing everything it needs to do and there’s just some internal reason that we can’t see that is making it difficult for the baby to come out.
We have to cultivate the flexibility of mind and spirit to change perspectives in real time to allow the medical professionals to help when our bodies and baby’s need it.
I’ll go into this in great detail in my next post on Mindset. For now I will reiterate that this is the main reason you need to find providers you trust because when medical intervention is suggested you want to be able to trust that your provider is using evidence based information to assess and provide intervention only when it’s needed.
You don’t need them to do anything or make decisions for you when your body is doing exactly as it is meant to.
So again, trust your instincts. Hire a health care provider who you trust!
Although you haven’t experienced the sensations of labor before, your intuition and instincts can still guide you because birthing is, and should be, a very primal experience.
The more you can let your thinking brain be quiet the more your instincts will take over. When you’re in labor and letting your primal brain be your guide by creating a safe, comfortable birthing environment then your body will naturally assume the positions, do the movements, and breathe and moan exactly as it needs to progress your labor forward towards birth.
The other benefit of being and staying in this primal brain space is that you will be 100 percent in the moment and your mind will be focused only on what is happening moment to moment.
This decreases fear and anxiety and therefore keeps contractions manageable. It will be easier to release expectations because you are present in each moment and not thinking about how it is or isn’t matching what you expected or wanted it to be.
You can trust yourself to know what’s right for your body and your baby!
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