Still Works...

Fist off, a little warning. This post is a bit TMI, so if you don't want to know too much, just skip this post entirely.

Now that you're completely intrigued, here we go...

Well, Baby Girl is almost 9 months old now, and except for a few lingering pounds, my body has fully recovered. Things are back to normal and right on schedule....and when I say that I'm referring to, well, you know, the little gift a girl gets each month. Thankfully it had been gone for a blissfully long time, but when it came back, it didn't feel so good. Let's not sugarcoat, it hurt.

Now, most of my close friends know that I did something a bit off the beaten track for Baby Girl's birth. I wanted a natural birth with both my babies, but when, after more than 24 hours of "slow" labor with Little Man, the doctor began a pitocin drip, I ended up requesting (begging) for an epidural. This led to more and more interventions, and several small complications that I would never wish on anyone, and I vowed that for my next birth I would be better prepared and avoid the epidural at all costs. So when The Husband and I started getting baby fever again, I started researching the Hypnobabies program. I have a degree in psychology, and hypnosis has always fascinated me, so from the start it was a natural fit and I knew I wanted to try this.

Long story short, I had a wonderful hypnobirth, no epidural, no drugs, very little pain, and a quick and easy recovery.

Fast forward to almost 9 months later....it was late at night and I couldn't sleep because of, ahem, cramping. I'm still nursing so I didn't want to take Advil, and Tylenol doesn't do much for me. I was desperate for sleep so I thought, "why not try my hypnosis?" It's important to say that I had not practiced this in a good 7, but probably closer to 8, months. In Hypnobabies, a mom is taught to instantly put herself in a deeply relaxed state (hypnosis) with a finger drop, so I did my finger drop. A mom is also taught to imagine anesthesia flowing through her body, and eventually she learns how to direct it to wherever she needs it. So I imagined my anesthesia down in my belly, and the cramping was instantly gone. Poof, 100%, completely gone. It was like magic. For some reason, even after my nearly pain-free, unmedicated birth, I was a bit skeptical. "Did this really just work, after not doing it for the better part of a year?" So I instantly brought myself out of hypnosis and, yep, that awful cramping was back. Needless to say, I did my finger drop as fast as I could, was instantly pain free, and soon fell asleep. Now I know that some will think I'm a bit "odd," and I know some people already do just because I chose Hypnobabies in the first place. I don't care, all I know is it worked during the birth when I needed it, and it's still working now.

The power of the mind is absolutely amazing!