Dreaming of your perfect natural birth and not having the support of those around you? This can be a very hard place to be and can only add stress to what should be a beautiful experience of growing and bonding with your baby.
So many people today have a vision of what childbirth is like and to the majority it is a scary, medical emergency that needs to be controlled and is only safe in a fully staffed hospital. If your loved ones aren’t supporting you the way that you thought they would, here are some things to keep in mind.
Your family loves you and given the agenda that has been pushed for decades makes them fear childbirth and they want to protect you. Many people feel like they can’t protect their loved ones when it comes to the childbirth process and the unknown scares them.
This goes for your husband more than anyone. If he is not so keen on the idea of you having a natural birth, at home, a birthing center, or hospital, it likely comes from his natural need to protect you in this intimate moment. If his only experience with childbirth is what he sees in Hollywood movies, then he is probably pretty scared of what that experience is going to look like and how he will possibly ever be able to protect you.
Want to know how to win them over? Here are a few ideas:
If you are planning to birth at home or a birthing center, have your husband (and whoever else you wish) attend an appointment with your midwife. Validate their concerns and allow your midwife to answer them from her expert position. This lets them hear the information for themselves and become comfortable with the idea of a natural birth.
You can also share birth stories with your loved ones, stories of successful home and/or natural births in any setting. Sharing these types of stories and the beauty in them can help change their mindset of what childbirth is like.
Please know that keeping your plans between yourself and your spouse is completely okay. Nobody else has a say in this because this is your pregnancy and childbirth journey.
As women we, of course, want to have the ones we love involved, but sometimes it is better to keep our plans to ourselves to keep others from feeling like they have a voice or a space to speak their thoughts into the situation.
