For too long the wrong phrase has been used for what a pregnant woman will go through if she doesn’t have another Cesarean. Boy that was long-winded. But the reality is the phrase VBAC (vaginal birth after a Cesarean) is very deceiving … without intent. And that’s where the phrase ‘trial of labor’ comes into play … but certainly isn’t the most encouraging phrase either. In reality, in order to get to a vaginal birth part a birthing woman must go through the entire hard-work of laboring process. In fact, the labor takes the longest amount of time and is the most difficult to cope with because labor is often associated with lots of naturally occurring pain.
Somehow too many pregnant women are mentally skipping over the labor part and the natural occurring pain and trying to go directly to the vaginal birth part. This is where Birthing Better VBAC online birth class will stabilize your efforts and the ones your birthing partner makes. In other words, you’ll learn the skills to:
- Prepare your pregnant body to become a birthing body … in expectant father’s terms … you have to help your pregnant partner open up her body to let a big object out (your baby).
- Together learn and practice skills so you can really learn to cope, manage, work with, deal with and handle the natural occurring labor pains … so you can achieve a vaginal birth.
- Commit to using these skills to work with your baby’s efforts to be born no matter how your baby comes out of your body.
So the phrase ‘trial of labor’ is really challenging you to rise up and meet the challenge of labor and the accompanying naturally occurring pain. Obstetricians absolutely KNOW that labor pains trip up too many women. They know women want a vaginal birth after a Cesarean but often don’t cope with the pain of dilation … and then one thing leads to another.
So the phrase VBAC requires you to primarily focus on the skills that will help you keep your labor contractions progressing after you’ve prepared your body to open up to let your baby come down, through and out. In other words, you must be counter-intuitive. You must learn to relax and open even when you are experiencing a great deal of naturally occurring pain.
And you absolutely must prepare your baby’s birthing passage so the sensations of a big object during the vaginal descent doesn’t cause you to react and tense up ‘down there’.
You can get through labor … even a ‘trial of labor’. Yet there’s one further step … no matter how your baby comes out of your body you and your partner will have the skills to continue to use so you stay connected to your baby’s birthing journey. You got pregnant to have a baby which means, as parents, you can become skilled birthing parents who commit to using skills to birth your baby.
Birthing Better skills were developed by moms and dads in the early 1970s in the US and used by many thousands globally in all types of birth. Birthing Better VBAC online birthing class are housed in Common Knowledge Trust.