# Hypnobirthing? Devotee or skeptic? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 13, 2003, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977 "2003-08-13T18:47:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![LilyoftheValley](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/54ee81/32.png) [@LilyoftheValley](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LilyoftheValley)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2003, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/1 "2003-08-13T18:47:10Z")
The natural childbirth class my hospital offers is “hypnobirthing”. (For example, see [this site](http://www.hypnobirthing.com).) Has anyone actually done this? I’m all for relaxation, but I’m a tidbit skeptical about claims that labor will progress faster and that you can give birth without any pain at all. Also – petty, but I can’t help it: the website has a few too many italics, bold, and underlines for me to feel comfortable, not to mention key phrases such as “internationally known” and “as old as ancient times” and “be sure that the person you have contacted has been trained and certified by the HypnoBirthing InstituteSM”. Am I the only one who sees websites like this and suddenly thinks :rolleyes: ? Finally, does anyone know if the tone is accusatory towards people who are also considering drugs? Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![Coldfire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a587f6/32.png) [@Coldfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coldfire)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2003, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/2 "2003-08-13T18:53:25Z")
IMHO, off we go! ---
**Author:** ![tanookie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/48db29/32.png) [@tanookie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tanookie)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2003, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/3 "2003-08-13T19:06:18Z")
I wouldn’t be a good candidate for hypnobirthing for a variety of reasons… one big one is that I’m having a C section 🙂 Hedra says some nice things about hypnobirthing [here.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=188151&highlight=hypno%2A+birth) She may also pop into this thread and elaborate further 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2003, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/4 "2003-08-13T19:12:37Z")
Hypnobirth? Make sure you don’t give birth to one of [these](http://www.luebke-lands.de/tesla2.html)! ---
**Author:** ![Manatee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/50afbb/32.png) [@Manatee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manatee)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/5 "2003-08-14T05:38:38Z")
I was totally skeptical to begin with. Given the (misleading) name, I expected some guy with swirly eyes to swing a pocketwatch back and forth while crooning “You’re getting sleepy…sleeeeeepy…” But with our second child, my wife tried it. Her water broke at 12:30 AM. So she popped in the visualization/relaxation CDs that our doula had provided. At 4AM, she felt that the pain was getting too strong, so she called in the doula. She arrived at 5AM. Just before 7AM, my wife gave birth to an 11 pound, 12 ounce boy at home. No drugs, no C-section, no doctors, no “birth-is-a-sickness” syndrome like with a hospital birth. This was in large part due to the focus provided by the hypnobirth program. So now I’m a devotee. (Or, given my screen name, a devo 'tee). ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/6 "2003-08-14T13:22:30Z")
Yeah, maybe they should give it another name. I don’t have any experience with Hypnobirthing (either directly or vicariously), but the anecdotes on the website don’t actually sound as bad as the name, which makes you picture a pregnant woman clucking like a chicken on a velvet-curtained stage on a cruise ship. ---
**Author:** ![Simple\_Dreamer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@Simple\_Dreamer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simple_Dreamer)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/7 "2003-08-14T13:30:12Z")
With my 3rd son, I used a modified version of this… My MIL is in the psyciatric feild and made me a tape to learn to focus on being relaxed. I listened to that many many times the last couple months of my pregnancy. When I went to the hospital (they were gonna break my water b/c I was miserable and the “bag of waters” was bulging (sorry TMI). They hooked me up to the moniters and I was already having contractions. We turned on my soothing cd’s turned out the lights, and talked some while I focused on being calm and relaxed. Up until the last 5 mins of my labor I was still able to laugh and joke. No meds were used and the “hard” contractions lasted about 15 mins… I didn’t actually do any pushing (I was trying to not push actually as they weren’t ready to catch him). Easiest delivery of my 3 by far. ---
