Of all the skills you can learn to prepare for childbirth, knowing how to remain present is the most essential one. It’s easy to lose yourself in the past or future; to dwell on how you’d like things to go or even get distracted by something completely unrelated. The human mind loves to travel – don’t let it during birth! Losing your sense of time, your sense of ‘now’ can be a seriously detrimental aspect to your birthing experience.
This is true for all kinds of births. Whether you have a VBAC, natural birth, planned cesarean, emergency cesarean or home birth, staying present (in the now) will help to alleviate pain and anxiety throughout your birth. There are ways to train your mind not to wander. You can begin to recognize when your mind isn’t focused properly and learn how to bring it back to the present.
When you’re able to do this, you will live each present moment as individual experiences, strung together. They will flow together and create your birth experience. By doing so, you’ll experience mental calm, no anxiety and higher levels of focus. Here is a good Mindfulness Exercise for both you and your partner to complete before giving birth:
- Choose any action/activity during your day. Pay attention to how your body is doing that action.
- Use your attention to notice any tensions in your body as you continue doing this activity.
- Then use your mind to relax the tension as you continue to do the action/activity.
- Remember to breathe throughout.
- Congratulate yourself for a moment of Mindfulness and being in The Flow
Mindfulness and staying ‘in the now’ is only a positive addition to childbirth if you make it so. You must maintain a positive attitude, even when the unexpected occurs. By staying positive, you create a positive now and, consequently, a positive flow of events. Remember that giving birth is moment to moment. Birth is now.