Breathing techniques for labour

Want to learn some breathing techniques for labour? Breathing can be used as a coping technique in labour. Especially if you learn how to do it effectively. Here at The Bump to Baby Chapter we encourage breathing techniques to cope with contractions as well as to keep you calm in other birth situations.

Why do breathing techniques for labour work?

Breathing techniques are beneficial for two reasons. They help you feel calmer in your head, so you’re less likely to feel stressed. They also make your body react in a calm way too. Both these reasons mean that you feel less pain, it helps your labour progress more smoothly and helps  you feel better in the situation you’re in. The last one meaning that you’re more likely going to remember birth in a positive way.

The first thing to do when it comes to breathing for labour is to go slow. Slow everything right down.

As a rule of thumb, you want to be breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth.  When breathing in, really focus on not just using your nose but also your tummy and diaphram. Your tummy and diaphragm should expand with an in breath. Your out breath should be longer than your in breath. When your out-breath is longer than your in breath, it triggers your parasympathetic nerve to be activated. Your parasympathetic nerve is the nerve responsible for slowing everything else down within your body. When the parasympathetic nerve is triggered your heart rate slows, your muscles relax and good hormones flood your body.

In comparison…

If you are doing quicker, shorter breaths then your sympathetic nerve is triggered. This triggers a stress response in your body and it contributes to a more panicked or fearful feeling in birth. It can also contribute to labour slowing down and feeling more pain.

Breathing techniques to reduce pain in labour

How can just breathing reduce pain in labour? Remember that parasympathetic nerve that increases your oxytocin? Well, when you have high levels of oxytocin in your body then your endorphins increase alongside it. Endorphins are your body’s natural morphine and reduce your feelings of pain.

Remember also how your parasympathetic nerve relaxes your muscles. Well, tense muscles, such as a tense uterus, is going to feel more painful than a relaxed one. So breathing will reduce the tension held here, reducing the pain.

Breathing techniques to help labour go smoother

Oxytocin is the hormone required for contractions. So a more relaxed breath will stack the odds in your favour for more regular contractions and therefore a smoother labour.

Your breathing is also something that can always be in your control. Whether you are on the ward having an induction, in the car on the way to the hospital, having your epidural sited, or if you are going in for a cesarean section and feeling nervous. Breathwork is something that can help you to remain in control.

What breathing techniques should I use for labour?

For labour and for situations in birth where you want to keep calm, it doesn’t matter what technique you practice, just slow your breath down. Whether you call it up breathing or a de stressor breath, it doesn’t really matter as the goal is always the same. To slooow your breath down to activate that parasympathetic nerve.

Here are a couple of breathing techniques that you can use to help slow that out breath…

Counting Breathing

This one is self explanatory. It’s counting. To ensure that your out breath is longer. I would encourage you to breathe in for 4 seconds and then out for 7 seconds. Counting here in your head “in, 2, 3 , 4” and “out, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7”. This will encourage you to keep a rhythm and the counting also acts as a distraction. To note here; the ratio doesn’t have to be 4 and 7, you can adapt it to however suits you, as long as the out is longer than the in. I would always start here when your practice, as the counting is a constant reminder that the out breath needs to be longer. You can then add in or swap for the below 2 techniques.

Rectangle Breathing

The other technique to use if you don’t want to count is to use a rectangle. Every room you go into during your labour will have a rectangle of some sort in it, a door, your bed, a window etc. Or you can just imagine one in your mind. Look at the rectangle or visualise one, and follow its lines. As you follow the short line, breathe in, and as you follow the long line breathe out. Go round the rectangle breathing in for the short, and out for the long.

Visualisation Breathing

Finally, is the visualisations. As you breathe in and out you can use visualisations as a distraction. You could visualise a hot air baloon going up, visualise bubbles floating up in the sky, or visualise a flame flickering. You may like to imagine a calming colour here that you breath in; it travels around and down all the way to baby and then back out again with your out breath. Our online antenatal and hypnobirthing course, The Birth Chapter, includes breathing audios to help you with these.

Want to learn some breathing techniques as part of a hypnobirthing course but not sure what to choose? Here are 5 ways to decide what hypnobirthing you should do.