#5: Hypnobirthing, Overcoming Fear & The Power of the Mind

Kelly shares the hilarious and embarrassing story of what happened in sex education class that led her sign a sworn affidavit that she would never, EVER have a baby.
Two decades later, she faced her deepest, darkest fear head on - childbirth.
In 2002 Kelly signed up to be a guinea pig for a then little known technique called Hypnobirthing. Follow her journey into the wonderful world of 'woo woo' as you ask yourself, 'What are you most afraid of? What lives on the other side of that fear?'

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Read the Transcript for this Episode below:

Episode five of the Project Me Podcast.

Hi, I'm Kelly Pietrangeli founder of myprojectme.com. And I'm on a mission to inspire women to step out of autopilot and into higher levels of conscious living. In each episode, I share a story from my own life path and how a seemingly woo woo modality has made a major impact on me. And we always end with a turnaround, an opportunity for you to reflect on your own life experiences and the insights they contain.

In the show notes, you'll find a PDF of journal prompts. If you want to explore the concepts deeper.  This episode is sponsored by project. We my online membership club for women who are ready to step out of autopilot living for a super low monthly fee. You get my online program access to the members hub, online workshops, exclusive action sheets, and the amazing power posse community where we share our journeys together and lift each other higher.

If you could use a boost of motivation and guidance in how to create your own project, me come and join project. We over at my project, me. com forward slash project. We, I will love to meet you there.

Hi, and welcome back to the show. If you're brand new to the podcast, you might want to begin with the short pilot episode and then listen in chronological order, as each one does build on the next as the story unfolds. Or if you've landed directly on this episode, maybe it's the one you're meant to hear first.

See what your heart is telling you in this moment.  Last night was our Project We Book Club Zoom Meetup, and we were talking about Glennon Doyle's new book, Untamed, Stop Pleasing, Start Living. Oh my goodness. That book made such a deep impact on so many women and we all took turns sharing our biggest ahas that we took away from the book.

I'd invited Glennon to bomb our meetup and I sent her the Zoom link and I knew she'd come if she could, but no promises. We were all kind of on Tinder hooks for the entire hour. When one member arrived late and her face popped up, people were like, Oh my God, is that Glennon?  But she didn't come.  I will need to do a separate podcast episode about this book, Untamed.

I want to thank everyone who's been subscribing to the Project Me podcast and leaving five star ratings and reviews. Very honestly, it's what made me leap up today and record a new episode. Evolving Jen in the USA wrote, Kelly is an uplifting storyteller. I've been following Project Me for a couple of years now, and the podcast has provided an intimate opportunity to get to know her on a deeper level.

I use her Project Me worksheets often, and in her usual Kelly style, she has created worksheets that allow listeners to dive in on their own life's journey. Entertaining and relatable. I can't wait for the next episode.  Thank you, Evolving Jen. I love that name. And here is the next episode.  I am sharing about how I overcame the biggest fear of my life using a modality that was considered highly woo woo back in 2002 when I did it but has now happily become mainstream accepted.

Here we go. Episode 5.

It was sex education day at school.  All of the boys were being herded off in one direction to talk about boy sex stuff.  We girls were being ushered the other way to talk about girl sex stuff. I was so excited.  As the teacher started talking, they wheeled in a big TV. This was the same TV they wheeled in when we got to watch Lady Diana marry Prince Charles.

They were putting in a video. Were we gonna actually get to see people having sex?  The lights went low,  the video came on, and there was a naked woman lying down! And her legs were open!  There was a lot of blood, and then a head started coming out. Oh my god, she was giving birth! It was absolutely disgusting.

And I started feeling like I'd faint, and then a wave of nausea swept over me, and I got up out of my seat and I ran out of the classroom in just enough time to vomit in the drinking fountain.  It took a long time for me to live that one down.  I pushed the entire incident out of my mind completely, but one thing was for sure.

I was never, ever going to have a baby.  I didn't have sex until I was nearly 19, and even then, I went on the pill for two weeks ahead of time and had it all planned out so that there was no way I'd get pregnant.  My university roommate Amy and I both made a pact that we would never, ever have children.

And whilst I didn't directly correlate that classroom horror to my anti baby stance, I Amy and I signed and witnessed each other's statements on a written declaration that we would never ever have babies.  Fast forward to 1999. I was 33 years old and pregnant.  My husband and I went along to the very first obligatory birthing class by the NCT in London and the teacher showed up and she dimmed the lights and started playing a video of a woman giving birth.

