Maria's Hypnobirthing Story

Jill is an amazing teacher! She is great at explaining how to breathe through the stages of birth.  Her years of teaching yoga add greatly to what she offers in hypnobirthing.  Most importantly, Jill taught us how to own the birthing experience in a traditional environment where hospital staff make assumptions about your birth plan.  After weeks of hypnobirthing, we were very prepared to advocate for ourselves.  The doctors wanted to deliver our baby via C-section and with an epidural planned.  In the end, we had our baby naturally with no pain medication.   

The benefits of hypnobirthing reach so much farther than the birth itself. Having weekly classes was beneficial because they built our confidence and gave us "time out" to breathe, visualize, and focus on baby. We used the Rainbow Relaxation CD as soon as we arrived to the hospital.  This helped us remain focused on us, and not get caught up in hospital related anxiety. As my uterus worked to draw itself back, I continued to have surges for 4 days after birth.  I used hypnobirthing techniques to breathe through those surges and help me remain focused and confident. 

The Rainbow Relaxation affirmations worked!  I was hesitant to put too much faith in them because I decided on a hospital birth, and ultimately I was induced.  I did lots of visualization along with the affirmations for a fast and complication-free birth.  At the hospital, I listened to the affirmations again and talked to the baby.  I explained that I would be induced soon and it was time for him to begin down the birth canal.  The nurse administered the lowest level of pitocin.  One and a half hours later, the baby was crowning.  

-Maria and Craig

Heather'S HYPNOBIRTHING STORY

My first son was born at home and using Hypnobirthing allowed me to remain calm and focused throughout the very long labor. In fact, when I became pregnant with my twins, I was very much looking forward to experiencing labor again, so magical was my first experience. I was eager to take the Hypnobirthing class a second time with Jill not only to brush up on my technique, but also because she has decades of experience in the field women's health and is an amazing resource for information about pregnancy and labor. Jill was always prepared for class, and every class was a nice balance of presentation and experiential learning (i.e. practice). In the end, I delivered my twins via cesarean, but I still drew on Hypnobirthing to help me remain calm and focused during the delivery.  You never truly know how labor will go, but I can't imagine a situation where the Hypnobirthing techniques Jill teaches wouldn't be useful. 

Will'S HYPNOBIRTHING partner STORY

Hypnobirthing gave my wife a strength that was profound and impressive.  When she was using the Hypnobirthing techniques, neither the midwife nor I could tell when she was having contractions.  When we distracted her from using Hypnobirthing, the pain of the contractions was evident and unbearable for me to witness. Speaking from the perspective of a husband, I found coaching my wife using the Hypnobirthing techniques gave me a role in which I felt very useful. The Hypnobirthing method was easy for me to learn, and Jill's support and presence deeply rooted us in a calm, loving space.