The last time I was pregnant, I was woefully unprepared, physically, mentally and psychologically. I felt totally out of control and worse, beyond extending any sort of control over my situation. I just decided to go with the flow and hope that it got me and my baby through to the other side.

It did. I emerged with a few scars and a firm belief that I will not go through it again. Of course I changed my mind. But being older and wiser (ha ha!), I decided that this time, I will not be caught unawares. This time, I will prepare myself mentally and physically for the labour and beyond. This time, I have not just one baby but two depending on my stability – the last thing I want to become is a stranger to my beloved son and make the whole thing more difficult for him.

So the first three months have been spent in research. Whilst I firmly believe that a little science is dangerous and so did not succumb to reading up on labour room war stories, I have been, however, reading up on alternative methodologies and therapies in relation to  labour. In particular, the form of labour called active birth.

Last time around, I spent my labour in the classic position – flat on my back, legs in stirrups, with a midwife, a midwife-in-training, an OB/GYN who was called in due to a last minute complication, a nurse and some lady who was insistently waving a paper in my face and saying something. I was too zonked out to know what she was going on about. S thinks it was about storing the cord blood but I am not sure.

This time, I am going to make my wishes clear well beforehand so I shall not be told about fledgling research and other assorted stuff at the last minute. Also, so far, I have been classified as a low risk pregnancy (touchwood) – I hope and pray that this remains throughout, in which case, I can sign myself in to the midwife-run ward, which does not believe in anything stronger than pethidine injection by way of pain relief.

In an effort to understand what the active labour deal is all about, I have been educating myself chiefly by means of the Buddha Bellies DVD and website. The concept is all about using yoga to help you deal with the rigours of pregnancy and labour. I started the DVD just this week (week 14 – the DVD advises you not to start before) and find it soothing and calming. Clear instructions make it easy to understand and follow.

Buddha Bellies believes in ‘giving birth back to women’ and goes to great lengths to demystify this frightening rite of passage. The woman behind it, Nicole Croft is a qualified Yoga teacher and conducts these ante-natal classes in Oxford. For women like you and me, who aren’t lucky to be residents of that city, we can arm ourselves with the DVD and reap the rewards. Her website contains quite a lot of information on the various stages of labour, water birth and a lot of other related issues. It all makes for fascinating reading.

What’s more, I quite like her concept of letting the woman be and not “dehumanise” her (as the Mad Momma put it whilst describing her own labour stories). Please do visit the site and read the articles – if anything, they do not scare the jeebies out of you and make you run for the hills. The matter-of-fact way of describing everything actually calms a person down. Even if you are too late into your pregnancy to get hold of the DVD and practice the asanas, these articles at least put your mind at rest and provide you with a set of options in dealing with your labour.

I hope to continue doing the exercises, following the DVD and would dearly love to see what sort of effect it has on my labour. However it turns out, you will read about it here!

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