Kidney stones or childbirth?

There was a big debate in TimeOut magazine last week about kidney stones. The debate, specifically gauges the pain of this complaint – discussing whether or not the pain of kidney stone is comparable that of childbirth. Childbirth is held up as the gold standard of agony. This view is firmly entrenched in our culture despite the many stories that contradict the assertion that labour is necessarily painful. The girls who give birth in the loo and tell no-one, the ‘she popped it like a pea’ and the ‘gave birth in the car’ stories. These stories are of course the anomalous ones; most women find childbirth painful. So, is it possible to learn how to experience easy, comfortable childbirth? The answer is yes; it is fear that causes pain. HypnoBirthing teaches women how to release the fear, and learn how to birth their babies peacefully and comfortably.

How I got into hypnotherapy

When I announce myself as a hypnotherapist, often, the first thing people then ask is: ‘How did you get into that?’ So I tell them my ‘becoming a hypnotherapist’ story and this is it.

I used to be a nurse; I worked as Intensive Care Sister at a large London teaching hospital. At that time I suffered from chronic neck and back problems. One day, I was describing the attendant tingling in my hands to the physiotherapist; she said, ‘You shouldn’t be here.’ She had a point, I took her seriously and decided to take time off so that my back could heal – it wasn’t going to get any better otherwise.

Using my time off work wisely I went to Alexander Technique classes; a system of relaxing and aligning all the muscles of the body. As I did this I had something of an epiphany. I realised that I was meditating doing my Alexander Technique exercises. I had done yoga but hadn’t been able to understand what was meant by meditation – I had decided that meditation was something I couldn’t do.

So then, I embarked on a journey of learning different meditation techniques; eventually alighting on transcendental meditation which I do to this day. In tie my back improved and I returned to Intensive Care. I found though, that despite the fact that my colleagues being vigilant about not letting me lift my back pain returned. I noticed that simply being at work made my back hurt; I realised that something else was going on. This is how I got interested in psycho-somatic disease and the mind-body link. And somehow in my travels I got chatting to a hypnotherapist who explained hypnotherapy to me, I enrolled on the course and now am a fully-fledged hypnotherapist with my own practice and patients.