Partner Encouragement During Labor Pain

Video Transcript

"Affirmations, mantras or words of encouragement can definitely be a pain coping technique. When a woman is in labor, she's going to get to a point where she's feeling very negative and she's feeling like she can't go on anymore. She's going to say things like "I can't do this. I don't want to do this, I'm done, I just want this to be over." When she says things like that, it's the partners job to keep her getting back on track and be positive. So, whenever she says something in the negative like "I can't do this," you always need to change that to a positive, "You can do this. You are doing this." If she is getting really down deep in "I don't want to be doing this, I want this over," remind her that it will be over soon, you're going to get to meet your baby soon. Every single time she says something negative, turn it around to a positive and eventually she's going to stop saying negative things because she's going to realize that nobody is going to respond to that. You also just want to say encouraging supportive words, even if she's not saying anything negative. Just telling her things like "you're doing a really good job," or "I'm really proud of you," or "I can't wait to meet the baby. You're doing so good, you're so strong." You want to tell her encouraging words, throughout her labor. As a woman, when you're in labor, you might find that you need a mantra, which is something that you repeat over and over. Feel free to explore that before you go into labor, maybe there's certain words that mean something to you. Maybe you are scared and if you say to yourself "I am strong. I am strong. I am strong," if you say that over and over to yourself, you're going to start believing it. So, you might have a mantra that just comes into your head, while you're in labor or you might have already picked something out. You don't have to say it out loud, you can say it in your head but you want to say good positive things about yourself. "I'm strong, I can do this, I believe in myself, my body knows how to give birth, this is what I was made to do." Just definitely keep something like that going, it's like a dialog in your head reminding yourself that you can do this. The main thing to remember, about affirmations and mantras and being supportive, is to always be positive. Keeping a positive attitude with all those things, are definitely going to help a woman deal with pain better."