In recent blog posts I’ve been talking about the 4 cornerstones to working with your labor. We began with it not being about pain, but about your mental attitude, then there was the concept of staying on your “mat” and controlling those things you could control for. Then there was the idea of the labor tunnel, the point when things get challenging and you truly have to focus- and that we want to push this off as long as possible.
But once we come to the opening of that tunnel, and we feel ourselves going in, we want to go in without hesitation and begin working with whatever experience lies within it. And inside the tunnel is, well, like a tunnel. Meaning things may seem dark, maybe scary, it may seem lonely or claustrophobic, since after all we are in a tunnel. And here is where the final cornerstone to working with your labor comes into play. What is your magic labor thought?
By magic thought I mean the thought that will keep you walking forward in the tunnel. The focal point or inspiring concept that will encourage you to keep taking step after step through this dark, possibly intense place. What I am speaking of is your own motivation. What keeps you moving forward towards the moment that you get to meet your baby?
Every birthing person will have different motivations, so you have to figure out your own for yourself. Reasons I have heard people express for wanting a certain type of birth have included:
Best outcome for baby
Personal empowerment
Previous trauma
Inspirational birth story/video
Shared experience with someone
and so many more
And here’s the other secret about this cornerstone of working with your labor. You probably want to have more than one magic thought you can turn to. Maybe you’re in the tunnel and investigating each sensation, watching thoughts come and go. . . and maybe beginning to feel like this is more difficult than you expected—or that you simply cannot navigate it any longer. At that moment, maybe you remember that women have been birthing babies for thousands of years. It feels inspiring to place yourself in this lineage, so you meet the next contraction with the mantra “Women have done this since the dawn of time,” or “My body was made to birth.” Maybe that thought carries you for a while.
But after, say, an hour or two, you might get a bit tired of saying it. So here’s where you have another thought, maybe something focused more on your own persona: “I am strong,” or whatever speaks to you. And repeating that keeps you walking forward for a while. And then you find that thought losing its sparkle and you move to another one. And on and on. There’s no right or wrong thought as long as you find it to be empowering, so I always encourage students to discover the words that have meaning for them in their experience.
I once had a student who admitted that part of her reason for wanting a natural birth was to prove her own mother wrong about how the birth process could unfold. Her magic labor thought at one point was literally “I’m not going to have my mother’s birth!” (which we reframed as “I can have my own birth experience” to give it a more positive spin). It doesn’t matter what you choose, as long as it’s meaningful to you. You’ll want to have several thoughts or reasons to fall back on; one single inspiration may not be enough.
None of this means you are locked into one version of the birth experience, either. It may be that in the moment of working with your labor you decide that an intervention would be appropriate. This is completely fine! I have actually seen some birth experiences become fully empowered when the birthing person chose to have an epidural or a surgical birth. The choices were made from a calm, centered place with the best information they could have at the moment.
Many childbirth classes will use the acronym BRAIN to help in deciding around interventions. When considering if something is right, take a moment to ask what might be the Benefits? The Risks? The Alternatives? Then ask for privacy while you check in with your own Intuition about whether this feels like the right step for you (or would you rather try something else?). Finally, ask what might be the Next steps, and what if you did not do this thing Now? Then having considered your options from a calm place, I always suggest informing your care team of your decision with a Smile, so you are expressing yourself in a cooperative rather than combative manner.
BRAIN(S) may lead you to deviate off of your original birth “plan,” which is still part of working with your labor. Make the best choice you can, and then work with that. Second guessing or looking back is a recipe for depression and regret, neither of which serve us in labor, motherhood, or yoga.
In working with the labor process, the real key is to find the ways that we can keep working with whatever is coming up. As meditation instructors will say- anything is workable so long as you keep working with it. This means staying present to our own experience, and also taking back our own power so we have the control we can have. Choosing providers carefully, and then staying in dialogue with both them and ourselves about how we want to birth. This then allows the possibility that we find the birth experience which is right for us- be it natural or not.
Key Takeaways:
Once we begin to engage with the labor process fully it helps to know your own motivations for why you are choosing the birth experience you are.
Having multiple motivations is helpful in continuing to work with the labor process.
Focusing on one type of labor and birth doesn’t mean you are closing out the other options.
You can take the time to evaluate the different options available during labor and then make the choice that is right for you, but to do this we have to make sure we select people who will truly support us before labor begins.
Making choices from a calm and empowered place can often lead to feeling accomplished in labor- even if you chose to deviate from your original image of birth.