Take Control of Your Body and Birth on Your Terms
To birth on your terms and reduce the risks of birth complications, it's not only important to be aware of hospitals' birth routines and your rights—it's an absolute advantage to also understand the connection between body awareness and a safe birth.
Just as when you have sex and want a pleasurable experience that culminates in ecstasy, you must—even before the act itself—be in touch with your body and know what your preferences and needs are, and be familiar with how your biological body works.
It's well known today that the hormone oxytocin must flow uninhibited in the body for us to be able to let go of stress and fear, receive the body's own pain relief, and experience pleasure—both when we have sex and give birth.
Kerstin Uvnäs Moberg, a Swedish physician and pioneer in oxytocin research, describes how oxytocin is released through physical touch and warmth, as well as other types of sensory stimulation, e.g., dim light, wonderful music, and lovely scents. High production of oxytocin also leads to increased activity in the parasympathetic nervous system (safety, calm, and peace) as well as stimulation of growth and healing in the body.
Obstetrician and researcher Michel Odent understood already in the 1960s the importance of dampening stimulation of the neocortex in the brain, e.g., intellectualizing, talking, observation, stress, cold, bright light, and unfamiliar scents, since it inhibits the production of oxytocin. Therefore, he created a home environment at the maternity clinic in the city of Pithiviers, France, where he worked as chief physician between 1962-1985.
If you want to emerge strengthened from your birth, you need to know what's happening in your body and how it's affected by the environment. Being compliant and hoping that someone else will "deliver" you, or thinking "it will be what it will be," usually doesn't lead to anything good. It can result in you feeling run over and, in the worst case, subjected to abuse.
You simply need to take your body's needs seriously and not transfer the responsibility to someone else. But how do you do this if you don't already know what you want, have a previous sexual trauma in your baggage, or are just disconnected from your body and its needs? It's definitely not hopeless, and the earlier in pregnancy you start thinking and acting on this, the more likely it is that you'll be able to heal and get to know yourself before the birth. All of this also contributes to you being able to enter parenthood with intuition and insight about what you and your child need, instead of searching for all answers externally.
In the books Gravid med kropp & själ (Pregnant with Body & Soul) and Föd på dina villkor (Birth on Your Terms) (MiMa förlag 2019), my co-author Victoria Häggblom and I write about exactly this and how you can use the time during pregnancy to explore yourself and come into contact with both body and soul.
