How does HypnoBirthing differ from other childbirth classes?
Many other childbirth classes do not totally embrace this fear-tension-pain philosophy, instead believing that birth is inevitably painful. This leads the classes to focus almost exclusively on how the laboring mother can endure or distract herself from the expected pain. This completely ignores how the elimination of fear and tension can prevent or reduce pain in the first place. In fact, the expectation of pain can end up contributing to the fear and tension in the fear-tension-pain cycle, thus increasing pain. Even many other childbirth classes that use hypnosis come from this same philosophy of expecting pain. These other hypnosis classes focus on hypnotic anesthesia as if preparing a patient for surgery. Yes, hypnotic anesthesia is so effective it has been used in many different surgeries as the sole anesthetic, and yes, HypnoBirthing does include training in hypnotic anesthesia so the mom can use it if needed. But the focus of HypnoBirthing is on eliminating the fear and tension