**Author:** ![Eliphalet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eliphalet/32/9563_2.png) [@Eliphalet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eliphalet)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/8 "2003-08-14T13:42:25Z")
I’m a pretty strong skeptic about these types of claims, and would not have believed it if I had not seen it in action. My wife is an extremely good hypnosis subject (she’s been hypnotized while sitting in the audience of a stage hypnotist), and created her own hypnosis script for use on our second child. She put herself to “sleep” while writing the script. 😃 When her contractions started, she went into her trance about 4 hours prior to the actual “pushing” contractions. We checked her pain several times during the active labor, and she never went higher than a 6 on her personal 1-10 pain scale. (A stubbed toe usually gets an 8). She went through a 22 hour labor & delivery with no pain medications, or serious pain. The medical stafff asked for copies of her hypnosis script for use with future patients. I think it depends on how susceptible the patient is to hypnosis. ---
**Author:** ![Avarie537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/48db29/32.png) [@Avarie537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Avarie537)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/9 "2003-08-14T16:21:46Z")
My husband’s cousin almost gave birth to her second son in the backseat of the car because she was so relaxed! Worked well for her. My MIL used the Bradley method back in the late 60s-70s, and it worked well for her. ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/10 "2003-08-14T17:44:04Z")
Consider me a big cheerleader for HB. The classes, especially, though also the tapes/cds version (Hypnobabies, New Way Childbirth). Important caveats: 1. you have to practice, at least a few times a week. If you don’t, you won’t be comfortable enough with it to rely on it. This is true for _any_ method. Expect to practice. If you don’t, it will not ‘work’ so well (though it may work enough for a decent labor anyway). 2. Abnormal labor won’t be counteracted as much as normal labor, pain-wise. That is, back labor, fetal malpresentation, etc, you’ll get more discomfort. But then, that’s true for not doing anything at all, too, and also true for many meds. I’ve got a friend who did New Way Childbirth hypnotherapy and did 10 hours of back labor with a kid stuck above her pubic bone (size 2 pelvis, 14.5 inch head facing the wrong way to fit through), before deciding she might need help. The midwives and OBs were pretty stunned. In fact, they couldn’t shut up about it. 3. Women who have good imaginations and use them a lot (say, take a story and run alternate scenarios, write books in their heads, make up stories for kids, etc.), and women who dissociate easily (zone out easily, get highway hypnosis, forget movies easily, etc.) are the most likely to get full 100% no-pain outcomes. That’s from a study of hypnotherapy patients for a variety of issues, the best results are in people who have good ‘fantasy’ process or who dissociate easily. I’ve got both, so I’m kind of a poster child for hypnotherapy. But even without being a perfect candidate, it works enough for the vast majority to not feel they need pain meds. Typical case, a woman I know from the HB class - she had some discomfort, but not at all beyond her capacity to deal. Then her tape player died, and her husband wouldn’t do the scripts - he just wanted to hold her hand. She ended up using nubain instead, and said the hypnotherapy was just as effective for taking the top edge of the contraction off (though some find that nubain does the opposite - takes the bottom edge off and leaves you with only the worst part). Plus, no risk of side effects for the hypnotherapy. Anyway, I feel it is really truly worth it. I was present, relaxed, and aware of my body and the birthing process. I felt my pelvic girdle strain and stretch as my son’s head went through (15.5 inch head, no cone head, 9 lb 6 oz boyo), but it didn’t hurt at all. It just felt like movement, and flexion, like stretching a stiff joint. I could feel him stretching his body down inside me, and could feel his head press forward, then slip back, then press forward again. I knew how far he was, and how close to birth. It was really cool. And it didn’t hurt at all. _AT ALL_. (unless someone accidentally put a hand on my knee, which was my personal cue to come out of hypnosis … hot tip - don’t use a touch on a really handy body part for that cue, if you even bother at all! **OUCHIES OUCHIES OUCHIES!** Hurt like a sonofabitch when the hypnotherapy was ‘off’, and knees are where everyone wants to touch during labor. Ugh.) ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/11 "2003-08-14T17:48:27Z")
Oh, and that was WITH pitocin, and with nurses who said ‘we’ll just keep turning this up until you can’t stand the pain anymore’, too. And they said that twice. :rolleyes: I sold the nurses on the efficacy of hypnotherapy, and they were originally not at all in that camp. ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/12 "2003-08-14T17:57:55Z")
