June 2011 Archives
Five Tips to Create a Sacred Space
Butterflies, and pretty art for your space
No matter what your religious beliefs are or your philosophical inclination in life, it is quite well accepted now-a-days that taking some time for yourself every day has great health benefits and improves your contentment in general. It can even improve your clarity of mind and speed up your decision making.
When a woman is pregnant, it is of great benefit for both mom and baby to dedicate some of that time to create a special bond, a psychic connection or telepathic conversation with your baby in the womb… What ever appeals to you most. You may call it praying, meditating, day dreaming or quiet sitting; your choice! The name is unimportant! What matters is DOING it!
To make it easier for you and your family, it helps to practice always at the same place and about the same time of the day. The people around you will learn not to bother you or call you at those times. Also, objects do carry an energy; so surrounding yourself with meaningful objects of beauty will support you in your practice. You will look forward to that time to sit in your “Sacred Space”, and you will feel the familiar support of the objects there, time after time.
So here are five tips to help you start a practice or make yours even easier to keep!
- Make your sitting experience a comfortable one. There is nothing wrong in sitting on a straight back chair with your hands on your lap. If you can sit crossed legs, it helps open the pelvis (good practice for birth), but make sure your knees are on the floor and your buttocks a little higher than your knees. You could slide a rolled blanket under, for example.
- Create a space that can remain yours at all times. For example, set a small table or a short shelf. Pick a beautiful cloth with pretty colors to cover your table and set on it items of significance to you: a flower, a crystal or a pretty stone from somewhere you visited and had fun, a fragrance like essential oil or incense, a small water fountain, a statue, … There are many symbols for many different culture that may be of importance to you. Just think of objects that make you smile inside as out!
- Pick a special candle you like for its color(s) and for its scent. Place it in a safe container big enough to protect the cloth and everything around it. Light it when you are ready to start, it will energize and enlighten your whole space. Never leave a burning candle unattended!
- You can play soft music if you like. At the beginning, it may help to play the same piece for 21 days so that the music will carry your mind automatically to your place of peace… Speeding up the “connection” process if you would!
- To quiet your mind and shift from the outside world to the inside world, a simple yet very efficient way is to take a few deliberate breaths through your nose and exhale very, very slowly through your nose also. For example, you could inhale to the count of 3 and exhale to the count of 6 (or 4-8), or whatever works for you as long as the exhale is longer than the inhale. Practice until you notice a quietness of the regular flow of thoughts and a sense of peace within you.
Crystals that appeal to you...
Aromatic candle, flower, pretty colors and sensual aromas, enhance the energy in your sacred space and help you discover that place of peace within where you can meet your baby. Now, you may start your private encounter with your Self, and your baby’s Spirit!
Side Effect of Epidural Anesthesia: Rare but Real!
In my 12plus years of doula career, I have seen many clients get an epidural, usually as a last resort. Being exhausted and with no relief in sight… It was a life saver for them. It happens to many (too many) women in labor (Why? is a different story and I will need another blog for just that topic…).
As a hypnotist, I know the power of the mind and I also believe that “Thoughts create Reality”. So, I hesitated to even post all the possible side effects, some permanent in very rare cases. But the truth needs to be accessible so that you are making INFORMED decision when it comes to your body, your health and your baby’s health!
So here is just a simple list (adapted from see source below):
1 ) Significant Low Blood Pressure
2 ) Fetal Distress
3 ) Cannulation
4 ) Trauma to Blood Vessel
5 ) Puncture Dura
6 ) Infection
7 ) Bach ache
8 ) Broken Catheters
9 ) Abnormal Uterine Contractions
10) Increased use of forceps and vacuum extraction in second stage
11) Inadequate pain relief ( For 7.1 % of women, it doesn’t work!)
12) Accidental Spinal Anesthesia
13) Maternal Heart Attack
14) If you have asthma, it can get worse during labor
15) Medication interaction i.e. with the prostaglandin gel used in some cases to induce labor
16) If you had migraine, that can get worse
17) Interactions with other illnesses
18) Fever and Malignant Hyperthermia
19) Respiratory Arrests (you stop breathing because your diaphragm is numb)
20) Neurological Disabilities
21) Nausea (30% of women)
22) Vomiting (3-7% of women)
23) Allergic conditions may worsen
24) Heart problems
25) Headache
26) Temporary paralysis
27) Recurrence of Herpes Simplex (if you had it in the past, it could flare up again!)
