Child birth preparation is an important thing to do if you want to have a smooth labor and natural childbirth. Ironically, most women are slack in this area despite the fact that birth is one of the largest event in a woman’s life.
Most women put the minimum amount of energy to prepare for birth despite their hopes for smooth labor and natural childbirth. However, “hope” is not the best way to approach for labor and birth. Smoothness in labor and birth process is largely influenced by how well you prepare for it.
A good child birth preparation is even more important if you are aiming for a natural childbirth. Not only you have to prepare your body for birth through exercise and proper diet. You also have to have a supportive caregiver and set up an ideal environment for you to give birth naturally. In other words, you have to be proactive and take charge of your birth
Here are the things you have to prepare ahead of time so that you can maximize the chance of having a natural childbirth whether you choose to have birth at a hospital, birthing center or at home: # choosing caregiver and birth setting carefully. # educate yourself about pregnancy and childbirth matter. # #prepare your body for a natural child birth.
Natural Child Birth Preparation ~ Choosing Caregiver and Birth Setting
1. Choosing Birth Setting for Natural Birth.
Before you choose your birth setting based on the default option (hospital), understand that you actually can have a natural childbirth in either of these three places: home, hospital or birthing center.
Think carefully of your birth setting options and choose the one where you feel the most safe, secure, protected and comfortable. It is a known fact that contraction can stop suddenly when a woman feels unsafe, unsecure and uncomfortable. Therefore, feeling secure and comfortable is important for a woman to maintain productive contractions.
Having said that, if you really want a natural birth, I recommend you to consider either giving birth at home (have a home birth) or at a birthing center since you will have more chance of getting a natural childbirth there. This doesn’t mean that you can’t have a satisfying natural birth at hospital. But, understand that in most circumstances, hospital birth is the least recommended option if you want to give birth naturally, mainly because the way the birth is managed at the hospital. Therefore, I don’t recommend you to have a birth there unless you have a condition which makes you high risk.
Having said that, there are some hospitals which are friendly to natural birth. Therefore, take your time to choose the best hospital in your town when it comes to natural hospital birth.
2. Choosing Caregiver for Natural Birth.
When it comes to childbirth caregiver, you have two choices. Doctor/obstetrician or midwife.
Regardless which one you end up choosing, your doctor or midwife has to support your decision one hundred percent. Change the caregiver if you have a doubt about her/his commitment on natural birth. But generally, you will more likely to get a natural birth with a midwife, just because midwives have different philosophy and attitude towards birth from physicians do. But there are some physicians which have good reputation for supporting natural birth. If you want to have natural birth at hospital, your job is to find a obstetrician supportive of natural birth .
In addition, there are two more things you can do to maximize your chance to have a natural childbirth.
Consider hiring a doula (a labor support person) to encourage and give you support during labor.
Doula’s presence has been proven to dramatically increase the chances of having a natural childbirth, especially hospital birth.
Make a birth plan and go through it with your doctor.
Make sure your doctor knows your wish of having a natural childbirth and honors your birth plan. It is also equally important to make sure that what in your birth plan is not against the hospital policy. If you do your due diligence in choosing the hospital and the doctor, then you should not encounter much trouble in getting them to follow your birth plan.
Natural Child Birth Preparation ~ Childbirth and Pregnancy Education
If you want to have an unmedicated birth, be sure to educate yourself on matters regarding pregnancy and childbirth. Nothing is more powerful than knowledge. Make sure you know things like what normal and what doesn’t, what each labor stage looks like and what to do at that stage, and so forth.
Here are the steps you can take to educate yourself as part of your natural child birth preparation:
Read these best pregnancy books and books about childbirth … and read lots of it
The most powerful child birth preparation, in my opinion is proper education. The easiest and cheapest way to achieve this is by reading childbirth books. What I mean by childbirth books here doesn’t mean reading countless of birth brochure or pamphlets handed out at your physician’s office. Instead, aim to read books on natural childbirth and midwifery, because these books are the most valuable of all childbirth books.
*Attend a birthing class *
There are lots of childbirth education class around. My advice is to stay away from classes sponsored by hospital or physicians. Find an independent childbirth educator whose class is focused on natural birth. You will find a lot of helpful information in this kind of classes.
Watch natural childbirth video
If you are on natural childbirth education class, usually the childbirth educator will have several natural childbirth videos, including home birth videos and water birth videos to show during class time. Ask whether you can borrow them. I also find that birth centers usually have childbirth library where you can borrow both videos and books on childbirth. Unfortunately, such library is only available for birth center clients.
Educate your spouse or anybody who will be present at your birth.
This will ensure that this person doesn’t unknowingly sabotage your plan. Make sure this person knows what you want (or don’t want) and can convey your wish of having a natural childbirth to the caregiver at the hospital at the time when you are concentrating on labor. Also, make sure that this person can support you throughout the birthing process.
Natural Child Birth Preparation ~ Preparing Your Body for Childbirth
To maximize your chance to have an unmedicated childbirth, it is important to prepare your body for childbirth.
Think of childbirth as a marathon. If you were a marathon athlete, you wouldn’t dream to go into a competition without a proper preparation, right ? Why would you do anything differently with a childbirth?
Here are things you should pay attention to in order to prepare your body for giving birth naturally:
Prenatal diet
Eating a balance meal while at the same time avoiding harmful substances and drugs, is what is generally recommended for pregnant moms. On top of that, I would like to add that you will need more protein than usual for both pregnancy and birth.And to drink plenty of water.
Prenatal exercise
The aim of having prenatal exercises is to prepare your body for birth. For instance, Kegel exercise is good for preparing the muscles in the birth canal for birth. You can learn about prenatal exercise through books, childbirth education class or by joining local prenatal exercise course. The most famous prenatal exercise course is yoga course for pregnant moms.
*Set up your first prenatal visit and go to your subsequent prenatal check up regularly to ensure you stay on low-risk category.