Oh, and FYI, I searched around for negative experiences, too. It kind of sounded freaky that everyone who tried it LOVED it. Like they were all brainwashed or something… And yes, I found a few who weren’t poster-children. People who admitted right off that they didn’t practice, most of them, followed by women who had complications that would max out any method, followed by high-risk situations that made it hard for them to maintain focus (fear-filled conditions). I’ve only encountered one woman who said it was a waste, though - and she wouldn’t say how much she practiced. The ones who practiced even sorta-mostly all said it helped, but just not enough for their situation. (Oh, two of those said it was still working just fine when they opted for meds, but they opted for meds because they were having problems maintaining focus due to the situation, not because the system wasn’t working - they anticipated likely issues down the pike and opted to change plans midstream to manage those issues. Unknown if their assessment was accurate, but you don’t get to try the other experiment…) I also know one woman who had a c-section who swears by it, as her recovery was super-fast (she used the methods to help pain management after surgery, and needed fewer post-op pain meds, walked sooner than usual, had less swelling than expected, etc., etc.). (sorry for the triple reply, kept thinking of things to add) ---
**Author:** ![Descartes\_afore\_D\_Horse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d78d45/32.png) [@Descartes\_afore\_D\_Horse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Descartes_afore_D_Horse)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/13 "2003-08-14T18:04:09Z")
Skepticism doesn’t cover it. These people are frauds, pure and simple. And they prey on the gullible just to sound like they know something others don’t (or, perhaps, want to cynically make money off of the gullible somehow) ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/14 "2003-08-14T18:15:29Z")
My mother did this with my little sister back in 1960. She breezed right through it. My dad was amazed. I don’t recall the exact story, but she was ill before she got pregnant, and the doctor was using the hypnosis thing for that, if I’m not mistaken. He suggested she use it in delivery. I guess it’s a pretty amazing thing to watch. ---
**Author:** ![epeepunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f19dbf/32.png) [@epeepunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epeepunk)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/15 "2003-08-14T18:27:42Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Descartes afore D’Horse \* > \*\*Skepticism doesn’t cover it. These people are frauds, pure and simple. And they prey on the gullible just to sound like they know something others don’t (or, perhaps, want to cynically make money off of the gullible somehow) \*\* **Descartes** , not to point to fine a point on it, but do you have any experience with _this particular method_ that enables you to make that statement? I only ask because I _do_ have experience, and my experience is counter to your assertations. You may not agree that hypnosis is the be all and end all of behavior therapy - it sounds like you have some issues around it - but that’s _not_ what the OP was asking for. To dismiss something outright is not fighting ignorance - it’s welcoming it into your house and asking it to sit a spell. ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/16 "2003-08-14T18:50:27Z")
**Descartes** , this is the Straight Dope. Please back up your assertion. Here, allow me to provide more than ‘just my personal experience’ (which is relevant - if the goal is pain management, my experience, even if entirely placebo effect, also is valid - it worked.): According to research performed by Dr. Lang (Harvard Medical School, home of quacks of all stripes, I’m sure :rolleyes:), in a clinical, randomized controlled trial: \*Int J Clin Exp Hypn. 1996 Apr;44(2):106-19. Self-hypnotic relaxation during interventional radiological procedures: effects on pain perception and intravenous drug use. Lang EV, Joyce JS, Spiegel D, Hamilton D, Lee KK. Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center (DVAMC), Palo Alto, California, USA. The authors evaluated whether self-hypnotic relaxation can reduce the need for intravenous conscious sedation during interventional radiological procedures. Sixteen patients were randomized to a test group, and 14 patients were randomized to a control group. All had patient-controlled analgesia. Test patients additionally had self-hypnotic relaxation and underwent a Hypnotic Induction Profile test. Compared to controls, test patients used less drugs (0.28 vs. 2.01 drug units; p \< .01) and reported less pain (median pain rating 2 vs. 5 on a 0-10 scale; p \< .01). Significantly more control patients exhibited oxygen desaturation and/or needed interruptions of their procedures for hemodynamic instability. Benefit did not correlate with hypnotizability. Self-hypnotic relaxation can reduce drug use and improve procedural safety. Publication Types: Clinical Trial Randomized Controlled Trial PMID: 8871338 \* Granted, the trial is small, but the impact is still statistically significant. Oh, and by the way, **she’s a radiologist** - not a psychotherapist, but someone who deals with medical issues in a scientific manner: Check her [bibilography](http://www.bidmc.harvard.edu/radiology/interventional/staff/lang_bibliography.htm). ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/17 "2003-08-14T18:52:03Z")
je m’excuse, that was supposed to be a :rolleyes: (preview is my friend, preview is my friend…) ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/18 "2003-08-14T18:56:35Z")
