Why the Perinatal Journey is a Continuum
If you work with pregnant clients, ask yourself what is the aim of working with them?
There might be a variety of replies:
- You might be working with them to help them have a positive birth
- You might be working with them to help them have a more comfortable pregnancy
- You might even be working with them to help them to get pregnant in the first place
- Perhaps you are helping them to recover from the birth either directly after the baby has been born or it might even be a few years down the line.
All extremely valid reasons and all very important services. However, are you able to categorically and confidently state which element is the most important?
There is not One Part of Process that Stands Alone From The Others
If your answer is yes? I would love to hear your reasoning. Not to criticise, you understand, but because I am genuinely interested to hear your argument as to why what you do is the ONE thing that is going to make the difference to your clients’ experience.
If your answer is No – I would agree with you. The reason being that there is not one part of the process that stands alone from the others. It’s a sort of chicken and egg situation. How can you feel good about the birth if they have had an awful time during their pregnancy? How can they feel confident about their parenting abilities if they can’t bond with their baby because they had a traumatic birth? How can they feel positive about the next pregnancy if any part of the previous experience was a veritable car crash?
The Perinatal Journey is a continuum
My point, in case you hadn’t figured it out yet, is that if the work you currently do focuses on one particular part of this, it is actually impacting on EVERY other aspect. The perinatal journey is a continuum and if you are not taking that into consideration when working with your clients – you are missing a trick (and potentially an additional income opportunity!)
Yes, there are certain elements that are specific to each part of this whole but what each of them are dependent on is the MINDSET of the client you are working with. You can use tried and tested methods of your modality but if THEIR mind isn’t in it, or actually, it would be more appropriate to say – if their mind is overtaken with fear, anxiety and doubt – whatever you are doing probably isn’t going to be too effective. This in turn will have a negative impact on their experience going forward.
Their Pregnancy Experience is New (even if it is not their first baby)
Their pregnancy experience is new (even if it’s not their first pregnancy), which means they’ll have worries, questions, doubts – it’s just the way our brains like to work. Which means if you can support them with this, you will not just have a better relationship of support with them, but you can support them SO much more during their birth and postnatal journey – i.e. The Continuum.
If you are working with a client to eg.
- Have a more positive birth,
- or prime their body to be more responsive to the labour hormones to have a more positive birth
- or remove a negative emotion associated with a previous birth/postnatal/feeding experience so they can feel more positive going forward
- or helping them to get their baby to sleep
- or give them confidence to look after their baby
- or, well you get the picture
the question you should be asking yourself is…
…“How can I extend what I already know into helping my client with the rest of the perinatal journey?”
“What mindset tools can I be making use of to ensure my work has maximum positive impact on my clients’ perinatal experience?”
I love supporting my clients with this, so if you want to uplevel your client’s experience as well as your own and explore what’s possible with either of the above please get in touch.
