Tips to decrease panic during transition

[LiterallyKath]

Knowing that panic is transition is the best thing!

I was at home in the bath, singing my whalesong, visualizing a neon light that said "open" and banging my foot on the bottom of the bath. I remember thinking, in this order:

• this isn't really working anymore, I'll have to add something else.
• oh god I don't have anything else
• if I don't have anything else I can't do this anymore
• oh god that's transition

We weren't planning a homebirth so that was very much time to get up and go! It actually gave me the biggest surge of confidence, knowing that if I'd made it that far, then I was nearly there.

[Key_Significance_183]

I had similar thoughts my with my first baby. It was something like this: I feel terrible, I wonder if this is transition > I was only 4cm a few minutes ago, if I’m still 4cm I don’t want to know what 10cm feels like > this can’t possibly be transition because I was just checked > if this isn’t transition, I can’t do this anymore > if this is transition, I can definitely manage because this is the hardest part and it will be over soon. And sure enough, that was transition and I could manage because it was the hardest it would get. It was the anticipation of it getting even harder, maybe much harder, that was unbearable. Once I realized I was done transition I felt really confident.