(my apologies for the slur on psychotherapists - that didn’t come out quite the way I intended! There tends to be a perception that ‘softer’ sciences don’t have rigorous clinical practice… I was referring to the tendency to that perception, that’s all.) ---
**Author:** ![hedra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/779978/32.png) [@hedra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hedra)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/19 "2003-08-14T19:21:47Z")
Re-reading the OP, realized I missed something: Regarding whether they’re anti-meds. Depends on who is teaching. Let them know what your position is, and see what their reaction is. Overall, they’re not as anti-meds as some Bradley Method trainers. Here’s a response I gave a Family Practice dr (who does OB work) when she asked if HB was a possible option for her (after a really rough natural birth the first time) - as a physician, she didn’t want to be wading into arguments about risks and procedures and meds… but she also was interested in having the help with the process (she’s one of the ones who opted for meds mid-stream, after an induction at 34 weeks for escalating pre-eclapmsia, who said it worked but she was on mag sulfate which makes focusing hard, so she decided with the anxiety of the preterm induction, plus the mag, she’d rather stop having to try to focus, and just get an epidural): > [@](#): > > Hypnobirthing doesn’t talk about risks/issues/etc. It talks about how to manage your process. > > You will find that some of the presentation of labor concepts are a bit, well, :rolleyes: though. The point is that they are trying to counter some of the dramatic imagery you’ve seen on TV, or heard from moms competing in the ‘how awful it was’ game. WHile I appreciated the fairly detailed and accurate (medically) discussion of labor mechanics (used for visualizing), there was one thing that bugged me from a biology perspective. That is, I was irritated by the whole ‘cats purr while giving birth’ thing. Yeah, they do. Because cats purr when they are stressed. I just kept in mind that while cats PURR (from stress) when in labor, they do not yelp, cry, or make sounds like they do when you step on their tails. Labor is designed to be managable, if you learn to manage your process (cats can’t take advil, so they have already learned to manage their pain through other means). Labor isn’t designed to be fun and easy, just well within your skills and abilities. Only, us modern humans (at least in the Western world) tend to NOT learn much of those skills and abilities. Add in stress (which you will have as a doctor, knowing ‘too much’ doesn’t help), and you get pain. Unfortunately, if you take people who expect agony, and tell them it might be uncomfortable, but within their abilities to handle without making a fuss, it doesn’t undo their initial expectation enough. Hence the ‘cats purr’ thing. They need the alternative image to counter the pain image. > > So, nature designed us to birth without a fuss. Not without effort or even discomfort (if it was that easy, we’d risk preterm births a LOT), but easy enough, managable enough. With the _ADDITION_ of hypnotherapy, you get a lot closer to the fun and easy version. Okay, not easy, but certainly better than even the natural plan with naturally learned coping skills. It is still effort. But beyond that whole ‘cats purr’ thing, I don’t think you’ll have any problem with it. > > My hypnotherapist does HB for planned c-sections, twin births where an epidural line WILL be set up automatically (even if not dosed), inductions, and so forth. She does talk about natural alternatives as a first line of approach, and the value of knowing the implications of meds. But it is very much about empowerment of the individual to make the choice that suit their labor and their process. There wasn’t an expectation of the medical staff being the bad guys. THere was an expectation that the medical staff wouldn’t know how to approach a hypnotherapy labor, though (which is true - the signs that you usually notice as part of your diagnostic process are not there! Such as knowing that a woman is hitting transition because she woke up from her nap and said ‘oh!’). There is a lot of discussion about how to educate your medical team as you go, because they often judge progress using markers that do not exist in HB moms, and use approaches that interfere more than help the approach. It isn’t hard to get them to adjust, BTW, it is just useful to know that there is a huge difference in the external aspect of the laboring mom, so the doctors need to do different kinds of checking/assessment than they expect to do. > > It may also be useful to separate your medical self from your birthing self. That is, as a doctor, you must see each patient both as a data point and as part of the whole statistical model. But as a laboring mother, you are ONLY the data point. There is no telling where that data point will fall - statistics do not apply to individuals, only to groups. Odds evaluation and medical judgement based on experience is helpful