Oh my God.  I was immediately swept up in this wave of nausea and I felt faintheaded. My knees were actually trembling and it was everything I could do not to puke or pass out. We never went back.  It's like when you put your fingers in your ears and you pretend you can't hear, la la la la la. I went along for the rest of my pregnancy by just avoiding thinking or talking about the actual birth.

And surprise, surprise, when my contraction started, so did my panic. I was gripped by fear.  After my waters broke, I got into the back seat of the car as my husband drove to the old Queen Charlotte's Hospital in Hammersmith, London, one of the oldest maternity hospitals in Europe. Founded in something like 1700s, the building was falling apart, and whilst a brand spanking new hospital was being built nearby.

Mine was one of the last births to take place in this hellhole before they demolished it and turned it into a block of flats. I'm sorry, but I do not have happy memories of that place.  I won't go into the long, drawn out story of that 20 hour birth, except to say that I was seriously traumatized by it for a long time to come.

I pleaded with them not to put my feet in stirrups, as I'd always had a fear of stirrups and having my legs forced apart.  They strapped me in, screaming and crying so they could do a von Toos extraction. I felt as if I'd been raped.  Thankfully, my son was born healthy, but I was a psychological and physical mess.

My birth had felt like a freak circus show with a dozen people in the room, total chaos. Yet, as soon as he came out, my husband was the only one left in the room to hold up a broken light between my legs so the doctor could stitch me up.  Looking down, sobbing, and seeing his face down there holding the light on my mutilated nether region, I was convinced he'd never find me sexually attractive ever again.

I was meant to recover in hospital for a few days, but the care there was non existent, as was security. I begged each day for a hospital bracelet for my son, which never came.  One day, I woke up and found a strange little Irish man with a flat cap touching my baby, saying, Oh, he's a wee one, isn't he? I called my husband to come and get us out of there.

And we literally walked out of that hospital without checking out, as there was nobody there to tell. They never even called me at home. I was out of sight, out of mind.  I cried as I told my husband that I was sorry, but I'd never ever be able to give our son a baby brother or sister. There was no way I could ever go through that again.

Fast forward three years later, and I was pregnant again.  I happened to be designing the logo and branding for a new alternative health clinic in Putney when I mentioned to the osteopath there that I was pregnant and considering an elective cesarean so I wouldn't have to go through childbirth again.

He started telling me that while cesareans are often necessary for the health of the baby or the mother, it's preferable cesarean. for the baby to pass through the birth canal so it ingests bacteria that contributes to its gut health and boosts its immune system and I was like fingers in my ear again going la la la la la I can't hear you as even the talk of a baby coming through my birth canal sent waves of panic through my body.

I had this whole internal story around how does a baby that big fit through a hole that small.  Later that day, I was thumbing through a local free parenting magazine and an ad jumped out at me. It simply said, want to have a better birth?  I called the number to hear what they had to say.  I could hire a private midwife who would come to me for all the antenatal appointments and be with me straight through the birth and afterwards.

It wasn't cheap, but I told my husband. I'd rather spend money on this than pretty much anything else I can possibly think of.  My midwife Anne helped me to reframe childbirth from something scary to something natural and beautiful.  She loaned me books by Sheila Kitzinger, a British social anthropologist of birth and author of 24 books published internationally, most about the emotional journey through this major life experience.

Her book Rediscovering birth was a revelation.  I discovered how women have been giving birth naturally without hospital intervention from ancient times to African countries today, and how it is the most natural thing in the world.  I recall being especially moved by stories of Women surrounding other women during childbirth as she leaned between two trees and they  ceremoniously welcomed in this new life.

Giving birth flat on your back with feet up in stirrups is the way male doctors began to dictate that it should be done so they could get a better look, bring in the forceps and ventus, and get back to their golf games. Maybe the book didn't say that, but it's what became apparent to me.  My midwife Anne was there for me every step of the way.

Empowering me, and helping me to reframe childbirth through a healthier new lens. She was even there when I found out that the baby girl I'd been told I was having at my first scan, was in fact, a boy.  I felt so guilty for how barrette I was feeling, and she said, You are mourning for the daughter you thought you were having.

