I am so excited to start sharing some guest posts and so happy to have a Hypnobabies Dad who is excited to share his story!
Jeremy Dyen is a musician, teacher, husband and papa. He works locally in Philadelphia, and has performed and recorded worldwide and with Grammy-Award-winning artists such as John Legend and Lauryn Hill. He blogs at Stay At Home Papa, and has also created a free video series on childbirth with his wife at http://fearfreebirth.com.
My name is Jeremy. About a year ago, my wife gave birth to our beautiful and wonderful daughter in the comfort of our own home. Our birth journey had several turns. We had originally planned a hospital birth. When I had asked my wife if she considered natural childbirth, she said she was all about the epidural and whatever medications would help make the birth easier. She had thoughts planted in her head that birth would be the most painful thing” she would ever experience. A lot of these thoughts were ideas passed on from friends’ birth stories. Anyway, one thing led to another. We chose Hypnobabies as a home childbirth study, mainly because we couldn’t fit a “live” class into our schedule.
Well, we quickly took to the methods and style of Hypnobabies. We ditched our other DVD birthing class–Laugh and Learn–since it just played into the typical fears and expectations of birth (and the woman in that video was anything but funny–no laughs). We started to uncover things we hadn’t thought about birth. We started to develop our plan for the birth we wanted. My wife found herself looking forward to sitting with the Hypnobabies CDs. I listened and practiced too–not just to the birth partner CD, but to all of the others. I wanted to be as connected to the experience as I could, and figured this was a good way.
Around that time we were also reading a book called The Power Of Your Subconscious Mind, by Dr. Joseph Murphy. This book, among several other great related books we have since read, helped me create positive affirmations not just for the outcome of the birth, but for all aspects of my life. My wife focused on her Hypnobabies affirmations CD. She listened to it on the way to and from work everyday. In the meantime, I wrote down several of my own affirmations about our growing family and the safe delivery and overall health of our baby. I focused on these affirmations each night before going to sleep, and right after waking up in the morning.
It was easy for me to slip into doubtful and negative thinking. There are so many “what-ifs,” you know? For some reason I had seeds of thoughts about something being wrong with the baby after delivery. I don’t know where it came from exactly, but perhaps I had a feeling that it was something genetic I could pass on. These kinds of fears are irrational really. But these affirmations really helped. There were plenty of mornings when I wanted to just get up and start my day, but I convinced myself to stay in bed for even 5 minutes to sit with my positive thoughts.
The thing about hypnosis, guided imagery and affirmations is, when you actively influence your subconscious with conscious thoughts, a magical change happens in your life. I don’t mean ‘magical’ in the sense of a magic wand or some kind of magic pixie dust. I mean two things. One, positive thoughts bring positive outcomes. Two, focusing your thoughts on what you want causes you to action.
By focusing on a positive, comfortable birth (as Hypnobabies intends), we were taking action to make it so. From the Hypnobabies workbook, and plenty of other books, websites and videos, we learned a ton about nutrition, exercises, birth positions, homebirthing and lots of mistakes that can lead to outcomes we didn’t want in our experience. As my wife was working full time, I prepared almost all meals. I made sure to create the meals based on her needs during pregnancy. I also encouraged my wife to do prenatal yoga, which I often did with her. We found a great midwife for our homebirth too.
I always considered myself very involved in the birth process. The old images of a woman birthing while the husband was pacing in the waiting room are absolutely ridiculous to me. But the Hypnobabies birth partner scripts were very helpful in developing my own. I couldn’t just read those scripts verbatim. I needed to be natural about it to help my wife remain calm and relaxed. Those scripts, acted as guides though. You can actually read our full birth story in my words.
Honestly, there were some things in the Hypnobabies CDs that didn’t work for me. Sometimes I can be overly critical about choice of words. But for the most part, I thought these guided hypnosis CDs were so positive. Either way, I respected the “bubble of peace” that was being created, and I refrained from being critical or pointing these things out to my wife. And, in all honesty, I have found myself using some of the breathing techniques and phrases from those CDs to find peace in stressful situations.
I think that’s at the heart of Hypnobabies, and many programs of hypnosis, guided meditation and relaxation: consistent practice enables you to achieve relaxation more easily and on command. So, now, my wife and I carry some of these techniques, and new ones we are learning, on a daily basis. We apply the principles of them to all aspects of our lives. And while life isn’t without it’s ups and downs, we have the tools and mindset to keep things positive.
If you’re interested, we created a FREE Video Series on Childbirth. There are over 15 two to three minute videos with tips, mistakes to avoid and other FAQs answered. You can get them all at http://fearfreebirth.com
It took me about 20 minutes to clean the table in the picture above. Because Rob had a friend from college coming over I cleaned it and he actually put his pile of stuff away too!
