About Me
Thank you for taking the time to get to know a little about me. I am the mother of 3 wonderful adults and I am a proud Hypnobabies grandma. My first birth experience was initially created out of no experience and no knowledge of choices. When I was told my first child was breech and would be a large baby I simply went along with the, “We will have to schedule a Cesarean” scenario and had my first son Matthew, delivered via C-section with an epidural weighing in at 9lb 9oz. When I became pregnant a 2nd time, I had garnered some knowledge of birthing and breast-feeding, but not enough to counter the OB’s command of “Well this baby isn’t breech, but it will be as large, so we will need to schedule another C-section”. Again, I bought the advice handed down by my all-knowing OB. However this time, my baby decided that birthing time would begin 12 hours before her ‘Dr. scheduled’ delivery date and time’ and I began having birthing waves at 9pm. So what’s a semi-ignorant pregnant woman to do? Call the Dr. and head off for the hospital. 3 hours and numerous birthing waves later the Dr. arrives, they wheel me into the operating room and my beautiful, 8lbs 12oz daughter Michelle is delivered via C-section without any discussion or even being given any internal exam to see how far I’d progressed. This time I went away feeling cheated and disregarded. These were not my birth choices, I did not give birth to them, they were ‘delivered by the Doctor’.
Four years later and a world wiser, I became pregnant with my 3rd child. This time I was a La Leche league leader in training and knew about trial labors and midwives, however I still went to a traditional OB. It was a father/son practice and the son continued to assure me of his approval to ‘allow me to have a trial labor’, however in the beginning of my 9th month, when I met the father OB in the practice I was told very firmly that no such thing was happening after 2 C-Sections! I was furious. I promptly went home and contacted all of my La Leche League friends and asked for their advice. They warned me that even if I found someone who would allow a trial labor, they may not take me on this late in my pregnancy. I got some names and numbers and began making calls. I came upon a midwife in Manhattan (I was living in Brooklyn at the time) and she agreed to meet me and discuss the situation. I am happy to report one month later I very successfully gave birth via VBAC to my son, Nicholas all 9lb 12 1/2oz and my total birthing time, including 1 hour of pushing was approximately 7 hours!!!!
We have since moved to California and I became busy acclimating to a state where I knew no one and became separated from my dream of working with mom’s-to-be. I did begin volunteering though, at Hoag Hospital’s Mother/Baby unit in Newport Beach about 4 years ago and have enjoyed that immensely. I also finshed my Bachelor’s degree and became a level two Reiki practitioner. But it wasn’t until my daughter became pregnant that I was introduced to the Hypnobabies program. She sent me the website and instructed me to check it out and that this was what she wanted to do. I read it and it immediately connected with something deep inside that lay dormant and I began to focus on the Instructor training tab to learn more. The rest is known, and here I am now, ready to share this incredible program with anyone who wants to feel empowered with his or her own birth experience.
Look forward to hearing from you to see if this is a good match for your goals of a natural, enjoyable birth experience.
Warmly,
Linda