in determining medical direction if you are the doctor, but is far less relevant from the laboring mother side - you have to deal with your labor, as it goes, not as it fits the model. Right? With HB, even the outward signs of where this particular data point is falling won’t match expectations of the whole model. HB should help you separate the two processes more, so that you can focus inward rather than doing the data check against the model. > > I think the fear release process in HB would be highly useful to you. You’ve seen the bad and the ugly enough to be able to fear it better than most people. For you, it isn’t the fear of the unknown, but of the known that has to be handled. Birthing from Within can also help there, but I suspect that HB would be better for you in a variety of ways - you’ve got enough ‘load’ on the complications and problems side of the line that the extra fear-release processing available through hypnotherapy is bound to make more of a difference. > > Probably the best approach would be to call the local HB instructor and explain the concerns you have. You might even decide that the best approach would be to do individual training (so you don’t scare the other moms with your variety of fears, and you don’t have to listen to the horror stories that so often drive women to try HB, many of which involve pretty negative images of medical staff, and so you can handle issues that are more relevant to you than to most women). Talk to the instructor, and see what would work best, in their opinion and yours. I was ‘odd woman out’ in my class, and it was sometimes uncomfortable. I work with the Pharma industry, am a complulsive researcher (I spend a lot of time reading the Cochrane Medical Abstracts…), grew up expecting labor to be fascinating, powerful, amazing, and potent, not awful and horrible and painful… and I hadn’t had a bad experience the first time, either. Just a long labor, and a stack of reactions to the epidural I opted for after 66 hours without any meds (no regrets on the medical choices, either, as they were appropriate and chosen with respect). Most of the others were there because they were scared, either of the unknown (the first time moms), or the known (moms who had absolutely horrible previous labors). I wasn’t scared, just wanted to use the method to improve things. It did improve things, even with pitocin augmentation (the OB didn’t wait 12 hours for pit after my water broke - she wanted it on INSTANTLY, despite my contractions picking up on their own). I had no pain until crowning, and then only a moderate ring of fire. And that’s with a 15.5 inch head coming out of me! > > Personally, the fear release was one of the most important things for me. I used Birthing from Within, too, but without doing that approach as a class (with someone guiding the process), I didn’t get through the fear processing very well ‘just from the book’. Oh, and I asked for an epidural at transition (with my hypnotherapist as my doula, BTW). I didn’t get any backtalk (which I would have expected) except from my husband, who wanted to make sure I was checked for dilation before they did it. Why did I want one if I wasn’t in pain? I was certain that my back wasn’t relaxing enough to progress properly (as if my back had anything to do with it, and as if epidurals are ‘relaxation therapy’ - :smack: ), and with transition comes huge self-doubt. I was certain I needed an epidural to be able to relax enough to dilate. :rolleyes: at myself. Fortunately, the L&D nurse was in agreement, she figured I’d just progressed really fast and far… sure enough, I was 7 cm and was pushing 10 minutes later (I’d progressed from 4.5 cm to 10 cm in 40 minutes!). Oh, and as for the shortened labor thing? My first labor, 80 hours. My second? 4.5 hours. Even counting my first labor as 14 hours (from the time my son rotated into a better position and I began to dilate properly), that’s more than the usual reduction in time span between one and the next. Of the women I know personally who used HB, the labors vary - some cluster way on the shorter end (4-9 hours for first labors) and the rest are in the normal range (12-20 hours). I haven’t collected stats on how many in which category, but a much larger number than usual are in the way-shorter end. And far more than usual were born within 10-15 minutes after arrival at the birth center or hospital (mom was rolling along and only realized at the last minute that she’d better get moving NOW!). ---
**Author:** ![hypnoboth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/bb73d2/32.png) [@hypnoboth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hypnoboth)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2003, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hypnobirthing-devotee-or-skeptic/194977/20 "2003-08-14T19:59:35Z")
Well, as the nick might clue you in, I’m a hypnotherapist, so I’m definitely a devotee (although, being male, can’t say I’ve had a baby…). Yes, it can help. A lot. No, it is no substitute for medical attention. Yes, as someone posted, there are clinical studies backing up efficacy. And thanks to the guy calling me a fraud without backing it up. Happy to answer questions if work allows me to get back here. hypnoboth