Tai Chi and Labour

Well, after a bit of a break to adjust to the arrival of Ethan Owyn Robins on January 13th, I'm back with more knowledge and understanding of just how amazing Qigong and Tai Chi are.

Despite everyone's horror stories of how terrible it could be, labour was actually a fantastic, life affirming experience for me.
Positioning:
Knowing that my mum had had issues with the position of my brother and I, and my grandma the same, I did lots of work beforehand to make sure Ethan was in the best possible position: I found that waist turning tended to move him into a more horiaontal position and so adjusted my practice to do less of these exercises.

Early Labour
Labour started at around 7pm with my 'show' and ended at 1.26 in the morning with a beautiful baby boy - around 6 hours. The first stages were all about learning to breathe with each cycle - a great insight into my qigong practice. I found that the exercise of breathing into and out of the Ming Men was really helpful at this stage, it helped to slow my breathing down, to relax the back muscles where they were cramping and deepened by physical breath to help me take in more oxygen. It also gave us enough time to work out how to use the TENS machine.

Second Stage
Once we arrived at the hospital, my breath work helped to create a focused state of intention which blocked out everything apart from the relationship between myself and Ethan and our need to help each other through his journey to the outside world. As a study in the qualities of resting in and supporting it was a truly fantastic experience; I understand much more about the qualities of connection trained in jue shou and tui shou now that before those few hours. Feeling his head transition from the womb into the birth canal and then feeling it descend and ascend, descend and ascend with each wave of contraction and working with my ability to push clearly and release the push completely to enable it to happen as effortlessly as possibly was an enlightening journey for me.

Many of our students have said that they found tai chi helped them in labour, sped things along, reduced the need for pain relief; I agree. I was more relaxed, more focused, stronger, more confident and able to trust my body's instincts because of my practice. Thank you to all my teachers.

Massage in Pregnancy

I had a fantastic Hydrotherm massage today with Rick Stone of Stones Hydrotherm clinic in Lewes. He turned up at home with everything ready and I just had to lie there and be pampered. Now 37 weeks pregnant, with an enormous tummy its great to have someone give me that extra bit of support with my circulation and work on my 'cankles' as muy students are so supportively calling them.

The reason that both Si and I reccommend this kind of massage to our students, is that it's all about resting in and supporting. One of the reasons that Hydrotherm is so good as a pregnancy massage is that you are able to lie on your back not your side or front and on top of large warm water bottles so your muscles are more relaxed when worked on. Because you are being massaged from below you have to completely let go and rest in - I have to say, it is so far the most luxurious Jue Shou practice I have found!

Unlike a lot of massage, Hydrotherm can be done throughout the pregnancy. For more info contact Rick on 07722 005905

Antenatal Qigong

At 7 months pregnant, I am really loving my Qigong practice. The repetitive movements are really soothing and gentle on the body. Great for stress release, deepening breathing, conditioning and strengthening the body, easing my back out - the list goes on. And baby seems to love it too, he is really active afterwards, just as if he's doing his own version.
So which ones would I reccommnd? Well there's about 3,000+ Qigong and some are contraindicated, some are for martial purposes and some are for people with experience, so, obviously I'd reccommend finding a good teacher if you've never done it before.

Basic Conditioning Qigong
1. Waist Turning:
Seated in a chair to keep the pelvis stable, gently turn through the waist to the right and then relax to come back to facing front. Repeat on the left. Make sure that you keep the head facing with the chest and that you turn gently through the spine. It's great for freeing up the ribs and easing out any tension which can be increasing shortness of breath.

2. Four Directions Breathing:
This short set of 4 flowing movements can be repeated over and over again to loosen tense shoulders and centre mind and body. The key element to work on is keeping the shoulder blades down as if they are dropping down the back. To see my partner, Simon, performing them, follow this link: http://www.youtube.com/user/taichiwisdom