It's all okay. And her saying that, allowed me to feel those emotions fully, and then, I was okay. And genuinely excited to be having another boy.  I felt so connected to him as my pregnancy continued.  Anne told me that she'd been hearing about something new on the scene called hypnobirthing.  And while she'd never assisted at a hypnobirth,  she'd heard some good things.

She got me the name and number of Annie McHugh, a French hypnobirthing practitioner. As always with these woo woo things, my hubby was skeptical. He was like, is this going to be, look into my eyes, look into my eyes. And I had to assure him it wasn't about putting me into a trance, but it was helping me to release my fears, relax me, and allow my subconscious mind to take over and visualize the birth I wanted to have.

As bonkers as it sounded to him. He knew we needed all the help we could get after the last time, and he reluctantly agreed to attend hypnobirthing classes with me.  Right at the start of the first class, Annie McHugh went and put in a damn video and I was like, no, not again. I do not wanna see another woman giving birth, please.

No.  When the video started, it was even weirder.  It showed people barefoot. Firewalking across hot coals. My husband and I were looking at each other like, Huh? Um, excuse me, we're here for the hypnobirthing stuff?  Annie explained that the reason these people were able to firewalk without feeling any pain whatsoever is because they have convinced their minds that they would feel no pain.

What's more, they would not even get blisters on their feet because that part of their brain is simply switched off.  She said, fire walking is not only a mind over matter exercise, it's also a symbolic experience that gives people the courage to take on any challenge. After all, if they can make it through the fire, they can make it through anything.

She said, it's the same with childbirth. If you go into it with the mindset that you will not feel pain, you won't have to feel pain. This sounded very good to me.  She then did go on to play a video of a woman giving birth, but maybe because of my new Sheila Kitchinger books, and my lovely midwife, and the fact that the woman in this video was using hypnobirthing, and she was so calm, and the birth was so gentle, I saw how easy it could potentially be.

I learned how to visualize my special place. Mine was a clearing in a lush green forest with a deer. And my husband learned how to stroke my inner arm using the glove of anesthesia. Or as he called it, the glove of anesthesia. Who was a popular pop singer that year. It always made me laugh.  I was also invited to recall the last time I laughed my head off and to bring that visualization in.

I immediately thought of an inside joke my friend Alf and I have. So, We had this whole arsenal of tricks to refer to, plus she gave me a load of cassette tapes, this was 2002 people, and I listened to those every night before bed for the month ahead of the due date. They were filled with Annie's beautiful words of affirmation, like, I am opening like a flower.

My body was made to do this.  Contractions are referred to as surges in hypnobirthing, and we welcome each surge rather than resist them. So when my surges gently began in the late afternoon of August 30th, I was super excited to be about to meet my son. It was a totally different mindset than I'd been in from my first birth.

By close to midnight, my surges were coming closer together, and my husband called the midwife, who arrived to find me calmly breathing in bed, candle lit, with beautiful music from the I Ching symphony playing. She had just assisted at a long birth, she'd had no sleep the night before, and by the look of me, that baby was a long way off.

She sighed and made herself comfortable in a chair in the corner to doze for a while.  The plan was to have the baby in a birthing center unit attached to St. George's Hospital in Tooting. But sometime after 12, I sat bolt upright and proclaimed, He's coming!  I ripped off my knickers, and my panicked husband was like, No, no, no, no, no.

This is not happening here. He'd always been against a home birth, and the birth center was our agreed compromise. But I said, I am not moving anywhere. He's coming.  And while Annie went to her car to fetch disposable coverings and mats, I instinctively got onto all fours. I remember feeling like an empowered wild animal.

I was sweating like mad and my husband kicked into gear with the hypnobreathing techniques and he was a superstar in using the glove of Anastasia and reminding me of Elf's funny story and during transition when I did have that moment of like, I'm going to lose it completely. He helped me to go to my special place.

Remember the deer, honey, the deer is there, right? And I was like, yes, yes, the deer, I see the deer. And when our baby was heading out, I was shouting, yes, Marco, yes, Marco, come on,  I love you.  I was cheering him out. And I know that if I'd been in the hospital setting, I probably wouldn't have just let myself go so freely.

But you know, I was in my own bedroom and I just did what instinctively came to me.  Annie had said. Fear equals pain. When you let go of fear, you let go of pain and she was right. I can hand on my heart tell you that I felt no pain. I felt a lot of pressure, and I felt damn hot like an inferno, but I felt no fear and I felt no pain.

