Outside of time/The whisper of water unites us

March 17, 2010 Jacquie Munro

Slow Birth lives outside of time. Women in labour are often supported by caring people who are unwittingly blocking the slow birth process by writing down the time, charting, calculating, commenting on the progress of labour.

We are all guilty of this. We turn our heads to the clock. We look at the numbers on the monitor. We whisper of our own need to eat lunch, dinner, breakfast. We are stuck in time. But a labouring woman needs our help to stay out of her left brain, her 21st century mind. If we help her to labour without time constraints, her autonomy is supported. There is no pressure. She is undisturbed.

That's it! Time's up!

March 18, 2008 Jacquie Munro

There is a very real anxiety that surrounds birth...and time. "How long was your labour?" "When will I have this baby?" "How long did that part take?" "If your water breaks, and you haven't had the baby in 24 hours, well..."

And then, someone puts a big round clock right smack in your line of sight in the hospital room.

When I initially ask clients what they wish for, the most common answer is, "A fast birth."

However, after we've been working together for a number of months, most clients realize that each labour takes as long as it needs - no more, no less. Each woman's task in labour is to accept its flow, allowing it to unfold as it should. Time and space start to recede, endorphins increase, tension starts to release, and then labour works well.

To put an arbitrary time limit on any normal pregnancy or labour harms its natural rhythm. Birth is a psychosexual process. And, just like lovemaking ("Are you two done yet??"), it withers when it is pressured by time.

Ultimately, once you understand the nature of birth and its relationship with time, you settle into a pace that fits you and your baby on this particular day. It may be fast. It may be slow.

So cover your eyes and plug your ears, and you won't be rushed or ruled by the clock.

“Come out of the circle of time/And into the circle of love” - Rumi

December 7, 2005 Jacquie Munro

Photo by uditha wickramanayaka — Photo by uditha wickramanayaka

In the past, it was the partner’s job, as coach, to time each contraction with a stopwatch. I still have my old list of “...8:27...8:39...8:45...8:54...”from my first labour in 1983. The fixation on time has continued. Now there’s even a program that you can download to your Blackberry which will graph your contractions!

In contrast, I encourage my clients to let go of actively timing contractions at the beginning of the labour process. I think timing contractions is almost too simplistic a gauge of how labour is progressing. It makes you focus on an external reality and lose touch with your inner rhythm, your inner knowledge. It can also make you fixate on how long things have been continuing which, in turn, can lead to frustration or impatience.