METHODS OF CHILDBIRTH PREPARATION

I. THE LAMAZE METHOD

Lamaze originated in Russia and then became popular in

France before it was introduced in the United States in the 1960s.
Designed to educate and prepare expectant mothers to help them
conquer fear and tension, its popularity grew in tandem with the
women’s liberation movement in the 1970s. Teaching specific
breathing techniques to prepare for and control pain, Lamaze
appealed to a generation of women who had been challenged to
take control of their bodies.

As women changed over the last four decades, so has

Lamaze.

“We don’t call it ‘natural’ or ‘prepared’ any more,” says

Barbara Hotelling, president of Lamaze International, “but rather
‘normal’ childbirth.” The term “normal” implies, for example, that
labor starts on its own and interventions, such as the artificial
rupture of the membrane, are not routinely administered.

Today’s Lamaze classes, Hotelling says, are more interactive

than they used to be and instructors use a greater variety of
teaching strategies. Breathing techniques, like the much-disparaged
“dog panting,” are de-emphasized and replaced with labor-support
techniques, such as massage and aromatherapy. Above all, Lamaze
today is focused on helping women become fully informed and
confident about childbirth.

II. THE BRADLEY (PARTNER-COACHED) METHOD

Bradley, also known as “Husband-Coached Childbirth,” has

been practiced as long as Lamaze has. It evolved in the late 1940s,
but it only became known after the original publication of Dr. Robert
A. Bradley’s book, Husband-Coached Childbirth: The Bradley Method
of Natural Childbirth, in 1965.

The method is based on the belief that with education,

preparation and the help of a loving and supportive coach, most
women can give birth “naturally,” without pain medication or other
intervention. During pregnancy, a woman performs muscle-toning
exercises and limits or omits foods that contain preservatives,
animal fat, or a high salt content. Pain is reduced in labor by
abdominal breathing. In addition, a woman is encouraged to walk
during labor and to use an internal focus point as a dissociation
technique.
 The key to the Bradley Method is relaxation and getting
women to trust their own bodies. Bradley boasts that nearly 90
percent of its students have vaginal births without pain medication.

III. BIRTH WORKS

Using ancient techniques and exercises, Birth Works

encourages women to focus on the beauty of birth, not the
pain.

“I don’t need to teach a woman how to give birth,” says Jennifer

Cowsert, a certified Birth Works instructor. “It’s embedded in her
body.”

The premise that every woman instinctively knows how to give birth
is reflected in this method’s motto – “Birth Works … because it’s
ancient – and in the content of the classes. What Cowsert tries to do
is to instill in her students the confidence to listen to their own
bodies and to “give women back their power.”

Birth Works classes incorporate experiential techniques, such as

pelvic bodywork to increase a woman’s awareness of her own
pelvis. The method caters in part to women who have had a
previous Cesarean-section. Cowsert estimates that 95 percent of
her students who had had a previous C-section were able to
successfully have a vaginal birth. But the goal of Birth Works is to
make women feel positive about birth, whether it’s vaginal or by C-
section.

IV. BIRTHING FROM WITHIN

Meditation, journal writing and creative expression are

the cornerstones of the increasingly popular Birthing from
Within method.

Birthing from Within is a new, holistic method based on the book

by the same name. In this method, the preparation for birth
becomes a journey of self-discovery through the use of, among
other means, journal writing, meditation and “birth art” creations.

Desiree LeFave, a certified professional midwife, uses the

Birthing from Within method to prepare her clients for an
underwater birth. Her classes focus on both physical preparation
(good nutrition and exercise) and emotional preparation.
 “I get my clients to acknowledge their fears,” explains LeFave.
“They imagine the worst possible scenarios, work through those
fears and then replace them with positive affirmations.”

V. HYPNO BIRTHING

Based on the belief that birth is natural and healthy,

HypnoBirthing uses mind over matter to erase pain.

“There is no pathological reason for pain in childbirth. There is

nothing that actually malfunctions. It’s tension and fear and
interventions that cause the malfunctioning,” says Marie Mongan,
founder of HypnoBirthing and author of HypnoBirthing: A
Celebration of Life.
A certified hypnotherapist, Mongan founded HypnoBirthing in
1989 and has since certified 1,500 practitioners in the method. Her
organization now gives out as many as 400 referrals a week,
numbers that have more than doubled over the past five years.
Hospitals and members of the medical community are now
recognizing the program and sending staff to be trained and
certified, according to Mongan.

HypnoBirthing is based on the belief tha birth is natural, normal

and healthy, not a medical incident. HypnoBirthing therapists teach
women how to self-hypnotize and use very slow breathing methods
– “no huffing and puffing” – that coincide with the body’s natural
“surges,” otherwise known as contractions.
“We teach them to actually relax their body to the point it can work
the way it was designed to work,” Mongan says.

A key element is teaching pregnant mothers a whole new childbirth

vocabulary:
• Babies are not “delivered,” they are
“birthed” through the “birthing process,” not “labor.”
• And moms do not “push” their babies out.
Rather they “breathe down” their babies.

“Language has a physiological effect on the way we think of

things,” says LuAnne Daly, a certified hypnotherapist trained in
HypnoBirthing. “Energy follows thought. If we control our thought,
then we keep the energy where we want it.”

VI. THE PSYCHOSEXUAL METHOD

The psychosexual method of childbirth was developed by Sheila

Kitzinger (1990) in England during the 1950s. The method stresses
that pregnancy, labor and birth, and the early newborn period are
important points in a woman’s life cycle. It includes a program of
conscious relaxation and levels of progressive breathing that
encourages a woman to “flow with” rather than struggle against
contractions.

Sheila Kitzinger is a respected social anthropologist with

tremendous expertise in pregnancy and childbirth. The
psychosexual approach she developed is based on the methods
developed by Lamaze and Dick-Read.

Kitzinger felt that the mother is not simply present at the birth of
her child, but an active participant in the birth experience, and that
she should not be limited to rehearsed breathing exercises and
relaxation techniques.

Most mothers who give birth in a hospital, according to Sheila

Kitzinger, are treated like animals giving birth in a zoo. Rather than
treat women in labor as patients, subject to the decisions of other
people, mothers need to understand and get what they really want
out of the experience.

As women learn how their bodies work and the way hospitals
work, human relationships with the doctors and midwives can be
developed so that the kind of birth the mother needs can be
negotiated.

Sheila Kitzinger felt that one of the challenges that faces the
medical profession is the need to provide the mother with choices in
which she truly had a stake; whether it's a managed birth, a natural
birth or anywhere in between. All labors, like the pregnancies that
preceded them and the women who experience them are different.

According to Kitzinger, hospitals need to customize their services

to take not only the wishes of the mother into account, but
understand how her culture and upbringing may influence her
attitudes about her body, and how comfortable she feels about her
organs, cleanliness and beauty. Only by creating an understanding
relationship between the mother and all the people who are
involved in the birth process can she relax completely during labor
and delivery.