Child Birth Education- It's worth it

Child Birth education can change the entire course of your birth and parenting experience.

It will decrease your pain in labour, enhance your hormonal function creating less medical intervention in labour, and give you the faith and confidence in your own body to do what it is designed to do.

In the 1960s is when ‘Child Birth Education’ (CBE) formally became an antenatal ‘must-do’ amongst pregnant women.(Link)

The general goals of CBE then & now are;

To increase confidence in the birthing mother and support partner
To teach the birth partner techniques to use in labour, to help calm the mother and keep her focused
Teach the mother breathing techniques to help with pain and optimal hormonal function
Birth ambiance
The freedom of choice and the parents being the soul decision makers in their birth experience
Establish a social support network, meeting other parents in your community who are going through the same stage of life.

Benefits of Child Birth Education

Decreased Pain in Labour

Pain in labour is a major & super interesting topic. So before I continue to explain how CBE decreases pain, I want to clarify a couple of things first.

PAIN & SUFFERING are two completely different definitions. You can experience them both at the same time, pain without suffering, or Suffering without pain.

Pain without suffering can happen in two different ways (Link);

Pain relief techniques

Many health care professionals have the belief that pain is an unnecessary part of life and ‘Why feel it if you don’t have to’. They may feel that reducing the pain is well worth any side effects of the medication. Examples of pain relief options in the birth room include;

Epidurals
Nitrous oxide gas (laughing gas)
Morphine

Coping with Pain

In this method, people believe that pain is a natural, essential aspect of labour.

It is necessary for the physical implications, making you move around actively through your birth helping bub navigate its way out of the pelvis and help you move your legs protecting the perineum.
Also, essential for the hormonal symphony you & bub go through in the labour, birth and immediate postpartum time, to develop that Appetence bond.

Now, How does CBE actually decrease you pain in labour;

You learn breathing techniques to help you remain calm, decreasing the perceived pain, & also allowing the natural beta-endorphins (pain relief hormones) to be released.
You learn positional techniques to help your body mould around bub better creating less tension and resistance in your body.
Your partner learns techniques such as acupressure, massage, & mental support
You & your partner learn how to crease a safe, supported space with decreases perceived pain.

The Confidence to Make your Own Choices

A huge part of CBE since classes started in the 60s, was to let parents know that they are in the hot seat for ALL decisions in their pregnancy, labour & birth experience.

Thats right… ALL decisions.

Our role as health professionals is to simply let you know your options and the risks & benefits of each to the best of our ability and leave the decision up to you.

If you are faced with the intimidation of a personality or facts that a health professional has given to you, you must remember ALWAYS the decision for your body and your baby is completely up to you.

Enhanced Hormonal Function

CBE also teaches you techniques your body requires to enhance your hormonal function. Healthy hormones through labour and birth avoids the need for augmentation with the ‘hormone drip’ syntocinon, avoids long labours, fetal distress & feelings of overwhelm and exhaustion.

This can be through;

Birth ambiance
- Music
- Dim lights
- Soft speaking tones
Allowing the mother to feel safe and supported
Not disrupting the labouring women
Allowing her to move as she pleases
Tickles and massage
Reassurance

The Importance of Private CBE over the Hospital CBE

I just want to say I have not against hospital births or hospital midwives, infact, I actually works as a midwife at a hospital myself.

What I will say is that the research shows there is a large difference when comparing mamas who had hospital CBE as opposed to private CBE.

Private classes tend to:

Focus on normal physiological birth philosophy – helping you build an expectation of a normal birth.
Give you plenty non- pharmacological options to practise at home and in the hospital, as well as pharmacological
Give you faith in your body to do what it was designed to do.

Hospital classes can tend to:

Not teach methods they do not wish to support at the particular hospital- therefore they don’t even give mamas the option.
Some (not all) condition you to accept the hospital routines and traditions even when they are not in your best interest or following evidence based care.
Prepare you to expect medical interventions- conditioning you into loosing faith in your body doing what it was designed to do.

It is extremely difficult to gather evidence on CBE due to the variety of classes and techniques CBE can have depending on the culture, the teacher and their beliefs.

One fantastic Australian study compares 176 first time mamas educated by private classes and 176 first time mamas educated by hospital classes.

The private classes incorporated the following 6 non-pharmacological comfort measures:

Acupressure,
Visualisation and relaxation
Breathing
Massage
Yoga techniques
Helping your partner learn how to support you through labor.

The results of this study showed that the couples who participated in the private classes had:

65% reduction in epidural rates
44% reduction in cesarean sections
50% reduction in augmentation using artificial means
53% reduction in neonatal resus
12% reduction in perineal trauma
A shorter ‘pushing’ phase

This study has been a phenomenal representation for not only the benefit of adequate CBE but also the legitimacy and drastic benefits of a variety of non-pharmacological techniques in child birth.