I was so in the zone that I never even thought about the fact that my waters never broke. Marco was born in the amniotic sac.  An uncalled birth is a rare thing of beauty, and apparently it happens in less than 1 in 80, 000 births.  And grabbed your camera and captured it. Marco was born completely gift wrapped.

I later learned that babies born in call are seen as a sign of good luck.  That hypno birth baby was my greatest achievement in life.  After my husband cut the cord. Annie ran a bath for me, and I lay there, legs shaking like I'd just run a marathon. She told me, You have just finished your own marathon.

Congratulations.  When I got out of the bath, I crawled into bed beside my sleeping husband and our newborn baby.  Anne had cleared up, and she just gently let herself out.  The next morning, I opened my eyes, and Three year old Max came in and discovered his new baby brother in bed with us, and he climbed in with us too.

I felt so incredibly overwhelmed with pride. I had overcome the deepest fear in my life.  That experience helped me to realize the immense power of our minds.  When fears creep in now, I think back to Marco's birth and I draw on a strength and power of focus that can see me through anything.  Our minds are incredible.

I now know that every experience we have has a neurological network in our brain.  That experience of throwing up in the drinking fountain at school and the shame and embarrassment ran deep into my subconscious mind. And here's where I'm going to go all woo woo on you.  I later had a flashback during a transformational breathwork session.

In a previous life, I lost a baby during a horrific childbirth.  This helps me to understand why I was the only girl in that sex education class that had such an extreme physical reaction to the birth video.  Memories stay stored in our cells and can be carried over into future generations too.  We owe it to our children and grandchildren and great grandchildren to transmute these stored energies and free us all from the past.

There are so many incredible modalities out there to help us rewire the brain and release traumas from our bodies. I'll be sharing more of these in upcoming episodes, as well as my past life experience. And remind me to tell you about the time I actually did walk on fire at a Tony Robbins event.  I learned so much from Hypnobirthing about the power of positive affirmations to help us rewrite old stories and the incredible power of visualization.

Direct your thoughts towards a desired outcome. Focus on success and you attract success. Let go of fear. Get help letting go of fear because it's hard to do that kind of stuff on your own. And get support focusing on success because that isn't always easy either.  Those women giving birth in the forest have their tribe of other women who are there to support them.

We need our tribe.  We don't always have to try to do hard things on our own.  It is considered an omen that a child born in the amniotic sac is destined for greatness. Happy 18th birthday coming up in a few short weeks to my amazing Marco. Destined for greatness.  And here's to his pretty amazing mother too, if I do say so myself.

Oh, and in case you're wondering about my old university roommate, Amy, who swore in a signed affidavit that she would also never have kids, she's got four now.  Never say never.

Dear listener,  relax your forehead.  Take in a long, deep breath,  and let it out with a sigh.  I'm going to ask you some questions, and you don't need to write them down, because I've put them, and more, into a PDF journal prompts for you.  Think of a time in your life when you faced a fear, and come out the other side stronger.

Think about a current fear, big or small. What are you afraid of right now?

What are the potential positives after releasing this fear? What could change in your life?

Imagine how you would feel to be free from this fear. What would that feel like?

What ideas do you have for overcoming this fear?

Who's in your tribe?  Who's there to support you and encourage you through the hard stuff?

In future episodes, I'll be sharing more modalities, books, and practices I've used to overcome other hurdles in my life. You don't have to accept these things as your normal. You can absolutely do anything you put your head and heart into. for I'm here to encourage you to do that.  If you'd like to work on your project, me alongside me and over 120 women from all over the world, come and join my online membership club, project.

We, we do our life wheel check ins every month and support and encourage each other with our goals and dreams. I'd love to meet you there. Go to my project, me. com forward slash project. We,  thanks for listening to the project. Me podcast. If you liked this episode, please subscribe. Please subscribe and leave a rating, a review, and share it with your friends.

I appreciate that so much. I'm going away with my husband for a little getaway next week, and I'm not yet in any kind of rhythm with pre recording or batching episodes, so I'm sorry if there's a longer gap in between sometimes. Keepin it real, guys.  Grab journal prompts from all the five episodes I've done so far, and you can have fun exploring your own stories on paper.

I've got this idea for an upcoming project we meet up, We're going to be sharing these with each other. So come and join. I really want to hear your stories too.  Until next time, open your mind, open your heart and stay curious. We all need some space in our lives for the magical and unknown.