In honour of Father’s Day next week (Sunday 19th June, in case you need a reminder!), I thought that I would do something a little different for my blog post this month.
I have spoken to my husband Luke about his experiences with hypnobirthing and being my birth partner for both of our beautiful babies. I hope his insight as a dad and birth partner is useful to you!
What were your thoughts about hypnobirthing before we started the course?
I wasn’t really on board. I think our time was quite limited because of the jobs we were doing, so the thought of potentially doing hypnobirthing classes and it maybe not having any benefit was in the back of my mind, but it’s not my decision to make. At the end of the day, it’s not me having the baby, so if it’s something that’s going to make her feel more confident in giving birth then it’s money well spent, even if it doesn’t have an impact on me specifically.
How did you feel about birth before and after our hypnobirthing course?
Going in I didn’t have any concerns about birth. The only thing that I had any consideration for was about whether birth would be painful for you. I knew how I was going to conduct myself.
After our hypnobirthing course, I realised that in reality I had very little understanding about the process of giving birth previously. I wouldn’t have known what to look for in terms of signs to know that you might be ready to give birth or approaching a certain stage of the birth. I think there was a change in not necessarily the way I would have acted but in the words that I used and maybe the way that I spoke, to be more supportive as a birth partner and create a more calming environment.
How did hypnobirthing help you as a birth partner?
To me it was around being more assertive. For our second birth I was more assertive anyway because we were in our own home, but for our first it gave me the confidence to be assertive and go and speak to our midwives and say this is how we want to do things, these are the words we want to use, this is our birth plan for you to read through and so on. There was a specific thing about you not wanting to know how dilated you were, so that became one of my responsibilities to discuss with the midwives.
You were a wonderful birth partner (as the midwives said at both births!). Is there any advice you have for other birth partners?
Listen! I’ve got no experience giving birth so I’ve no idea what I’m expecting my wife to feel when. If I don’t listen, I’ve got no understanding of when you need the most support or when you need specific things like massage, when you need me to hold your hand, when you need me to fill the pool and so on. If you’re not listening to your partner, you’re listening to the midwives in the background, because they give you an understanding of what’s going on. I knew for example at our second birth that our son was going to be born within the next five minutes before anyone told me. I could tell from the atmosphere in the room.
Thank you so much to Luke for sharing your thoughts with me! (I know we're married but with two young children we don't often get the chance for an in-depth chat...)
Share this with your birth partner if you think they will find it useful, and let me know if you have any more questions about hypnobirthing from a birth partner's perspective.