28) Permanent Disability
29) Death
It is a balancing act to get information and than decide what is best for you and your baby. Get you partner involved, so he too knows the “inside story” and can advocate for you when you are staying focused during labor and connected with your inner work and your baby. Once your decision is made, make total peace with it, because that is what is most important after all!
Let me know… Was it useful to you? Did it help you decide? Or Would you rather not have known?
P.S.: In my “Quantum Birthing” hypno-program for childbirth, I teach a simple technique called clearing the “Library of Record” to help erase or cancel the negative beliefs and information not in alignment with your blissful, undisturbed, normal birth!
Source: Medical Risks of Epidural Anesthesia during Childbirth by Lewis Mehl-Madrona, MD, PhD and Morgaine Mehl-Madrona, midwife.
You might also like: Is Epidural a Safe Way to Have Pain Free Childbirth?
Continue reading Side Effect of Epidural Anesthesia: Rare but Real!
Is Epidural a Safe Way to Have Pain Free Childbirth?
I have read on other “mom and baby” blogs comments like: ” For pain free birth get an epidural!”. My epidural was the best thing ever, I was rested and did not feel a thing.” That is until the effect wears off, mind you! I know, epidural anesthesia can be a life saver but do you really know the risk you and your baby are taking?
Epidural Anesthesia: so common we seem to forget its risks!
They say: “Women are almost never given informed consent for epidurals. Even if they were, just read two paragraphs from the package insert that comes with the medication used for epidurals (manufactured by Abbott Laboratories), they might think twice.”
The package insert states:
Local anesthetics rapidly cross the placenta, and when used for epidural, caudal or pudendal anesthesia, can cause varying degrees of maternal, fetal and neonatal toxicity….
Adverse reactions in the parturient, fetus and neonate involve alternations of the central nervous system, peripheral vascular tone and cardiac function….
Neurologic effects following epidural or caudal anesthesia may include spinal block of varying magnitude (including high or total spinal block); hypotension secondary to spinal block; urinary retention; fecal and urinary incontinence; loss of perineal sensation and sexual function; persistent anesthesia, paresthesia, weakness, paralysis of the lower extremities and loss of sphincter control all of which may have slow, incomplete or no recovery; headache; backache; septic meningitis; meningismus; slowing of labor; increased incidence of forceps delivery; cranial nerve palsies due to traction on nerves from loss of cerebrospinal fluid.
Would you sign a consent for an epidural if it included the above language? The Mehl-Madrona also state: “The degree to which the facts about the risks of epidural anesthesia are hidden from women in labor is astonishing”. And I agree. What happened to “informed consent”!
Would you do it now that you have read the “insert”? Would you do it again? What do you think?
Let’s share…
source: Medical Risk of Epidural Anesthesia during Childbirth
Continue reading Is Epidural a Safe Way to Have Pain Free Childbirth?
Birth Preferences: All Women Want What’s Best for Baby!
“Of course!”, are you going to say, all women want what is best for baby! Yet it is amazing how many times I hear as a doula and birth professional that a mother who wants a home birth or a water birth or even just a drug-free birth is just being selfish, thinking of herself only and not of what is best for her baby.
The unique bond between mother and child!
There is a consensus in this country more than anywhere else to keep the population in fear… And that has worked so well in the field of childbirth that now a vaginal delivery is considered “normal” birth even with all the interventions (induction, epidural and other medications, forceps and the like) as oppose to a birth by c-section (which is still going up by the way).
So, I am here to say, no, you are not selfish for wanting a calm environment and support and freedom to do what your body wants to do. Choosing in what position you feel most comfortable, using whatever method helps you get in “the zone” (warm water immersion, self-hypnosis, music, drums, signing, praying or what ever else), connected to your baby and own this wonderful moment. You are not selfish to want to protect your baby from unnecessary interventions, poking and rubbing, aspirating, isolating and washing when he/she should be resting on your chest to find its “bearings”, neurologically and physiologically!
Many medical staff like to hide behind the say: “It’s for your baby’s safety”! Really? How much distress and complication comes from the “disturbing” of the birth or the separation of a newborn infant from his/her mother? Well, I know, there is very little “hard” evidence, because undisturbed birth happens mostly at home and that is not valid information.
So… Who will take the challenge and run a “Big” study, in a “Big” hospital and show “scientifically” the outcomes of undisturbed birth compared to the regular medical model of care!
Who will take the challenge?
In the mean time, don’t blame the informed parents who choose a different approach after thorough investigation and mind searching! They only want what is best for their baby! 
Continue reading Birth Preferences: All Women Want What’s Best for Baby!
